1986 GMC S-15

[Andrew_S]

^ that's funny.

I've been meaning to ask, how do you guys deal with the bugs? You seem to always camp next to rivers or lakes, so I have to imagine the mozzies are out in force.

Typically bugs in southern BC aren't terrible. We get fairly dry hot summers which usually burns them off quickly.
If they are bad we either hit the water or hide in the camper.

We did a quick canoe trip up Clearwater lake last weekend.

A good buddy of ours and his girlfriend joined us for the trip.

The weather was less then favourable the first day.

Pretty much sums up the entire day.

Stunning scenery and 3 of us were enjoying it regardless

Home for the next couple of days

The weather broke and we made the best of it. Pretty fantastic fishing.

It rained all night, incredibly hard. My buddies new girlfriend was not enjoying herself, especially after sleeping on water all night....

The next am, weather broke for a bit.

It was short lived haha

and then we actually got a decent break from the rain for a bit

Stop for lunch

The forecast was looking bleak and buddies girlfriend had enough. So we headed for warmth (campers).

Final day at Bailey's chutes.

Last stop at the iconic Helmcken falls.

Beauty trip, possibly the last one until hunting season.

 

[Todd n Natalie]

Last stop at the iconic Helmcken falls.

Beauty trip, possibly the last one until hunting season.

Ah yes. That's a beautiful area. It's been years and years since we were there. We lucked out with a sweet camping spot right alongside the river.


Also saw this nearby as well:


I know. Crappy pics. I'm guessing they were taken with a Blackberry back then or one of the 1st ever crappy digital cameras?

 

[Andrew_S]

Awesome^ that's funny about the blackberry. The provincial campsite is actually really not bad along the river. It's not our "dream" camping spot but it's a decent launching point for all of the sights nearyby.

It's been a pretty productive two weeks.

Picked up a beefy IRO double shear track bar second hand new in box. That finishes the front end link assembly.

Cut off all the old junk acme tube inserts and fitted up the fine thread inserts

The remaining parts outstanding is starting to dwindle.

This thing left me stranded twice in a month...
New starter and the throttle cable snapped.

New parts for the 4runner.

This was much needed. The original stock coils were sacked out. Layer in 2 blown out shocks, it was a pretty horrific ride.

Lifted the back end 1.5". Holy smokes do those 5100s ride nice. I'll likely do the front end in the near future.
This thing got some steering rack bushings as well at the same time.

Now onto something I had been putting off for quite a while.

I don't know why but for over a year I couldn't find the motivation to finish this truss.
On a roll now. Finished out the C's first thing. Preheated to 400f and spread the heat around, let them cool slowly.

Welded up the axle tubes and then checked for straightness. Followed up by 2" stitch welds on the truss. Flip & repeat until everything was completed.

Track bar mount. This is such a nice truss kit for assembling.

[/url]

Done deal.

Now it needs an arb installed & some paint.

 

[mountainsports2002]

Awesome^ that's funny about the blackberry. The provincial campsite is actually really not bad along the river. It's not our "dream" camping spot but it's a decent launching point for all of the sights nearyby.

It's been a pretty productive two weeks.

Picked up a beefy IRO double shear track bar second hand new in box. That finishes the front end link assembly.

Cut off all the old junk acme tube inserts and fitted up the fine thread inserts

The remaining parts outstanding is starting to dwindle.

This thing left me stranded twice in a month...
New starter and the throttle cable snapped.

New parts for the 4runner.

This was much needed. The original stock coils were sacked out. Layer in 2 blown out shocks, it was a pretty horrific ride.

Lifted the back end 1.5". Holy smokes do those 5100s ride nice. I'll likely do the front end in the near future.
This thing got some steering rack bushings as well at the same time.

Now onto something I had been putting off for quite a while.

I don't know why but for over a year I couldn't find the motivation to finish this truss.
On a roll now. Finished out the C's first thing. Preheated to 400f and spread the heat around, let them cool slowly.

Welded up the axle tubes and then checked for straightness. Followed up by 2" stitch welds on the truss. Flip & repeat until everything was completed.

Track bar mount. This is such a nice truss kit for assembling.

[/url]

Done deal.

Now it needs an arb installed & some paint.

Great work, excellent thread

 

[Todd n Natalie]

Looks like I'll be in Kelowna with a day to kill in early Oct.
Any fun drives / light trails that you can recommend that can be done in an afternoon?
Driving a stock F150.

 

[Andrew_S]

^The 201 is a nice drive for a stock vehicle. It'll take you from Penticton to Joe rich along the east side of the lake. Couple of nice hikes up in that area as well. Another good one is Christie falls up bear main, nice drive and a short hike into the waterfall.

Let me know when you'll be in town. I've got nearly 80% of Oct scheduled for hunting and may be out of service, but if I'm around it would be great meet up.

Some updates,

Fuel tank is mounted up,

I'll weld the cross members as I get closer to finalizing the suspension.

Back to the dana 30. Oil drain slots slotted

This was a challenge for 2 reasons. The first being I didn't have any of the original shims and the second being this is my first diff set up ever.

Picked up some new tools for this job.
Nice little bearing press.

Clamshell puller

Everything all laid out

I thought about how to go about this too much. Finally I just started and it wasn't as bad as I was expecting.

Started with setting up my pinion pre-load

Just took a wild guess at shims, set the backlash and checked the initial pattern

Surprisingly not bad for a shot in the dark. Pinion is too deep, but a great start.

2nd attempt,

Quick distraction, road trip and a few birds.

Cow with 2 calves

Great first day out, 5 spruce grouse, a ton of moose sightings a few deer.

 

[Andrew_S]

Picked up the heads from the machine shop. First place completely messed up cutting the seats and grinding the valves. The leak down was brutal, so glad I tested it. They are mint now.

Feels good to make some forward progress on this.

Need to get the pushrods measured and order some, that's the last piece.

Sealed it up a bit for now.

A buddy pulled his car out of storage for the first time 7 years. What a rocket.

He's been giving everyone rides all week. Targa top, 6 speed, 2jz, twins and black leather interior. Such an awesome car.

Got the '84 all cleaned up for a car show/bbq at work.

Back to the dana 30. New axle seals.

Got it all set up with a decent pattern on the coast side (high pinion).
Struggling a bit with what I think is an inferior gear set.

I've got to call Nitro gears tomorrow and chat with them. My backlash/pattern will be perfect but when I spin the carrier it will change .007" at 180*. I've verified the ring gear is sitting flat & the carrier is spinning true. I think* the gear set wasn't chucked properly when the cut/ground the teeth. Hoping Nitro will be able to confirm. I don't think it's absolutely critical but it's super annoying. My backlash goes from the low to the high end of the spec and the pattern changes as well...

I've got it all buttoned up the best I can with what I have.

Upper arm mount and WJ brake spacer kit

Just about ready for paint

Setting up to do the 8.8 next.

 

[Andrew_S]

First I needed to correct a mistake...
I had to chop this mount off, clean it up and reweld it. I messed up the angle by almost 8*. Got a head of myself and fully welded it out before double checking it. What a pain. Lesson learned, tack, check, check again and then burn it in. It turned alright considering the circumstance.

Rear drums on the '86's stock 10 bolt are starting to make some noise. Picked up this newish set up from the junkyard for a whopping $3 on Sunday.

Also grabbed some WJ steering components to make this thing turn. Nice new moog joints, should be a good place to start atleast. Might upgrade to bigger stuff down the road.

Next up on the chopping block

First attempt, pinion was too deep.

The 8.8 went a lot smoother. I took another 8.8 apart at the junkyard and made a full set of set-up bearings out of the old ones. That and actually having a benchmark for shims made on hell of a difference.
Drilling and tapping for the airline in this pic.

4 attempts and I landed here. 11 thou back lash, 19 in/lbs of pinion preload. Not a perfect pattern but I believe it falls on the acceptable criteria.

New axle bearings & seals installed

Copper line bent up to float & clear everything

The crossshaft and pin bolt is a much nicer design over stock w/ the arb units.

Just about wrapped up

One last look,

Ready for some brake lines

 

[Todd n Natalie]

^The 201 is a nice drive for a stock vehicle. It'll take you from Penticton to Joe rich along the east side of the lake. Couple of nice hikes up in that area as well. Another good one is Christie falls up bear main, nice drive and a short hike into the waterfall.

Let me know when you'll be in town. I've got nearly 80% of Oct scheduled for hunting and may be out of service, but if I'm around it would be great meet up.

Awesome! Thanks for the tip. I'll check it out.
I'm driving in from Edmonton on the 5th (of Oct) and I'll have the morning / afternoon of the 6th to do a bit of exploring with our little pooch before I have to be back in town to pick up the misses. Then off to Vernon on the evening of the 6th to visit my folks.

 

[Andrew_S]

Shoot I'll be in the bush for those days returning late on the 6th. Safe travels.


Knocked off a few more quick things tonight.
8.8 now has lines.

The rear has always sat level or sagged just a bit when were fully loaded for a trip.
I've had some 2" lift shackles on the bench for a minute and decided to knock that off tonight.

This should have been a 20 min job. However the spare tire wouldn't release... The cotter pin for the winch snapped off and it took almost 2 hours to sort that out.

Netted exactly 2" in the rear. Bit of a rake now and will settle a bit loaded.

I talked to gear manufacturer about the issues I was having setting up the dana 30 today. They gave me a few pointers to check/measure. I confirmed tonight the ring gear teeth are cut .008" off from the mounting surface. I'll call them back tomorrow to see if they are willing to help out.

 

[Todd n Natalie]

Camping or hunting? Or both? lol
If hunting, good luck!
I'll def check out that 201. Appreciate the tip.
Possibly might be taking the wifes Bronco Sport OuterBanks since it's cheaper on fuel.
Hopefully it would be up to the task of a forest road, haha

 

[pigsammy]

Looking forward to your October updates. I just returned from two weeks in Colorado with my wife. The trout were biting well, and I bagged my first grouse! We enjoyed those meals immensely.

I did not get an archery tag for elk, but they were bugling and running cows, it made for some great serenades in the evenings.

Good luck on your fall hunts.

 

[Andrew_S]

Camping or hunting? Or both? lol
If hunting, good luck!
I'll def check out that 201. Appreciate the tip.
Possibly might be taking the wifes Bronco Sport OuterBanks since it's cheaper on fuel.
Hopefully it would be up to the task of a forest road, haha

Both, I never really thought about it before but they kind of go hand in hand.
Nice, hope it was a good ride out.

Looking forward to your October updates. I just returned from two weeks in Colorado with my wife. The trout were biting well, and I bagged my first grouse! We enjoyed those meals immensely.

I did not get an archery tag for elk, but they were bugling and running cows, it made for some great serenades in the evenings.

Good luck on your fall hunts.

That sounds like a great trip. Nothing like fresh fish & game meals while camping. I can only imagine how awesome that was listening to the elk in the evening. They are such unique animals.
Thanks, I'm going to need any luck I can get.


Bit of catching up to do here,

Got the front end painted, before/after

This Por 15 is great stuff,

Flipped it for a second coat

Painted a few other misc items at the same time,

Scrounged up an astro van steering box for the front axle conversion. Pitman arm points the opposite direction and it's a reverse rotation to accommodate. Without this the front steering would potentially bind.

Back on the bush roads and back on the birds

Check out this bunch of Shaggies

Sunset the first evening

Ran into this big dude on our way up to camp the first night. His front end looked like he had been juicing for quite some time hahaha

This is going to get repetitive as we spent 3/4 nights at the same spot,
Sunrise while sitting the next am,

Beautiful area, out for a quick walk

Great way to take in a morning coffee

Out for a mid aft hike. Tough stuff to walk through.

When you realize how far away the beer is,

It tastes that much better at the top

Starlink beamed by us 2 nights in a row. Pretty crazy to see this for the first time in a totally dark clear sky.

Next am view from bed, bit late getting going

 

[Andrew_S]

Same place, bunch of does this am but no bucks to be seen

Mid aft grocery shopping,

With an ostrich egg Shaggy

The truck has a much better stance with the rear up a bit. Several times during this trip we were driving through drainage ditches/washouts anticipating the typical trailer hitch drag but we cleared almost all of them now.

Had our limit for the day so these spruce grouse were allowed to cluck on

Spotted this immature bull mid day in a swamp. Would love to find him again in 3 weeks when it opens...

Exploring a new area,

Evening sit not far from camp for the night,

Plucking birds and making breakfast,

Last morning at the location of choice

Home for 3 days,

One last sighting on the way down,

& one last bird

More to come on this, teaser for now,

How I can tell you it's hunting season without telling you it's hunting season...

Repeat that again,

When I got home I:
-blew out the rad with compressed air
- passenger inner tie rod & alignment
- New power steering pump belt
- Oil change/oil filter/air filter
- wiped down the interior
- fixed the tail gate
- greased the front end and driveshaft's u-joints
- new leaf spring isolators

Hopefully it's good for another outing now?

 

[Andrew_S]

Oh* before I forget. I would love some opinions on tires for the new set up.

I'm wavering between these 3 options"

33x10.5/15 BFG KO2's
255/85/16 BFG KM3's
7.5R16 BFG KM3's

I would love to stick with the KO2 but unfortunately it doesn't come in the second two sizes.
Ideally I'm in the 32-33" range I would like to stay relatively skinny.
I'm leaning towards the 7.5r16's. They are light-ish, skinny and would fit perfect.
I think the 33" offerings may involve some fender trimming. Also consider I still want/need to be able to run tire chains on all 4 corners occasionally. That turns a 33 into a 35".

7.5/r16 vs 255/85/16 the price difference is staggering. A set of 5 -7.5's rings in at over $800 cheaper...

Couple pics for ref

7.5 vs 10.5