86 Crew Cab, Cummins, Static Drop Build

I have been meaning to make a build thread for a long time. Most of this stuff was done over the last couple of years, so the thread will be playing catch up.

I bought it to be my daily driver. I was tired of paying $500/month on a loaded out '05 2500 HD with the possibility of something breaking that was expensive and beyond my ability to fix myself without a wiz bang scanner.

I bought the truck with the intention of putting a Cummins in it and static dropping it or bagging it. I was convinced I could build it for 10k or so. That part hasn't quite worked out...

I drove the truck with the 6.2 and TH400 for a few months to make sure I was man enough to drive a 25+ year old truck every single day and to make sure it was going to be reliable. Once I was satisfied, I got rid of the 2500 HD and continued to drive the truck as I bought it.

Here are the pics from the CL add...







More to come as I get time. I am going to try to really cover how I tackled all the tricky parts of the Cummins swap.

I did the cummins swap there really is nothing to it

I ended up buying my buddies truck that had inspired my project. It was a 85 C-20 crew. He had converted it to a dually, static dropped it, and put a '93 Cummins and A518 in it. I bought it thinking that all the swap stuff was figured out and all I needed to do was swap the parts over. I knew the truck was rusty and some of the swap stuff needed to be cleaned up some, but the more I looked I realized that all I got was an engine and a parts truck. I didn't like the way he did ANYTHING.

Bringing her home.


Intake tube rubs the master cylinder.


Hacked cross member and frame. GM alternator mounted sketchy and a regular width serpentine belt.




For the motor mounts he used just put a piece of tire sidewall (literally) in between the stock dodge mount and the Chevy frame stand. Bolts were loose and the holes were wallered out.


One other "feature" was that the shift linkage was hooked up as is. The dodge bell crank was combined with the chevy column linkage. This resulted in the truck and transmission being backwards from each other. Park in the truck was low on the transmission. Park on the transmission was low on the truck. the neutral safety switch was still hooked up so you had to start the truck in gear.


The core support was pretty hacked. The intercooler was only hung with the top mounts and it was set back where the condenser should have been.

In hind sight I'm still very glad I bought the truck. I have used sooooooo many parts from it.

dayummm thats rough. how much did you pick it up for>?

More than it was "worth", but I have gotten my money's worth out of it. Its so nice just walking to the backyard if I need some parts.

The ride home was a fairly sketchy experience too. Waaaaaaaaaaaaay too much tongue weight with the Cummins practically on my tailgate. Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too little power with the 6.2. 18' car hauler isn't ideal for a crew cab dually. I stabbed the brakes once, just to see what I was really dealing with. The front tires locked up very very easily. I took my time.

I have the same year model motor and transmission in my dually and last road trip I went on it got 20.9mpg running 70 most of trip and my injection pump is leaking a good bit.....these motors are no power houses like my Duramax but they sure kick their ass at fuel mileage

I started by pulling the engine out of the black truck...LOTS of leaks



Then I started tearing my truck apart...LOTS of leaks

That's great to hear! I hope to get mine up over 20 mpg one day.

I get like 24 mpg in my 90 chevy with my 90 cummins. I have 3.42s

Next up was getting the Cummins mounted.

The front cross member was in the way for this part. I decided that I would move it rather than cut a big section out of it. The frame also had to be cut for AC compressor clearance. I cut as little as possible while still allowing the compressor to come out without taking the engine loose.












I considered buying mounts, but I finally decided that they were really expensive for what they were. I was also concerned that with everything being as tight as it was they wouldn't work in my truck. Every 1/8th inch counts.

I went with the chevy style mounts. They just looked beefier than the dodge mounts. I got some polyurethane inserts for some added beef.

The transmission heat exchanger also mounts to the motor mounts. The heat exchanger mount had to be modified. I failed to get pics of this.