I'm building a 95 chevy s10 short box as a daily driver. I currently have a 05 lq4/t56 in the truck and a 373 8.8 explorer rear to go in.
I don't have the truck running yet, but have been thinking about what direction to go with for power. I'm looking for 450-500 wheel with great torque and driveability. I would like to get the best possible mileage that I can. I have been looking at Advance induction head and cam packages. while those will get the job done, I have always wanted to build a turbo setup. If I left the longblock stock exept for rod bolts. off boost mileage shouldn't suffer as much as a midsized cam right? my biggest concern is reliability. I live in wisconsin, my one negative thought is having to fix the truck in january , while its way below zero. any thoughts would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Kory

 

if your only looking for 450-500rw id go with a heads and cam pkg. the turbo is alottt of work.
mines failry close to running and its been rediculously time consuming... im looking to make 550rwhp on pump, 600+ on race gas on the stock shortbock, and more when i do rods/psitons/studs...

my build thread is the builds section.

 

Build an engine stand and get the motor/transmission running on the the engine stand, that's 70% of the work. Then once it's running, stuff it in the truck and drive it till it's slow, then go for more power

 

:rock: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:

 

Thanks for the replys. I know my goals are modest. My only conern is that if I were to go with a head and cam package, the required cam would be fairly large and would kill my mileage. part throttle mileage is a concern as this will be a daily driver. Am I wrong in thinking that a moderate sized turbo setup will get decent mileage when not under boost. given the 6 speed and 373 gears?
Thanks,
Kory

 

Let's get something straight, if you put 500hp to the wheels in that little truck then you're going to shrug your shoulders and mash the loud pedal. You're lying to yourself if you think you'll get consistent great mileage with that truck. You might get a nice number in one of every few tanks and even then you'll be running higher octane. That's just the nature of power vs. driving. If you want a gas sniffer, get a gas sniffer. If you want a street rod that "occasionally" moonlights as a gas sniffer that's fine. Get a $3000 accord and make that your daily. Get the motor running on the engine stand, stuff it in the truck and go from there. If you get it running right, THEN add a turbo and/or heads and cam. Otherwise you'll be selling that pile of parts for a loss in the next 1-3 years. Believe me, we've all done it.

Also an added benefit of having a sniffer is that the more reliable/efficient it is, the faster the street rod can go.