Small world, I just saw your posts on the burb 2500 fb page. You've got the newer rear window with the little spoiler on yours too, been looking for one of those since all my defrost traces are fried anyway.
I like the color matched grille, been considering either doing that, or leaving the center strip chrome and painting the rest.
Which torque converter does yours have in it? GM used two different converters in these trucks, some have a ~2000 rpm ish stall speed and others have closer to a 2400 rpm stall speed. Might be a happy medium vs. going up to a 3k stall? My cammed 8.1 is set up to lock the converter at WOT in second and shifts and tows mostly locked up. Stock converter clutch with calibration changes has been handling it fine, though boost may be a different story. The stock tow haul mode generally has this same behavior though. Mine has 3.73 gears and the higher stall speed OEM converter, which definitely helps with getting out of the hole.
1.75" is what I went with for rear spacers. This is the only pic I have right now that sort of shows the wheels, it's almost perfect if not a little too wide. If I did it again, I would probably do 1.5" spacers. On 245 tires right now and the rears are pretty well flush with the flares/mudflap outer edges. I got mine from Bora, since I wanted them to be hubcentric. I'll have to see if I can find a better pic.
Better pictures of the spacer clearance from this morning.
gearheadE30 said:
Better pictures of the spacer clearance from this morning.
That's just about perfect. I haven't measured the difference in track width between the front and rear yet, but the rear is significantly sucked in (unless the rear bodywork is for some reason wider. All I want is for the rear wheels to be flush with the bodywork without sticking out since that'll just fling road debris everywhere. I have 2" spacers arriving Saturday - hopefully it doesn't push the rear too far out (265s all around). I'm leaving the front alone.
The rear spoiler thing is nice. I was going to paint that and the D pillar covers in a gloss black, but since there is really nothing else gloss black on the truck besides the bowtie on the grille, I think I'll clean them properly and apply either Back to Black or ceramic coat to make them shine. The taillight lenses also have some weird finish issues that looks like peeling clearcoat, so I will likely just sand/polish/clear those as I like the OEM look.
No clue on torque converter. I would say "whatever came in it" but who knows if it has been replaced as some point as the body has 196K on it. The more I read about it the more I am inclined to keep it since the 4.10s help it get off the line and the stock "large diameter" lockup clutch will be better suited to towing. If/when I go turbo, it'll be a 7665 or 7675 or smaller and should spool quickly. It's been a long time since I've played with lockup parameters in HPTuners but I would think, like TerminatorX, you can set it to unlock once TPS% exceeds a certain threshold.
Funny how as you get older your priorities change. I have been more interested in working on this truck lately to better suit my family's needs, while my turbo LS Jag sits dusty in the garage needing a bunch of little things.
My wife and I bought tickets to a Bills game and we like to go all out with tailgating, so I dug through my scrap pile and rigged up a mount for my flattop griddle. It attaches using 2 hitch pins for easy removal.
The 1-1/4" square tube is also used as a bike rack I made a few years ago
The 4WD system was freaking out and finally started to affect driveability with some weird shifting issues.
I finally got around to installing the new transfer case motor, and cleaned out the electrical connector which was full of green corrosion. Just need to install the new front driveshaft and I'll have working 4WD again.
Glamour shots while getting cleaned up
I have been chasing a wicked loud whistle from the motor for a few weeks now. Since the whistle sounded so much like an air leak, part of my troubleshooting was to remove the intake and do intake manifold gaskets/valley gasket; while I was in there I also did the cam position sensor, oil pressure sending unit, and knock sensors and harness.
I also pulled the PCV hoses and inspected/cleaned them, and pulled the driver's valve cover to clean out any sludge in the drain back holes (there was not much). The motor looks pretty good for 200K miles.
The result? Still whistled. I removed the oil cap with the engine running after a cold start and still whistled. Definitely not a PCV or intake leak at this point.
After doing some homework on Youtube, I saw a lot of guys complaining about their A/C tensioner causing a noise like this. It didn't sound like a belt squeal or bearing noise, and I had replaced the A/C tensioner just a few months ago with a Gates 38159, but at this point I had tried everything else with no results, so I said screw it...
One new GM Genuine tensioner later (PN 12580196, $48 shipped on Amazon) and it's silent again! Hope this helps someone down the road. For what it's worth, the GM part looked identical to the Gates part, except that it didn't have the GM PN stamped on the tensioner arm. We'll see if this one lasts, but for now I'm so happy to have a quiet truck again.
New tensioner still occasionally whistles, just at different frequencies. and RPMs. Driving me nuts.
