04 Colorado V8 swap (Lot's of pics!)

[TRPLXL2]

Thanks guys for all the compliments, It really means a lot. When people see the truck they think it's awesome, but they have no idea how much went into it unless they were to see what I am showing all of you in this thread.

Last summer after we had the truck running, Pick-A-Part salvage yard had a Trailblazer SS complete rear axle assembly for sale. They were asking $799.00 or best offer, so I went and looked at it in person and offered them $500 cash money and they took it!!! It is a BEAST!!! 23,000 miles on it, 9.5" ring gear, yukon axles, 12" rotors, LSD G86 4.10 gears.

We were going to just put a set of 4.10 gears in the colorado rear end, but this gave us rear disc brake upgrade, locker, and our gears lol!! So again the truck was torn apart.......




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The rear axle also came with a basically brand new set of Bilstien shocks, which Ralph pressed the bushings out and put new ones in so he could use them on the Colorado upper mounts. He had a blown rear shock anyways, and the funny part was even though his truck is lifted way up these new shocks were identical in length.

The black rods in the first picture were part of the trailblazer ss stabilitrac I think, we could not use them so they are in the spare parts bedroom. The axle had mounts welded on for the air ride suspension from the factory, Ralph removed these as we would not need them. Stay tuned for some real good updates,.........I PROMISE

[Enkeiavalanche]

Does it ever end??? Nope The Mod Bug!!! But it's looking good....

[SupplySgt]

Very nice on the new rear end! Makes me wish I had a lot more funds to work on both the truck and the Camaro

[TRPLXL2]

No this thread will never end lol, because the truck is a 9 year work in progress. Ralph keeps talking all kinds of crazy crap, he has a very big imagination as do I. This truck has kept me broke for as long as I can remember, but when we fire it up it is well worth it.

Some more pics of the rear end, stay tuned for more....

[Conlan Rose]

Looks sweet, but question: Isn't the Colorado a 5 lug pattern not 6 lug like the TBSS rear you bought. How did you make that work especially when using 5 lug Camaro rims?

[TRPLXL2]

Exactly right Conlan Rose, we have a real bastard truck on our hands lol!!! I called up Motorsports Technologies, told him the mess we had and he assured that he could make the adapters. Here is what was made:

2 front adapters Colorado 6x135mm-Camaro SS 5x120mm
2 rear adapter Trailblazer SS 6x127mm-Camaro SS 5x120mm

We actually just got these thursday, $485 shipped with the 24 special lug nuts to mount the adapters to the hubs. They are a 2 piece design, it was not possible to make them one piece unfortunately. The quality was second to none, beautiful workmanship. He also had to deal with 3 different hub bore sizes. The allen bolts were torqued to 50 ft. lbs. per instructions, and the camaro lug nuts were torqued to 106 ft. lbs. per dealer instruction.

[Enkeiavalanche]

HOLY Hub Bat man!!!!!!!

[TRPLXL2]

Hours later Ralph had cut and ground all of the excess brackets off the axle tubes, he painted the whole rear axle with black rustoleum. VHT red caliper paint, this stuff was very nice to use and I would recommend highly. Also swapped the stock bleeders for Russell speed bleeders from Summit Racing, $19.95 for a set of 2, these also are a must have from now on lol!!



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Ralph painted the pumpkin cover gloss black as well, I was not happy with this so I stole it out of the garage and painted a Mr. Horsepower graphic, and checkered flag theme on it for fun! He freaked out at first, but now it has grown on him and he likes it lol!! You can see it under the truck too when your behind it, people probably think we're nuts. I painted it using One Shot pinstripers enamel, no clear coat and it's shiny as can be.

We removed the bed and flipped it over, and Ralph couldn't believe that the factory never painted underneath of it. We hand sanded the whole thing, and he sprayed it all to match the truck and then clear coated it. No you can't see it, but it really bugged him.





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Some pictures of the truck with the bed off, we redid all the wiring while it was open to inspection. I actually found a short in the reverse lights, as they were grounding off the frame. We removed all of the emissions equipment, gas tank, filler neck, spare tire and holder.

[TRPLXL2]

Ralph painted the back of the cab of the truck as well, they didn't do a very good job from the factory. We used the engine hoist to pick the bed off, then we flipped it over by hand. We also painted the whole frame in gloss black rustoleum.

[Enkeiavalanche]

Should have just added a Dump body to it. Do a nice paint job under the bed and lets all see it...