There's been a long delay since my last post about this swap, since I was primarily working on the parts of the truck that are largely remaining stock. I've completely rebuilt the brakes, suspension, bearings, bushings, and frame to nearly-new condition, in addition to new fog lights and tires. I've also replaced all the light bulbs with LED upgrades, and rebuilt the dashboard with a manual truck gauge cluster (tachometer!)
Now that the chassis is finished, it's time to focus on the swap itself. The first step was to design and fabricate the mounting brackets for the engine. I wanted to use the factory stock rubber mounts on the frame (replaced with new ones of course), so I manufactured the brackets accordingly.
The passenger's side mount was significantly easier to make, because there are few accessories in the way. Drawing and fabrication took about 1.5 weeks, with a brief hold-up due to stripped out threads on the engine block. These were quickly rectified with some helicoils.
Next, I designed the driver's side mount. This was much more complex, because it needs to get around the water pump, oil filter, and the lower geometry of the rubber mount. After 7 or 8 redesigns, I hit on the version that worked. The only downside is that this bracket obstructs the return port for the cab heater core, so it is necessary to plug this port and reroute the return hose to the lower radiator hose.
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