The not-often-seen Blazer Chalet

[77blazerchalet]

I'll direct you to the Welcome forum for my 1st post there http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=230514 been meaning to join this forum for a while......

It's an entertaining vehicle overall, the previous owners kept it in storage for years, so the paint is the best 30 year old metalflake I'ver ever seen (no evidence of a repaint that I can see!), but it's got other minor issues. Ignore the door sag, for example, I need to find instructions on how to remove & replace the hinge pins. Then there's the missing cruise control.... and only one of the four backup lights has power... and the gas gauge reads a quarter tank off (found that out the hard way in the first week I owned it).....etc, etc.

- Russell, Phoenix AZ

[special-K]

That is a nice one.I like the Chalets and Casa Grandes.

[Zoomad75]

Dang thats a solid Chalet. Welcome to the board. I'll give you a quick heads up on the hinge pin replacement. It's not that hard. We just did it on mine a couple of months ago.

Go to any local part store that carries the "help" brand of parts. Most if not all the chain stores carry that line. You need 2 kits per door, 4 total. The kits come with two sizes of bushings to put back in. The smaller one fits in the hinge if the hole hasn't been wobbled open. The larger one will go in a wobbled out hole after you drill it out slightly. I was able to use the small bushings on all but one location.

The job is easiest if you unbolt the doors from the hinges. Do this at the door side of the hinge. (a second pair of hands is needed here) One the door is out of the way, drive the old pins out. We ended up cutting them in half with a die grinder and forcing one side up and the other side down. With the pins out you can assess the damage. factory bushings were plastic and when they wore out, the wobbling of the hole starts. So you may have to use the larger bushings. Tap the bushings in place and reassemble the hinge tapping the pin through both. Then you can put the door back on.

Keep in mind that you will need to re-align the door once you bolt it back up. (don't just slam it shut after bolting the door on!) The hinges are where the adjustment happens. The mounts to the door can bring the door in and out to the sides whereas the hinge mounts at the body close or open the gaps to the fender and quarter panels. You may need to adjust the striker pin also.

Replacing the pins took less time than the door adjustments. We must have taken one door off 6 times to get it right. Take your time and do a good job. Before you would have to slam the snot out of the door to get it to shut on mine (either side). Now they shut like a new truck.

[tvblazer78]

That is one different looking Blazer, but cool. I have some old cruise control parts if you would like to fix yours. What parts are you missing?

Trav

[Big Block]

I'm not trying to jack you thread but I just joined your yahoo group and I haven't posted any pictures. I bought my Chalet from the original owner in 2004. It has 70,000 miles on it. It is equipped with a 350ci and not the 400ci. I think most came with the 400ci. It is covered because one of the windows in the poptop is leaking. It is early production #23 built in 4/76.

[77blazerchalet]

Tim - keep an eye out especially for the Casa Grande, our little group has managed to dredge up three of them so far. One was a project for sale on Craigslist (initially misidentified as a Chalet) a few days ago, but the owner said he was reconsidering after all the neat info I gave him about them.

Rob Z. - thanks, exactly what I was looking for. I need to get to it sooner than later, before the latch pins start to tear out of the sheet metal. Doug W aka 1976K5CHALET showed me that on one of his other Blazers. My pins just have the tops ground down so far. Kinda annoying to lift up the doors right now while closing them....

Trav - Being primarily a VW GTI guy, I don't know beans about old Chevys. If ol' Doug W can pry himself away from the lucrative oil field business, I believe he really wants to diagnose all of what ails mine. I think all I have is the stalk on the steering column with its dangling wire. Lots of empty holes on the driver's side inner fender, where photos seem to indicate that's where the cruise control stuff goes. I might need everything you have....

Big Block - no worries about hijacking the thread, it only adds to the interest in these, which is my underlying evil intent. With a big collection of Chevy nuts in this forum, the interest gets those eyes out looking harder for them, perhaps even to get names, locations and phone numbers, instead of saying "wow, lookee there!" Regarding the leaky windows, that's one of the basic design problems, the other bigger thing is that the top needs to be redesigned where the edges overlap the walls instead of sitting on top of them in a U-channel. A discussion for the Chalet owners' forum........

Pic below explains mostly why I bought it. Tent camping is getting hard on my back lately and my GTI doesn't really like lousy dirt roads.

[Zoomad75]

My striker pins were getting wasted too. Plus on top of that the door pillar where the striker pin attaches was starting to crack from all the abuse. Take a look around the pins and where the hinges attach to the doors. Mine had cracks on the doors where the hinges bolted too. We had to skillfully weld the cracks up on mine.

Mounting a rack like that on the back with a bike behind the existing overhang of the chalet body might have the front tires hanging in the air. Might want to look at your wieght distribution!

[77blazerchalet]

Rob Z.,

I cleaned a bunch of dust out of the hinge area in the door jambs, don't remember seeing cracks, but I will look again. Yep, adding weight to the back is not a good idea, I'm hoping a one-wheel trailer (not really a rack as such) with the wheel a bit further forward will support the weight to some extent. Those Rokons weigh just over 200 lbs, and I will swap that custom solid steel bumper for the OEM chrome one - it will need some fab work for a good pair of 'trailer' hinges and some beefing up of the Chinook-crafted (?) bumper extensions.

Pic below of what it looked like before I bought it, moving the spare back to its OEM location is part of the rear weight reduction... I'll be sure to get a weight of the steel bumper, it looks really heavy, one mechanic said it looked more beefy than the Chevy frame. Not having driven a normal Blazer, I'd still say this thing feels a bit light in the front. I think I can get away with my plans, but if it handles too weird, I'll have to ditch it. I don't care for the Rancho helper springs on it, the air bag option like what Doug W and others have may be the better idea.

[edman87]

I like the chalets!
As for the weight problem, put a nice homebuilt front bumper with a winch in the front will help.

[redneckgirl]

We saw one in Delaware over this past summer that looked as if it just rolled off the showroom floor. It was the first one I had ever seen in person Wish I had my camera handy that day

[Grim Reaper]

You may have to take the door off to see the cracks. My old 75 had cracked pretty good but not visible till the door was off.

The striker is suppose to have a plastic Ferrel on it. When it breaks off it is had to shut the door. It also allows the door to sag and helps make the cracks at the hinge.
See if this link will work. Most parts stores that have HELP! you can buy just the plastic piece.

http://www.diypartscatalog.com/Rende...iypartscatalog

[77blazerchalet]

Thanks, Grim. Flat forgot about the plastic bits on the striker pins, looks like they've been gone a long time. That link is good, I narrowed it down thusly: http://www.diypartscatalog.com/Rende...iypartscatalog Nice that the bushings are inexpensive, I'll have to put this fix into the priority list somewhere.

[LOW DOUGH]

These are neat. I'd say yours looks just like the one on Hemmings Motor News.

Even has a saging door. Is it yours?



artical link

[77blazerchalet]

Sorry for the delayed response, I was out of the state for a week.

That be me... gotta do the door pin fix one of these days. Original photo to show how the Hemmings people wiped out the background.

[LOW DOUGH]

Yours is very nice. Keep it up.