The links for the front sway bar came today from Darrell and they really do look great. He does such nice work.   I still had some concerns about interference with the front wheels and the front sway bar when the wheels are turned to full lock. The layout of the truck does not allow for the front sway bar to be mounted in the exact location as the Corvette so the link attachment is no longer within the wheel diameter. So I did modify the design a little from Darrell's intent and move the links inboard of the sway bar. I also shortened the bushings so that the connection gives the most clearance I can do with this design. I spoke some with Darrell and he recommended to keep the front wheel width to 9" and to keep the offset as close to 0 as possible,

     After trying this, and making new measurements, it looks like it will fit without rubbing. So it's now time to bite the bullet and make the final decision on wheels and tires. After researching more trucks and looking again at the trucks I saw last month in Daytona, I decided that I would pick something a little more classic in wheel design, something chrome with a dish look. I decided it needed to be a 5-spoke, similar to the classic Torque Thrust design. Corvette rims are about the only ones that use 19" rear wheels, and I don't really like a 18" front and 20" rear stagger. It's just too much. So I decided to use 18" both front and rear.

     It really came down to 2 choices: Either American Racing Torque Thrust M or Foose Legend F105 in chrome. In the end, I decided on the Foose Legends. I'm a big Chip Foose fan, and I like the idea of having Foose wheels on my truck.   Turns out Alex Pagan has the same wheels on his Camaro, except he has the black version with the red pinstripe. The Legends are really sharp, and are available in various sizes and offsets that look promising. In the end, I settled on 18x8 with 1mm offset for the front and 18x9.5 with 34mm offset for the rear.   I decided not to push the issue of maximum tire size and risk rubbing. I looked at 285/40R18 for the rear, but the 275/40R18 was over $100 cheaper than the 285 and there really isn't much difference in size. For the front I went with 245/45R18 which has the same exact sidewall height and diameter as the 275/40R18 tires in the rear.

     Also, the 18x8 front rim with 1mm offset and the 18x9.5 with 34mm offset have 1.5" difference in width and 33mm or 1.3" difference in offset. This makes the dish depth identical between front and rear. So the front and rear wheels and tires look identical from the side, and the only difference is that the fronts are 30mm or 1.2" difference in width. This should look good. The front wheel bolt pattern is 5x4.75"(120.65mm), the rear wheels are 5x120mm. The chassis bolt pattern is correct for the front but slightly off for the rear (120mm vs 120.65mm). This is a longtime internet controversy, but the consensus and my results are that the 120mm fits just fine.

     So I ordered the wheels and waited for them to come in before I made the final decision on the tires. I mounted the wheels, and they look awesome! The 9.5" width of the rear is huge! The 8" front rim looks perfect. Everything clears, and now that I see the actual wheels on the chassis, I'm much more comfortable with my tire size choice. The only odd thing that I had not realized was the difference in lug nut protrusion with the different wheel offsets. The 34mm offset in the rear has the lug nuts protruding about halfway from the spokes. These look great and are exactly what I wanted. The front wheels with the 1mm offset are sunk deeply into the spokes so the lug nuts are not visible. They look fine, but I would like them to protrude similar to the rear. I may be able to find the longer lug nuts I need to make them look the same.

    So now the choice was down to tire brand. Both 245/45R18 and 275/40R18 are reasonably common so they are available from many different manufacturers and at many different prices. It surprised me how many manufacturers dropped off and how much the price increased just to go to a 285/45R18. So I gave up and stuck with the common sizes. Final choice came down to either BF Goodrich Sport Comp-2 or Nitto 555 G2. There really isn't much difference, but after reading many reviews, the consensus was pretty clear. The BF Goodrich were fine, but the Nitto 555 G2 was better. Supposedly it handled better, rode smoother, and was quieter. Wear was the same for both. So Nitto 555 G2 it is!

     The wheels were mail ordered from Summit Racing, but I wanted to buy the tires locally. I ordered them from Discount Tire and they came in a couple of days later. Discount Tire was great! The manager personally installed the tires being sure not to scratch the rims. He even stuck the weights behind the spokes so they would not be visible. I brought them home and mounted them to the chassis immediately and they look great! The chassis is now off jack stands and is sitting on the floor. Ride height looks like it will be good; about 5-6" from the running board to the ground. Low enough to look good, but not too low as to be a problem.

     For everything that's done so far, there's only a few things that I need to address. First, the sway bar links in the front are heim joints. I'm sure these are just mild steel and they are not sealed against dirt. I may want to upgrade them to a higher quality, or at least add dust seals. Second, the springs on the coilovers in the rear are not carrying the weight. They may be too small, or it may be that the rear suspension is binding. If it is binding it may be the rear sway bar. I may need to upgrade the rear sway bar links to heim joints also. And third and most important, it looks like the toe link tie rod ends in the rear hit the frame before the rear coilovers hit full compression. Looks like the coilovers have about an inch to go. It looks like I can either lower the existing toe link tie rod ends, or change them to heim joints and space them down. All 3 things look fairly easy to do.

   I will be taking a break from working on this project for a couple of months while we get ready for a motorcycle trip. The next step is to locate and engine and transmission. I could do everything new with a crate engine, but by the time I buy the engine and transmission, I still have to buy all the accessories, starter, alternator, power steering pump, brackets, wiring harness, computers, etc. It really begins to add up, and for this project I am really looking more at reliability and driveability rather than performance. So a used engine and transmission is beginning to look a lot better.

     It has to be a Vortec truck engine as the car engines tend to be low and wide and the truck engines tend to be taller and narrower which fit better in this chassis. It will either be a 5.3 or 6.0 Chevy Vortec. The transmission will either be a 4 or 6 speed automatic.. The trade-off is age for complexity. The easiest are the Generation III engines and transmissions. These use a single computer that runs the engine and transmission and contains provisions for A/C cutout and cruise control. The problem is that Gen III ended in 2007, so it is difficult to find low mileage engines. These drivetrains last so long, easily for 200k to 300k miles, so that anything below 100k miles is considered low mileage. There is lots of information on how to do this swap, and how to modify the harness. There are also many harness suppliers and modifiers and many more computer re-programmers.

     Generation IV is much easier to find low mileage engines, but there is much less information on the swap. The engine and transmission use separate computers, cruise control requires either the body control computer or a separate module. There is also some controversy about how the voltage regulator works through the body control computer. There are less harness modifiers and less computer re-programmers but information is beginning to become more available.

     At this point, I just need to do more research. I do have a degree in Electrical Engineering, so the electronic complexity doesn't really scare me. But simplicity does make it easier to maintain. It's really just an effort to become a short term expert so I can figure out what I need to do.