Stout 85K5

[campfire]

Pretty much everything UPS buys is spark ignited to be able to run on gasoline and easily convertible to propane. Canada is 100% propane. They buy only a handful of diesels per year, if any at all. Smart people

Interesting. I know I live in the middle of nowhere, and our UPS trucks are old. A number of them are old enough to have flat noses with circular headlights.

But most of the ones I've encountered here have a rattly diesel sound. Some of them I'd swear are running paint-shaker 4BT engines. But those would all be obsolete by now, no? Whatever they are, no self-respecting gasoline engine should ever sound like that.

I've also seen 3-pedal UPS trucks. Are those even sold anymore?

 

[Larry]

Interesting. I know I live in the middle of nowhere, and our UPS trucks are old. A number of them are old enough to have flat noses with circular headlights.

But most of the ones I've encountered here have a rattly diesel sound. Some of them I'd swear are running paint-shaker 4BT engines. But those would all be obsolete by now, no? Whatever they are, no self-respecting gasoline engine should ever sound like that.

I've also seen 3-pedal UPS trucks. Are those even sold anymore?

Yeah, the flat nose package cars like that one were bodied by MorganOlson (or known as GrummanOlson prior to 2004). That flat nose carried on until 2009 when MorganOlson’s changed to the more aerodynamic sleepy catfish hood with Olds Alero headlights. If that is an actual package car from your area it is a P70 model designated by the 6***** car number. The car groups are P50, P60, P70, P80, P100 and P120.

There are still plenty of mid-90s and later package cars on the road so if you think you’re hearing a 4BT, you very well could be as our competitor Freightliner offered the 4BT for many years. The GM P-Chassis also use the 4BT for a few year’s but UPS doesn’t have any of those. Workhorse also had a 4BE for a while but UPS doesn’t have any of those either (Frito-Lay got pretty much all of them). Manual transmissions were dropped around 2001 across the board as I’ve been told but there are still many manual transmission package cars on the road. As I mentioned, UPS still buys a handful of new diesels but they are very few and far between and most will live in rural areas where the package car will turn more than 300 miles per day. They need to highway run time for the aftertreatment regeneration cycles to work properly. Hundreds of key cycles day on city routes is no bueno for modern diesels choked to death by emissions

 

[Truckman4life]

Yeah, the flat nose package cars like that one were bodied by MorganOlson (or known as GrummanOlson prior to 2004). That flat nose carried on until 2009 when MorganOlson’s changed to the more aerodynamic sleepy catfish hood with Olds Alero headlights. If that is an actual package car from your area it is a P70 model designated by the 6***** car number. The car groups are P50, P60, P70, P80, P100 and P120.

There are still plenty of mid-90s and later package cars on the road so if you think you’re hearing a 4BT, you very well could be as our competitor Freightliner offered the 4BT for many years. The GM P-Chassis also use the 4BT for a few year’s but UPS doesn’t have any of those. Workhorse also had a 4BE for a while but UPS doesn’t have any of those either (Frito-Lay got pretty much all of them). Manual transmissions were dropped around 2001 across the board as I’ve been told but there are still many manual transmission package cars on the road. As I mentioned, UPS still buys a handful of new diesels but they are very few and far between and most will live in rural areas where the package car will turn more than 300 miles per day. They need to highway run time for the aftertreatment regeneration cycles to work properly. Hundreds of key cycles day on city routes is no bueno for modern diesels choked to death by emissions

I can't even count how many 7.3L engines I have swapped out in those older UPS trucks. They would come in with so low of compression they wouldn't even start any more.

 

[diesel4me]

There are still many older UPS trucks here with both diesels and 300 Ford straight sixes...and fleets of Frito-Lay step vans with the Cummins show up for sale every so often...they get scoffed up quickly,since the engine and adapter to a GM TH400 or 4 speed sells for as much as the whole truck did at the auction most of the time--salvage yards buy them,strip the body off and use it for storage (or scrap it if aluminum prices are up)..

 

[beags86]

I can't even count how many 7.3L engines I have swapped out in those older UPS trucks. They would come in with so low of compression they wouldn't even start any more.

So how many you got stashed away then?

 

[Larry]

Finally got the little 454 SuperSportside project wrapped up. Post 50 has the details of what this project is about. All that is left to do is charge the AC and clay bar and wax off 4 months of shop fallout then I can get back on other things like working on the K5! But, before I can do that I have to get the K10 ready for our annual Desert Trip then the Polar Bear Suburban needs some love. In between working on those I’ll be doing little things that will eventually end up on the K5

Anyway, here is more on the 454 SuperSportside project. This was 3 months worth of work with working a couple hours a day.

TBI fuel pump to EP381 swaperoo. While I was at it, I discovered that the exhaust morons that laid the dual pipes on here back in 2012 welded one of the friggen exhaust hangers to bed floor! Errrr! I swear, I don’t know what it is with exhaust shops and their lack of common sense. The ding dong that did my Suburban welded a hanger to the floor of that one too. Both the Suburban and this truck had odd vibrations due to the harmonics. Here I always thought this Sportside had a rough idle felt in the steering wheel and seat of the pants because of the Energy Suspension engine mount inserts. Come to find out it was the exhaust hanger all along

Wiring near the ECM came out nice and tight

The theme is to look as factory as possible as if GM would have built a Vortec 7.4L 454SS Sportside. Thanks to @Capt Ron for helping secure many of the missing puzzle pieces for this project

Laying some one tire fire while trying not to grenade the 10 bolt. Luckily it lays down rubber without trying very hard

I also need to run it up to @ZooMad75 shop for a front end alignment and I have a pair of new beltline window moldings to put on it. Might have the windows retinted before my father in-law gets back from FL as well. I can’t stand the 90’s purplish window tint that is on it now

 

[ZooMad75]

So when do I get to take a run in the new and improved beast?

 

[Larry]

So when do I get to take a run in the new and improved beast?

Soon

 

[Truckman4life]

Very nice! We have a 3500 cab and chassis dually here at work with that engine setup and an NV4500 behind it with the skinny dually rear end. I serviced it the other day and took it for a cruise just since it's fun to drive. It's got a big hideous wide dually flatbed on it though with a liftgate that ruins the look of the whole truck. If it wasn't for the need for the liftgate in the current use of the truck I would slap a nicer flatbed on it.

 

[Smokinthehippies]

It’s too bad @eaglemark isn’t around to put a tune in that 7.4 for you (although I’m sure your more than capable of doing it uoureelf) the time he put on my 7.4 burn was astounding. I love what you did to that truck.

 

[Larry]

It’s too bad @eaglemark isn’t around to put a tune in that 7.4 for you (although I’m sure your more than capable of doing it uoureelf) the time he put on my 7.4 burn was astounding. I love what you did to that truck.

Yeah, well Eagle Mark burnt my first 3 PROMS for this truck back in 2012 and each got worse than the one before. Not a single one of his tunes were drivable. That was the time frame when his health was really getting bad and probably had a hard time focusing on the programming side. I ended up using a guy from tbichip.com. At least his allowed the truck to run decent enough to tolerate it for 8 years until this latest swap.

 

[Smokinthehippies]

Yeah, well Eagle Mark burnt my first 3 PROMS for this truck back in 2012 and each got worse than the one before. Not a single one of his tunes were drivable. That was the time frame when his health was really getting bad and probably had a hard time focusing on the programming side. I ended up using a guy from tbichip.com. At least his allowed the truck to run decent enough to tolerate it for 8 years until this latest swap.

Yeeesh! Didn’t see that one coming.

 

[beags86]

Holly dominator ECU would fix all your problems...

 

[ZooMad75]

Holly dominator ECU would fix all your problems...

Keep in mind the intended recipient of said truck. Larry's father in law is not a gear head in our normal sense. He loves this truck but without Larry it would still be rocking a 4.3/5-speed combo. They take this truck all over and even towed a pop up camper trailer to visit family in North Dakota with it. So he needs as much oem engineering as possible for reliability, durability and any Joe wrench at a dealer or garage could work on it and understand what's been done to it.

As fun as it would be to kick it up more than it is now, reliability is #1.

Larry had aftermarket stuff on here for the TCI standalone controller for the swapped in 4l60e and it was a pita from the get go. Now the gm pcm is running the engine and transmission together as gm intended it. No more tps codes flipping the trans controller out and forcing it into limp mode with 100% line pressure banging every gear change. It was insane how often it did that alone.

 

[Larry]

Yeeesh! Didn’t see that one coming.

I believe Eagle Mark was one hell of a tuner back in the day before he got sick, especially with old school TBI PROMs. Towards the end the poor guy was just struggling to live. TBIchip.com got it running decent enough to live with for a while but it always ran kind fat and would boggggg at WOT. Wish Mark was still around doing his thing though

Holly dominator ECU would fix all your problems...

I’ve read a lot of stuff today and this without a doubt, is the most ridiculous thing I’ve read all day. Thanks for this.....I needed a good chuckle Not sure how a Holley Dominator would fix a transmission controller problem? This entire project was driven by getting away from a POS Aftermarket TCI-EZ TCU trans controller as Rob stated and that just solidified the deal to move it to port injection all in one shot. I agree though, a Dominator fixes a lot of computerized engine issues for people that don't know how to read and write

Keep in mind the intended recipient of said truck. Larry's father in law is not a gear head in our normal sense. He loves this truck but without Larry it would still be rocking a 4.3/5-speed combo. They take this truck all over and even towed a pop up camper trailer to visit family in North Dakota with it. So he needs as much oem engineering as possible for reliability, durability and any Joe wrench at a dealer or garage could work on it and understand what's been done to it.

As fun as it would be to kick it up more than it is now, reliability is #1.

Larry had aftermarket stuff on here for the TCI standalone controller for the swapped in 4l60e and it was a pita from the get go. Now the gm pcm is running the engine and transmission together as gm intended it. No more tps codes flipping the trans controller out and forcing it into limp mode with 100% line pressure banging every gear change. It was insane how often it did that alone.

Right

 

[beags86]

Did you send the trans controller back? Talk to tech support?

Anyway, while I was slightly joking about the Holley ECU because I know you like stock stuff, and wouldn't buy it. but,
I don't quite think it's as humorous as you. The ECU would fix your problems. the Holley ECUs can control that 4L60E.
Also some people want to tune themselves. Personally I would rather buy the ECU and tune it myself instead of messing with the stock stuff. And sending ECU through the mail and what not for a tune. And it has nothing to do with my abilities to read and write. To each his own.

 

[Larry]

Did you send the trans controller back? Talk to tech support?

Anyway, while I was slightly joking about the Holley ECU because I know you like stock stuff, and wouldn't buy it. but,
I don't quite think it's as humorous as you. The ECU would fix your problems. the Holley ECUs can control that 4L60E.
Also some people want to tune themselves. Personally I would rather buy the ECU and tune it myself instead of messing with the stock stuff. And sending ECU through the mail and what not for a tune. And it has nothing to do with my abilities to read and write. To each his own.

I think it is very humorous that people actually spend money on things like the Dominator kit. Like 2 grand? No thanks!

Of course I reached out to TCI…. Several times. Really dude, do you think this is my first rodeo?? Actually, the TCI guys were very nice and cool to work with. This thing kept repeatedly dropping TPS codes and when I contacted them they said, “Ya, we see this often” and to send it to them. I sent them the TCU and about a week went by and it showed up. Dropped it in the truck and life was good for about a year then the TPS codes started again. Called them again and they asked the Serial number of the actual module then said they would send me a new one as they have a newer version. It appeared in the mail and it was DIA. It wouldn’t even accept a set up tune. Called them back, and they shipped another one. This one also ran fine for about a year and started the same TPS BS codes and when it drops the TPS code the trans stops shifting but will make a 1 – 2 shift about 2800 RPMs with a huge bang. I measured the TPS voltage with the Tech 2 on the engine side as well as at pins 8 and 10 at the TCM where they were reading the exact same TPS voltage of .5 to 4.9 volts. I did find that if you cleared the TPS code out of the TCU it would shift fine until the next key cycle so my father in law kept clearing the code every time he went somewhere and that got real old. This is the exact reason why I do everything is done with with the stock GM theme as GM has put millions of test hours on their powertrains and components while the aftermarket doesn’t. Its just a fact.

I’m glad you are thrilled with your aftermarket goodies but when something does go wrong in the middle of nowhere, and it will, its not like you can just walk into Napa in Mooseballs, MT or Rattle Snake Butt, AZ and pick up Dominator ECU, Injector Driver, etc. but you can sure pickup just about any factory GM sensor or module you would ever need at practically Wal-Mart or Dollar General anywhere.

And I know many people like to bag on mail order tunes, but I have yet to have an issue with an out of the box tune from Howell. No, I don’t believe they’re perfect tunes performance wise but they have always had good manors in that they don’t jerk, die at stop lights, get hot, detonate, etc. whereas the two times I have used “Tuners” to make a custom tune for one of my projects turned into huge expensive wastes of time (this Sportside TBI PROM back in 2012 and my Suburban with the RayLar cam that was tuned in Colorado Springs at Rocky Mountain Competitive Research). Good for people that want to learn to do their own tunes but that is not for me. I don’t feel I would ever do enough tuning to really get good at it. I want the thing to start, run, run well and go play…….not continually keep tuning on it every weekend for the rest of my life and tune some more when the vehicle actually goes to a different altitude at a different temperature. Already been through that with the MEFI-4 ECM my 8.1 ran on for the first year. Ya, no…no thanks.

 

[beags86]

Well I didn't realize that TCI wasn't that good. Good to know to stay away from them.

For application that you can't run a factory computer who would you use?
I'm not saying that all aftermarket stuff is the best. But I feel like that the Holley stuff is probably the best. Sometimes the aftermarket has solutions for problems that aren't easy to overcome with other methods.

Can't say I blame you about the tuning. I was just more making the point that some people want to do that. You were dunking on someones intelligence for their inability to use/tune a stock computer. Which isn't fair. Some people like it. Some don't.

 

[Larry]

Well I didn't realize that TCI wasn't that good. Good to know to stay away from them.

For application that you can't run a factory computer who would you use?
I'm not saying that all aftermarket stuff is the best. But I feel like that the Holley stuff is probably the best. Sometimes the aftermarket has solutions for problems that aren't easy to overcome with other methods.

Can't say I blame you about the tuning. I was just more making the point that some people want to do that. You were dunking on someones intelligence for their inability to use/tune a stock computer. Which isn't fair. Some people like it. Some don't.

Ha, I didn’t realize that is what you were saying about not thinking it was humorous and quite honestly the Dominator I was imagining was the big toilet of a carburetor as I didn’t realize Holley had a full kit to control and engine and trans. Anyway, my read and write comment was a joke that is old spin off from people bickering back and forth about Motorcycle brands or car brands like the old saying the difference between a Harley Davidson and Indian rider was the Indian rider knew how to read and write. Same with Chevy vs. Ford, etc. It was a joke… I like to joke around a lot and I figured most already figured that out by now

Funny you should ask about engines that don’t have factory EFI support, as my K5 project originally was going to have a late 60’s 292 Straight 6 because I wanted it to be different and I really love those old tall block straight 6’s. They had absolutely 0 horsepower but really nice low-end torque. GM did offer a MPFI intake for the 250 6 banger in Brazil in the late 90’s running MAF (not sure of the ECM though) that would bolt on to a 292 but it was going to be a huge hassle to get one up here given the logistics and language barrier (they speak Portuguese). With that, I was considering a Holley Sniper kit for an AMC 258 because there was not many options EFI for GM straight 6’s and the price was pretty decent for the Sniper AMC 258 kit plus the self-tuning idea seemed intriguing. In the end, the 292 turned out to be a complete turd when I peeled the tin off and started peeking at the cam and bearings. It would have cost a fortune to rebuild a 292 and didn’t make sense when I had a ready to run TBI 350 already sitting on the floor. So ya, if there isn’t any other OEM alternative what choice do we have but to rely on the aftermarket. The old FCJ guys have been dealing with that for years on 304s and 401s. Same with old Ford FE engines, International gassers, Buicks, Olds, etc. About all you can to is buy extra parts and carry them with you on road trips. Hell, we do that now with our OEM systems to a certain degree. I carry an extra EP381 fuel pump that luckily I haven't needed to use in 10 years

 

[beags86]

Ha, I didn’t realize that is what you were saying about not thinking it was humorous and quite honestly the Dominator I was imagining was the big toilet of a carburetor as I didn’t realize Holley had a full kit to control and engine and trans. Anyway, my read and write comment was a joke that is old spin off from people bickering back and forth about Motorcycle brands or car brands like the old saying the difference between a Harley Davidson and Indian rider was the Indian rider knew how to read and write. Same with Chevy vs. Ford, etc. It was a joke… I like to joke around a lot and I figured most already figured that out by now

Funny you should ask about engines that don’t have factory EFI support, as my K5 project originally was going to have a late 60’s 292 Straight 6 because I wanted it to be different and I really love those old tall block straight 6’s. They had absolutely 0 horsepower but really nice low-end torque. GM did offer a MPFI intake for the 250 6 banger in Brazil in the late 90’s running MAF (not sure of the ECM though) that would bolt on to a 292 but it was going to be a huge hassle to get one up here given the logistics and language barrier (they speak Portuguese). With that, I was considering a Holley Sniper kit for an AMC 258 because there was not many options EFI for GM straight 6’s and the price was pretty decent for the Sniper AMC 258 kit plus the self-tuning idea seemed intriguing. In the end, the 292 turned out to be a complete turd when I peeled the tin off and started peeking at the cam and bearings. It would have cost a fortune to rebuild a 292 and didn’t make sense when I had a ready to run TBI 350 already sitting on the floor. So ya, if there isn’t any other OEM alternative what choice do we have but to rely on the aftermarket. The old FCJ guys have been dealing with that for years on 304s and 401s. Same with old Ford FE engines, International gassers, Buicks, Olds, etc. About all you can to is buy extra parts and carry them with you on road trips. Hell, we do that now with our OEM systems to a certain degree. I carry an extra EP381 fuel pump that luckily I haven't needed to use in 10 years

Oh yeah, sorry I guess I'm to young for that saying (or to sheltered). I obviously thought it was meant differently. And I was slightly confused by it as your generally so good natured.