97 chevy rcsb sleeper

twomanymontes · Jan 15, 2016

Oh Man! You need to post a build thread on this!!

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That looks so cool!!!

bluedevil · Jan 16, 2016

Haha, ya maybe. That's sort of a fly by the seat of the pants build. I bought a bunch of 100 wall 1" tube to build a mini buggy, and while searching for ideas, stumbled across wheel barrow rods. So I chopped up our good wheel barrow, found a radio flyer wagon for a box, and the rest just went off the deep end from there. Its powered by and 18hp briggs twin, kawasaki sport quad spindles / brakes, leaf over tube drop axle, radius rods, like a t-bucket, and stepped frame for the rear 1" axle. Will have to find or build a right angle gear box to get the chain out to the sprocket in the back. Might even find a 3 or 4 speed trans from a rear engine rider mower, so the boy can grab gears, then use a comet clutch, or centrifugal. Wheel base is approx 6 feet, and I can force my body to cram in there...gotta make sure its safe and stuff..cough :driver:

lol

Here's a couple more

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twomanymontes · Jan 16, 2016

That's awesome!!! My kid and I are working on his Go kart project. it won't be anything as cool at that!

bluedevil · Jan 17, 2016

twomanymontes said:
That's awesome!!! My kid and I are working on his Go kart project. it won't be anything as cool at that!

Thanks! Its been a long time coming. I keep promising him a go kart, so it was time to do something bad ass.

twomanymontes · Jan 19, 2016

I just showed that to my son, He wants to build one as a tow vehicle for the Go kart. Guess I had better start looking at Garage sales this Spring.

SixSpeedSS · Feb 5, 2016

That is pretty cool.

bluedevil · Feb 11, 2016

SixSpeedSS said:
That is pretty cool.

Thanks, we are having a lot of fun with it so far.

5.3_silverado · Aug 11, 2016

bluedevil said:
More small updates;

I finally finished up the front accessories. It feels like its taking forever to get these little things done lately...none the less its moving ahead. The alt bracket is basically unaltered, save for removing the idler pulley. I was going to switch it with a ribbed pulley because I was woried that if I ran the belt straight from the alt to the power steering pump that it would be too close to the water pump. After everything was mocked up, it turns out there is plenty of clearance, so I ditched the idler. One other small thing to note: if I would have ran the idler, there would not have been much alternator engagement, and might have caused slipping. Now that Im certain its not needed, I may trim off the mounting boss from the bracket to clean it up just a little more.

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The power steering bracket turned out well. I did oops on one spot while cutting the top portion of the bracket for the a/c pump (you can see the partial cut mark on the lower mounting hole by the water pump where I cut in a little more than I intended too). Other than that I rounded some corners and roughly polished it up a little. Now it doesn't seem like the accessories block the view from the engine so much.

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After its all said and done I cut the stock belt down and with some handy dandy zip ties, I ended up with an 85" belt. I orded a new one today, so there's another thing to cross off the list.

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On a side note, don't you hate when your working in sort of a mess of stuff, but you are in too much of a hurry to make sure you don't knock things over while your working. I was trying to multi task while doing the accessories, and decided to land the distributor for some reason. So I set the cap on the rad support right next to me, and sure enough while rolling the engine over to tdc, I kocked the cap off, and it broke on the ground Guess I will need another new cap...dammit!

Anyways another small but satisfying update on the gauges. I prepped the gauge panel, and sprayed it in semi gloss black and it looks way better now. I also picked up some pilot lights for turn signals and one for high beams and put them in. Just need to get that last volts gauge now, and then I can start wiring things up and get the dash back in.

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How did you make the gauge cluster

bluedevil · Aug 15, 2016

5.3_silverado said:
How did you make the gauge cluster

I took the factory cluster apart, gutted the needles and electronics, then traced the outline of the overlay onto 1/8' aluminum sheet. I drew on the gauge diameter I wanted then cut out. When that was done I just lay'd the aluminum in place of the original one, onto the factory plastic back half of the cluster, and it just snaps back together and bolts in the dash like it should. I tried first to test fit the gauges individually to see how much plastic had to be trimmed on the back half, but eventually just trimmed the entire back portion, and left the perimeter. I made a few braces to keep its shape afterwards. I had to drill an extra hole in the clear plastic lens after to get access to the trip on the speedo. The I added turn indicators, a high beam, and alternator dummy light, and painted the aluminum sheet black to tame it down. For the gauge cluster bulkhead connector, I cut and peeled back the wires that I needed (signals, high beam, gauge illumination, alt, power, and ground etc) and installed shielded spade connectors, then tucked the rest of the factory harness back into the dash. All the new Auto meter wiring for sensors just ran down parallel the the factory harness, and out through the firewall through a new grommet.

97 chevy rcsb sleeper

twomanymontes

car show addict

bluedevil

I'm Awesome

twomanymontes

car show addict

bluedevil

I'm Awesome

twomanymontes

car show addict

SixSpeedSS

I'm Awesome

bluedevil

I'm Awesome

5.3_silverado

I'm Awesome

bluedevil

I'm Awesome

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