I'll start from the beginning and try to make it quick.
Picked this 88 Suburban up in november 2015 for $250 and planned on a small lift, 33s and a little crawlling here and there. The term 'snowball' comes next.
In January, I picked up an 89 for parts. I mainly wanted the wheels and tires, but it was cheap enough and spare parts are always a plus. My roommate and I swapped the suspension in the yard.
I soon came to realize, I needed lockers of some sort.
In November 2016, I decided I wanted a little more power. I pulled the engine from a 5 year project and put it in the suburban. The ECU couldn't make sense of the cam and noone makes a chip that could. I swapped it to carb and the fpr failed on me so I parked it.
While it was sitting, some friends and I decided to plan a trip to Moab in May. That gave me 6 months to get the suburban ready. I needed an engine, taller lift, bigger tires, winch, and lockers.
Ordered a Rough Country 4" lift with rear blocks, sold the blocks and used the ORD 4" shackle flip.
I decided to make use of the 02 Denali I had sitting in storage. It had a bad transmission and the interior was worn, but otherwise ran great.
Swapped the LQ4 into the suburban. I used the Trans Dapt mounts and conversion flexplate and spacer since I kept the 700r4. I had to move the engine mount frame brackets back about 1.5" to get the engine to line up with the trans. I also hit the stock crossmember with the corner of the oil pan, so I got the ORD hd crossmember.
While waiting for someone to modify the harness for me, I got bored and pulled out the cutting wheel. Took 8" out of each side of the core support.
To avoid any possible fitment issues with exhaust, I picked up some block huggers from Yearwood Performance since they had them in stock. Then I dug through my scraps and made the straight pipes work.
The guy that was suppose to be modifying my harness for almost a month finally got it back to me...untouched. I was a little intimidated to mess with it, but it had to be done. It wasn't pretty, but it worked. I plan to redo it later.
Picked this 88 Suburban up in november 2015 for $250 and planned on a small lift, 33s and a little crawlling here and there. The term 'snowball' comes next.
In January, I picked up an 89 for parts. I mainly wanted the wheels and tires, but it was cheap enough and spare parts are always a plus. My roommate and I swapped the suspension in the yard.
I soon came to realize, I needed lockers of some sort.
In November 2016, I decided I wanted a little more power. I pulled the engine from a 5 year project and put it in the suburban. The ECU couldn't make sense of the cam and noone makes a chip that could. I swapped it to carb and the fpr failed on me so I parked it.
While it was sitting, some friends and I decided to plan a trip to Moab in May. That gave me 6 months to get the suburban ready. I needed an engine, taller lift, bigger tires, winch, and lockers.
Ordered a Rough Country 4" lift with rear blocks, sold the blocks and used the ORD 4" shackle flip.
I decided to make use of the 02 Denali I had sitting in storage. It had a bad transmission and the interior was worn, but otherwise ran great.
Swapped the LQ4 into the suburban. I used the Trans Dapt mounts and conversion flexplate and spacer since I kept the 700r4. I had to move the engine mount frame brackets back about 1.5" to get the engine to line up with the trans. I also hit the stock crossmember with the corner of the oil pan, so I got the ORD hd crossmember.
While waiting for someone to modify the harness for me, I got bored and pulled out the cutting wheel. Took 8" out of each side of the core support.
To avoid any possible fitment issues with exhaust, I picked up some block huggers from Yearwood Performance since they had them in stock. Then I dug through my scraps and made the straight pipes work.
The guy that was suppose to be modifying my harness for almost a month finally got it back to me...untouched. I was a little intimidated to mess with it, but it had to be done. It wasn't pretty, but it worked. I plan to redo it later.
