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Project Polar Bear: '89 V2500 Suburban

Based on this thread and Larry's guidance, I just swapped over to the big-block radiator setup (same as Larrys), ditching the aluminum 4row and electric fans & their shroud. I can now idle in 95F full-on Sunshine with the AC on and it hangs right at 180F. Before it would creep up to 210 and then I would have to cut the AC off (in stop/go traffic). Very pleased. Thanks Larry!
 
big-blue said:
Based on this thread and Larry's guidance, I just swapped over to the big-block radiator setup (same as Larrys), ditching the aluminum 4row and electric fans & their shroud. I can now idle in 95F full-on Sunshine with the AC on and it hangs right at 180F. Before it would creep up to 210 and then I would have to cut the AC off (in stop/go traffic). Very pleased. Thanks Larry!
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Right on! :waytogo:
 
Part numbers please.....
Radiator...CU774
Shroud? HydroBoost? Master? McMaster Plug For Firewall? My 6.0 is coming out shortly.
I'll start a post on the rework after i get my stuff from the boob in Vegas.

DW
 
azblazer said:
Part numbers please.....
Radiator...CU774
Shroud? HydroBoost? Master? McMaster Plug For Firewall? My 6.0 is coming out shortly.
I'll start a post on the rework after i get my stuff from the boob in Vegas.

DW
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What do you think I am, you’re personal parts looker upper?? :flipoff11:

Haha, just kidding Doug :pimp:. I was wondering how that engine swap ever turned out that you were paying that guy to do. Rule number one with these engine swaps….Never pay anybody to do the work for you. They will never be right and you will over pay.

The shroud and hydroboost were picked out of the junkyard. The booster came off of about a 1985 or so 1 ton chassis cab. The shroud, upper radiator cover and radiator brackets came off of a mid 80’s C10 with a 6.2L diesel. As big-blue mentioned, 7.4L trucks and burbs should be the same. The brake master cylinder I went with was a Napa M2135 and the McMaster-Carr firewall plug is a 9600K527.




Oh, I finally got around to pumping up the A/C pumped this afternoon. She works great and that Delphi HT6 compressor is so quiet you don’t even hear it run. It’s in the upper 90’s here today and she was blowing 54 degrees out of the vents cruising down the highway. 54 really feels cold when it is almost a 100 ambient. Next 2 projects is to get it back to the tuner so they can straighten up their tune to take out the parking lot idling hop and the piss poor cold start open loop operation. After that it goes back to the exhaust shop to have some rework done on the exhaust as I cannot stand the way it sounds. Going to have a dual inlet dual outlet Magnaflow x-muffler installed and move to true dual exhaust instead of the huge restriction it has now where it is squeezed down to a single pipe for 3 feet.
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Well...it got me home funny guy. Lol. Lots of sub par work that i can't even begin to fathom why said work was done as it was. So i am looking at what i can fix with in a small budget and what can wait but still be reliable. He installed and rather nice pricey aluminum griffin radiator but in the 17" flavor and it wasn't even an LS conversion unit....
and the list goes on.

Hope to finish removing the PSI conversion harness tonight and all the Dakota Digital dash stuff so i can focus on removing the the tbi firewall harness like you did and getting the wiring under control before getting into the cooling system. The diesel rad has the bonus of having an oil cooler if i remember right....

Thanx for sharing the numbers...saves me alot of time. :0)

DW
 
That is too bad you have to rework his work. Never understood why so many LS swappers use Dakota Digital stuff. There really is no need to waste money on their stuff for a late model engine swap unless you really want their goods. Hope you get her worked out. Let me know if you need anything.

Oh, I forgot to post the official decal to consummate the 8.1L install :haha:

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And a few shameless glamour shots :laugh:

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This makes me want to blow my roller 7.4 up and do a similar swap to this. I have been finding lower mileage 8.1s mated to the newer 6 speed, around 1800 with a computer and meh, probably some of the wiring. Nothing beats the OBD2 systems as far as finding problems, and tuning. I do love the TBI, but if i find an 8.1, the 7.4 will power my 58 2 door Impala barn find.
 
You said you found all the shroud parts in a bone yard down your way?
GJ is pretty sparse for parts. Any chance of lighting striking twice in the bone yard up there?

Took myself...a fellow ck5'r and his son plus the winch on my quad to get her moved across the garage on skates so i can start getting after the repairs. Tonight the ORD engine xmember is coming out and the TNA is going in. After that is custom rear xmember.
 
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azblazer said:
You said you found all the shroud parts in a bone yard down your way?
GJ is pretty sparse for parts. Any chance of lighting striking twice in the bone yard up there?
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I dunno, I walked 3 yards before I found this stuff. I was looking at ¾ ton and 1 ton trucks and was about to give up then I stumbled across a little 5 lugger C10 with 6.2L badges. Sure, nuff! It had the right stuff. I’ll keep my eyes open for you but won’t be visiting any yards anytime soon. Old stuff is getting scarce around here too after we lost the great Truck yard (Canyon Truck) in Canon City 2 years ago. They had literally everything from the 60’s to current but one of the brothers died and the other brother closed it down and started crushing and selling off inventory. Bad deal. Now all we have are crappy yards


eclipse85k10 said:
Post as many glamour shots as you like. Your burb is definatly eye candy for this fellow burb owner!
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:waytogo:
 
Great job Larry. Love the glamour shots :thumb:
 
Couple updates on the ole girl. I ran it over to the exhaust shop a couple weeks ago to replace the restrictive single inlet/dual outlet Flowmaster with a dual inlet, dual outlet MagnaFlow. Turn out pretty nice and much quieter and less poppy. Still can’t say I am totally thrilled with the sound but it is certainly better. It sounds too much like a Camaro or Vette where I prefer the cackle of the K10 much more. Ah, well this will do for now.

The new dealeo

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Before
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The more I’ve been driving this thing the more I notice how sucktastic the front springs are. It’s harsh! The lift springs were some el cheapo hand me down spring off the K10, maybe Rancho or Rough Country's. I really like the way the K10 rides with Superlift Softrides so I ordered up the exact same part number which is supposed to be a 6" spring. When the new springs arrived I thought they looked very odd and nothing like what is on the front of the K10 so I called Superlift where they said they changed suppliers over the past few years so the springs may look a bit different. Yeah, not only do they look different they are sky high! Superlift’s 6” 01-235-6 spring is more like an 8” lift spring. I called Summit Racing and they are shipping me a 01-234-6 4” spring set to replace these. They’re also paying the ride for these sky high springs to go back
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Stupid tall!
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It’s also been back to the tuner a few times getting things tweaked. Not sure what to think just yet but I’ll say this, it runs like a scaled dog when you poke it in the neck. Regular drivability isn’t nearly as smooth as the stock 8.1L in the K10. I am kicking around a few options with one of them being ordering a stock cam from work to put back in it then copy the tune from the K10 to sprinkle in the Burb. I’m not tolerating the way it drives very well. If you drive it wide open constantly it runs great, drive it like a normal family truckster and it bucks, jerks and dies with the A/C on here and there. I’m going to try a few more things before I totally throw this cam to the curb. The NV4500 not wanting to go into 5th gear is really starting to piss me off too.
 
Is the location on this rig still accurate?

A guy drives by me in a very similar white barn door rig on 80 almost every day. Headed West in the mornings.
 
y5mgisi said:
Geesh! A string of not so good luck! I'm sure you will get it all dialed in and be happy.
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One of these damn days. The burb is going to have to go on the back burner once the new springs show up and get installed as I’m starting a new project for my buddy Rob. 91 K5 with a 5.3L, 14 bolt full-floater, full ORD treatment minus the :hack: treatment so many people do :rolleyes:…

dhcomp said:
Is the location on this rig still accurate?

A guy drives by me in a very similar white barn door rig on 80 almost every day. Headed West in the mornings.
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Yep, still in Southern CO. White seems to be pretty popular on the 89-91 Burbs. I know of a guy in Truckee, CA that has one too. Oh, wait….that is you :haha:
 
Can't wait to watch the build thread on that one! I love clean trucks with what you call the ord treatment!
 
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