The "other" 396...with a factory turbocharger

[njsteve]

I had a set of decals made up for the Suburban, based off the factory &quot;6.5 Diesel Turbo&quot; decals. I got tired of everyone calling it a 6.5 Liter diesel. It's a 396 DAGNABBIT! [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/grin.gif[/img]








I've been spending my time working on the 1995 diesel Suburban recently. I bought this truck new back in '95. Still has its factory original blue paint. It's a very rare color: Atlantic Blue. You may remember this baby from the infamous headgasket failure episode while towing the SD455 to the 2013 MCACN show.

I spent the past month underneath cleaning the scale off the frame and painting the rails. I had to pull the fuel tank to repair a rusted part of the frame box in front of the trailer hitch mount where the crud gets trapped and sits. Unless you pull your rear bumper and run a hose into the frame horns you can never clean that area out. The salt sits there and corrodes the rails from the inside out. I found the rust after hammering the scale off the rails. Quite a shock in deed! One good trailer pull with the class IV hitch could have torn the end of the rail right off at the hitch mounting area.

I also upgraded the infamous factory exploding rubber&amp;aluminum oil cooler lines with AN fittings and braided steel hose. And I replaced the harmonic balancer and serpentine pulley - two other major failure points on the 6.5 engines. The balancers are known to lose their rubber and let the outer ring go flying. The distorted harmonics then cause the engine to immediately grenade itself within seconds.

I upgraded the downpipe and exhaust to 4&quot; and got a madrel bent crossover pipe to replaced the double walled factory pipe that tend to collapse internally with age.

And years ago I relocated the fuel injection pump module from the pump to behind the front bumper. This was the other bad design of these engines: the PMD &quot;pump mounted driver&quot; as they call it was mounted to the side of the injection pump in the intake valley. In theory, the cool fuel flowing through the pump reduces the temperature of the controller. Only the engineers didn't bother to think what happens when you shut the engine off on a 95 degree day. Heat soak would destroy the PMD and leave you stranded. GM refused to acknowledge the problem and just replaced the entire pump. They even extended the warranty on the pumps to 100,000 miles in order to avoid a recall. This truck went through three warranteed injection pumps when new, at 15,600, 15,800, and 48,000 miles. The problem only stopped after I relocated the PMD behind the bumper ten years ago.

Anyway, Just thought I'd show off the old girl.

We should start a new section for our haulin' vehicles along with the other mark-specific sections.

[njsteve]

And no, I am not using it to tow the SD455 to to MCACN this year. My buddy is lending me his Dodge Cummins 2500 pickup and new trailer. The Suburban is too nice to drive around in bad weather now. [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/grin.gif[/img]

[Xplantdad]

very cool!!

[PeteLeathersac]

'

Nice work Steve and your Hauler thread is a great idea!
Amazing for original paint also those later style factory rims really make it look like a much newer rig!
[img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/beers.gif[/img]
~ Pete

[njsteve]

I found those next generation 16&quot; 2500 wheels on ebay really cheap a couple months ago. They were brand new take offs removed from a truck back in 2002 and sat in some lady's garage til she got cleanin' one day and wanted them gone.

The unsprung weight difference is amazing. I think these aluminum wheels are 9 lbs each versus the steelies which were 30 lbs each. It was instantly noticeable when accelerating, that these wheels were lighter. It was like swapping a out 120 lb flywheel for a 36 lb one.