86 k10 ls swap

[bh86]

I'll give a little back story with this build. So last year a friend of mine bought this truck from the original owner with 69000 miles on it. The motor had a knock and that man had parked it 6 or 7 years ago planning to replace it but finally realized that it wasn't going to happen, he sold it. When i first saw the truck and how clean and solid it was, I tried to buy it before he started to tear it down since I had a feeling it wouldn't ever get finished. So fast forward a couple months from when he bought it, he pulled the motor pulled, lost his storage and asked to store it at my shop for a few weeks. A few weeks turned into a year and he finally realized he wasn't going to finish it. He asked if I wanted to buy it, I said how much, he gave me a great price, I said deal. That was about 3 and a half weeks ago. It came with a motor he had bought for it, a 400 but I didn't like the idea and didn't feel like it was a good fit. When i got it the front clip was pulled and sitting in the bed so first thing i did was pull it in and tidy up the front frame area and take care of the suspension while i figured out the motor situation. After trying to find a decent option for a 350 I decided to say the hell with it and drop the ls I had sitting in the shop into it. Long story short, after a couple weeks and some long nights, we got it put together. My little brother and I both had some time off so we knocked out everything we could and pulled it out for the maiden voyage yesterday, and today I buffed it out. For the most part this was built with parts I had built up already. I had a 99 suburban that had a blown motor and a rebuilt trans so i pulled the 4l60 out of it. I had picked up a 5.3 out of a 01 tahoe a while back and hadn't done anything with it so it got the nod for this build. The same suburban that had the trans had decent wheels and tires that were brand new so I tossed those into the mix and ordered a tuff country 4" lift. Anyway I'll quit rambling,heres the (never) finished product, theres a few things left still, I'm waiting for my grille to show up on tuesday, need to get the exhaust done on monday, and need to toss the bumper on as soon as i get new bolts, but if anyone has questions about the ls swap in the 4wd's lemme know I'd be glad to help. I need to get all the pics from beginning to end, my lil bro takes more pics than i do but heres what I have for now.

[bh86]

some interior pics, we replaced the carpet, headliner, and seat. Most everything was in great shape, door panels are super clean just need a good cleaning. i still need to figure out the dash but so far I haven't been real fond of the aftermarket stuff I've seen, so I don't know what to do with that yet but I'm open to suggestions.

[bh86]

just got pics before motor was dropped in, still haven't found pics pre lift.

[bh86]

I've been trying to load a video of the first start but no luck, i'll try again another day, maybe I'm doing it wrong I don't know. But heres some more pics of pulling it out of the shop for the first drive.

[bh86]

some pics from today, first pic or two will be after bolting on the wheels and tires but pre buff job, the rest will be after buffing and putting it to bed for the night. I'll get the bumper, grille and exhaust finished up and update accordingly.

[bh86]

Some of the main things that stood out on the swap would be, for the 4x4's with the truck oil pan, theres a nub/mount for the positive battery cable and other starter wiring and miscellaneous stuff that goes over there on the front drivers side corner of the oil pan. It will help to clear the frame ALOT to cut that off. You'll also need to slide the motor back in the mounts (if using the dirty dingo mounts) quite aways, I will get a pic of the final resting place if anyone wants one, but I'd say they ended up about an inch to inch and a half from the furthest place back. If running a non ls 4l60e from a non LS style motor, even if its the newer style 4l 60E, you'll need to work out the flexplate/torque convertor situation. From what I understand most order a spacer and torque converter. I was in a time crunch so I ran to the local trans house and had them custom make a torque converter with an extended snout. It worked great. The other big thing was mating the old style tcase to the newer style trans and making the bolt patterns work out and incorporating a vss into the system. For that the only thing I found that worked was to go through advance adaptors, it wasn't cheap but it was simple, easy and clean.

[bh86]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jx7t...ature=youtu.be