Ugly Gold 4 door Hoor SAS-LS

Yeah, Im super happy with it. Simple designs but very heavy duty! I was gonna get enduro joints because I saw a lot of people running them but they were out of stock and Barnes said these ones were better and rebuildable. So, idk if I made the right choice but can't wait anyway. Also, its nice it comes from the east coast. Cuts shipping time down a lot! You are like 1 day.

 

Quicker than that, I go up there and pick my parts up.

 

Haha! nice!

 

Dealing w this whole assembly is difficult w no existing mounts. It’s long and heavy. Got the engine close to in place but need to spend an hr or so measuring. Need help tomorrow for safety concerns. Make mounts and should be done w this motor shit.

 

Gonna be job, that's for sure. I feel for ya.

 

Its killing my body but I love it! Have 10 hours to spend on it tomorrow so, should get it done if I don't have to drive around buying shit. Still don't know how im gonna change the t case brace to a solid mount but have a few ideas.

 

Did you get the trans and motor in w/o removing the trans?!

Edit: realized you don't have the IFS x members - reason to SAS alone.

 

Yeah, I put in all on those small ass harbor freight dollys and rolled it in there. I swear, I can bang any kind of shit out with ease mechanically but I always get my assed kicked by tranny installs. I always try to keep them together at all cost. On ifs I just pull the motor w trans if I have to take trans out. Motor takes me like 45 min to prep for removal. So, much easier.

 

I've done 3 motor pulls and 2 motor installs (although the first one I dropped it in 4-5 times) with the 3.4 and the 4x4 trans is a pain. I think you'd be able to do it even with the ifs parts if you cut out the front core support. Each time I kept the AC and PS hooked up so I wasn't going to cut out the core support though.

 

I take pff ps pump and compressor and bungee them to the left side of bay, take harness off ecu and put it on motor, take intake out, undo fuel and vacuum, trans lines, pull fan, undo mounts, take off t case completely and take the whole fucker out. 4x4 trans separation is not something I even fuck with. Id rather work standing vs laying down with 36 extensions, swivels and a sore neck. Shit, the flywheel cover is even a bitch to get to.

 

That's what I do, but did you get the 4x4 trans and motor out in one piece before removing the IFS?

 

On this one I pulled the trans out first cause I had to use the housing and I was originally gonna leave the frame the way it was. But, it was a prerunner and the trans was super easy to get to. I pulled the motor a week later. But if it was 4wd I would have done it in one shot.

 

The motor mounts took 2 full 8 hour days to figure out and make. Getting the motor and cases in the perfect position was the most time consuming part. Had to use a shit ton of ratchet straps.



I decided to redo the mounts entirely. Gave them some better angles and the square tubing wouldn’t work on the oil filter side anyway. Way too tight. They came out nice I think. DOM is super hard to weld around but clean. Gotta give credit to @malburg114 as well for the idea. I knew he used dom and now I know why. Thanks!

 

Had to cut a little for the t case. Ended up with the motor 2.5” higher at cams and 3/4” back. Cases are as high as I want them.

 

Final mount setup.

 

Mount Update - Made an absolutely massive mistake. Thought I could squeeze the starter in no problem when the pass side was getting final welded. I was wrong. The starter is way bigger than I thought. Spent an hour grinding and trying to make it work. Not happening.

So spend 4 hours cutting the existing dom from frame back 2" and cutting engine mount back, replating it and adding 2" of dom on that side so the joint was far enough away from starter. Then switched the joint to vertical vs horizontal bolt up and had to weld the tube on the truck so it isn't as nice either. Really pissed at myself but its done.

 

Fuck...damn.

That's the thing about custom work; least you found a work-around.

 

but you know when the thing is out tearing it up, the smile on your face will be worth the effort.

 

Man, it was pretty painful cutting that 1 hour old finished mount. But, yeah, I hope I can use the shit out of this thing like truck is intended for.

 

Yeah. You focus all your attention on the overall goal sometimes and overlook the smallest things. For the links the truck will sit running w every part on it. Not gonna let that happen again.