grassroots trucks for fun

I'd like to see the drawing if you can take a pic of it or scan it.

I wouldn't mind a Ranger except for the front suspension. They didn't go to a-arms until '98.

At the junkyard today I looked at a few S-10s and it looks like you can lop three feet off the rear of the frame if you delete the leafs, and probably a foot or more off the front. This on a regular cab short bed, which is what I'm looking to do.

Interesting you mention the t- roadsters, because I think small trucks stripped down and modded for handling and speed could be like those original hot rods: Cheap, fast, raw, and take on a million variations.

-James

James

You are right on regarding the suspension. Having driven bot the Ranger and the S-10, the later handled much better. Modifying a Ranger's I-Beams to lower the vehicle is also far more complicated.

I started with the Ranger out of nostalgia really - I learned to drive in one a little over 25 years ago, so it has a soft spot in my automotive memories. But, that nostalgia drive compromise, like the extended cab frame. To get the truck as low as I would want to, I expect I would need to modify the frame. The extended cab has the extra material needed to do some fairly radical modifications, as well as providing room for one heck of a set back from the front wheels.

I'll find my old drawings, and try to figure out how to post them - always enjoy a good challenge.

Stealthfighter1 - sorry about the thread hi-jack. You just asked a great question. I think you are on a pretty good track. Like James and others said above, the little trucks are very flexible. If you wanted to go crazy, you could start by lowering the truck, put any V-8 that fits in the front, move the battery and radiator in the bed to open up some room under the hood and redistribute some of the weight, get a little crazy with the aero so you reduce the grill opening (no radiator anymore), limit the air that goes under the truck with a splitter and side skirts, use a fan to pull air flow for the radiator from under the truck (maybe even generate some down force from active suction??? probably not), dump the cooling air into the space above the bed to reduce the drag associated with the flow seperation at the back of the cab, and maybe even use an independent rear suspension out of a Ford Explorer. Probably goes a little past grassroots - okay, it's way beyond grassroots. But it could be a fun way to put together a handling beast that would shock most other cars on the road, or the parking lot for that matter.

Mark

problemaddict wrote: I used to be in contact w/ a guy from the midwest named Paul Abernathy. He built a handful of T-buckets and rods from scratch. he said that the D-50 frame was a great starting point for a T-bucket and used that frame in several. Here's the only one i can find right now: i know he built another T bucket and also a 30s Ford on the same D-50 chassis.... food for thought

I'd seen that project, on a site called Jalopy Journal IIRC. It definitely seems like a cool idea. Right now though it looks like I'm going to just make some safety / reliability improvements and prep it for a short stint as a daily driver as part of a plan to get out of debt. The payments on my wife's Accord are rather painful, so we figure we can put a couple hundred into essential repairs on the D50 and make it a safe, roadworthy truck.

Once my wife gets a newer daily driver, then I'll have to decide what I'm doing with the truck. Those T-buckets look pretty cool, but a beat up looking truck with a hopped up 4G63 could be a lot of twisted fun too.