Out with the old and in with the new.
 

After much deliberation, cleaning spree's, cursing at cleaning the hair out of the seats and not having anything except for my brown 78' stepside to carefully haul some stuff in I have made the decision to switch back to a truck as a daily driver. As some of you may know, it is hard to find a 2wd up in NY or in the northeast period especially looking at new trucks. So I am trading in my Subaru (insurance was too expensive on the thing anyway), and selling my 71' 2wd Blazer that I picked up a few months ago to BUILD my new truck.

I made it pretty simple and will be putting a down payment to build the truck later tomorrow (7/28. I decided on a 2015 Sierra RCSB 2wd, 5.3L, SLE, Trailering package, 3.42 gears, color matched wheel lip openings and rear wheelhouse liners in the beautiful color of Sonoma Red. Truck will wind up arriving during truck month which is great timing for incentives.

I am putting the factory style 20x9" wheel on the truck....the ones that kind of look like beehives or whatever. Staggering the tires 265/45R20 and 285/50R20 Pirelli Scorpion Verde All Season's. Also adding a Mcgaughy's 4/7 lowering kit with shocks....all the parts are ordered and will be waiting for the truck.

Once the 71' blazer sells, I'll add Hooker headers, Flowmaster hi-flo cats, flowmaster super 40 mufflers with a stainless 3" exhaust system, K&N air intake, MAFS, a tonneau cover and then call it good for the time being.

If anyone wants the 71' it is in the classifieds and I will give you a good deal on it, especially with all the money I spent making it more road worthy because it was for sitting for so long.

All in all, I'm gonna have the only truck in my area like it, and I'm very happy that it'll be built the way I want instead of taking what someone has on the lot.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Cool-almost bought those wheels in the 22" version.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Looking good!

2011 GMC, McGaughy's lowering kit, Azuza wheels, 5.3, EFI tune, 6 speed auto, with 3.42 gearing. Kooks headers and Magnaflow muffler going to dual rear outlets.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

How do you like those Kooks headers? Are they much better quality than say Hooker, Doug Thorley or Gibson? Love the truck too, I wish I could have black...I'd be polishing it everywhere I went though.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

I have never had a set of Hooker headers, in my life. I have had many other brands that were a lot cheaper. I do have a set of Thorley headers and the design work on them appears to be in alignment with the Kooks set. I got my Kooks headers from Maryland Speed and it was during their header special sale that they do annually. I got the headers, piping and cats all together and the headers are Jet coated for a lasting finish. The jet coating was at no extra cost and they saved me some cash on the whole deal. They installed easily and the fit and finish was right easy to deal with. I think that if I wanted to do the same on my Pontiac G8 and maybe a later truck, I would still go with that brand.

When I install headers, I use teflon tape on the bolts that holds them to the heads and that solves any issues of having bolts coming loose. I set them, drive for a period and reset the bolts one last time and that is all that is needed. The teflon tape will let the bolts comeout without any problem either. The headers on my 2011 have been there since the middle of 2011 and I now have over 100,000 miles on it. I purchased the truck in January of 2011.

I have a couple black vehicles and I live in the middle of Kansas, in a small rural town. The trick is to get the paint smooth and clean and then use a product that really works in all kinds of weather. Everyone has their particular brand, but I found the Wizards products do quite well in Summer and Winter. Just check with Low E above, he and I have had several together.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Wow! That's a very nice truck

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Congrats on the new truck… The only thing that sucks about the 2014 Reg. Cab trucks, is the radio… No matter what level of trim you get, it's still the small 4" screen, you need to get into a double cab in order to get the 8" screen… Hope that changed for 2015…

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Has anyone tried to update the air intake on a new 2014, yet? We have one that the CAI was installed and the owner is not sure if the computer is reading it right.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Gotcha. Hooker is about $150 less than Kooks so I have a month to deliberate about it. I'm probably not going to be driving the truck during winter soooo, I should be fine regardless of the color that I chose. I'll have to give wizard a little try, I have a mix of meguires and mothers products.

That's just a picture of a truck that mine is going to look like. Mine is ordered and comes in around September.

It is still a 4" screen because the manager kept asking if I wanted more than a regular cab and I kept telling them "No".

If you don't have an answer in a month & 1/2 then I'll let you know.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

[QUOTE=BabyBlue;6785553]Gotcha. Hooker is about $150 less than Kooks so I have a month to deliberate about it. I'm probably not going to be driving the truck during winter soooo, I should be fine regardless of the color that I chose. I'll have to give wizard a little try, I have a mix of meguires and mothers products.


I had the opportunity to match up the Wizards to Mequiars a few years ago and the amount of return for the amount of elbow grease given was leaps and bounds in the Wizards house. I was on a Hot Rod Power Tour and the Mequiars people did a morning with their techs as a demonstration of their products. I was clearly surprised the difference was in the Wizards favor.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Debadged, McGaughy's 4/7 kit installed, 20" OE Wheels. More pics to come as I just installed color matched moldings and wheel house liners. Also order Kooks Headers and Y-pipe with flowmaster series 40's.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Nice truck. I just got my new Silverado on Monday. I'm happy with mine so I'm sure you are too. I did end up going with one on the lot and getting the 2014 for the truck month discounts but I got what I wanted. Your wheels look great.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Yes, thoroughly enjoying it. I just installed my K&N filter, my weathertech floor mats and I will be getting my Kooks Headers installed this weekend with my flowmaster exhaust hopefully welded in on Monday.

Updated picture of the truck.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Truck looks beautiful…

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Update: Kooks 1 3/4" Calico coated headers installed with Y-pipe, new MSD wires installed and K&N air intake. Pics to follow after it gets cleaned up. Video after it gets exhaust on Monday.

Thanks!

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

well........ we're waiting.......

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Nice truck man. Planning on getting a victory red single cab mid year next year. The wheels and drop look perfect.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Great looking truck! How is the ride with the 4/7 kit? Also what size tires did you end up using?

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Finally stopped raining and got some pics!

Thanks. Look forward to seeing yours!

Honestly, seeing how they sit so high to start out with I can't feel a difference from stock. Well, aside from the front air dam scraping every now and then. Rides really nice.

Tires are front - 265/45R-20 and rear - 285/50R-20 Pirelli Scorpion Verde All Season Plus XL's.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Last two for now

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

that's a good looking truck you have.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Very nice truck.
Would you care to say how much you have invested in this truck?
$50k+???

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Barely just crossed over $40k

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Been talking with Texas Speed, Lingenfelter and also a couple local shops. Brain storming in the works and a lot of research to get particular idea's to fruition. Looks like it's time for some more upgrades, and some tunage.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Interested to know what cam you pick and how well it works.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

http://www.lingenfelter.com/mm5/merc...E#.VGIUFFtigi4

http://www.lingenfelter.com/mm5/merc...7#.VGIUC1tigi5

These two parts are at the top of my list right now. I am trying to get a head gasket thickness to find out exactly how much this might drop my compression and if I should just buy stock 6.2L heads. 56.5cc vs the 59-61cc of those beautiful machined heads. That cam might be a little aggressive in which I may opt for the Comp Cam D .224/.236 N .222/.234 118LSA .572/.529 @ .050" (With 1.8 Rocker Arm).

We'll see. I might just go with a tune for the moment and wait till spring for these upgrades.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Very nice truck! I just bought a 2014 Chevrolet RCSB with the 5.3L/6 speed automatic, but haven't' picked it up yet. Can you haul anything after doing the 4/7 drop? I'd like to lower it, but I'm hesitant because I want to pull a trailer sometimes as well as throw stuff in the back. Not to mention the possibility of warranty issues.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

My 2011 has a McGaughy's 5/7 drop. I upgraded the rear shocks to a Bilstein shock over the McGaughy's shocks. I use my truck daily and haul what I want in it. I have had close to a 1000 pounds of black dirt in it without any real issues in hauling it.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

Blank canvas... I have a few ideas.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

I'm with piecesparts, I've had a bunch of lumber in the back without any issues. I kept my bumpstops and those hit every once in a while if I am not careful around a huge bump or hauling a lot with a good bump, but other than that, no issues. My dealership is a little finicky but they didn't care about the lowering, more about the tune that I have to do after the headers and air intake.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

I talked to the service manager at my dealer and he said the only pieces that would not retain the factory warranty would be those that I replaced. However, if they deem the drop caused a failure of other parts they may not be covered. For instance, if a u-joint fails and they attribute it to a vibration caused by the drop it wouldn't be covered by the warranty. Fair enough, I guess it's the price of looking awesome! :lol: I think I will go with a 3/5 drop initially since the drop is adjustable. One question that does come to mind is that you all mention changing shocks. Everything I've read says the kit comes with front struts and rear shock, do they not work well?

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

The front drop consists of changing the springs and the spindle piece, but uses the factory strut. As good as they are, I wanted a better control of my ride, so after a short period of time, I upgraded to a different strut. The rear shocks work well, but the pair that I got from McGaughy's did not have the valving that I wanted, so I upgraded to a Bilstein shock. With my 5/7 drop, I changed out the degree pieces in the front to allow for more range on the wheel alignment.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

I should probably get those alignment cams for mine, it isn't quite factory alignment but it is darn close.
MY front drop used the adjustable coil spring mounts....now that they have an adjustable strut, c-notch and drop shackle......hrmmmmm, maybe it's time to go looooweeeer. hahahaha. Have to wait till this NY winter is over and I know I can get a "winter" rig though. I hate driving it in the winter but it's not like the 78' is touching pavement anytime soon.

Re: Out with the old and in with the new.
 

The one thing that I found out about mine and winter. It now sits low enough and the design of the frame being so low, the truck actually became a sled in deeper snow. It would actually move along until it lifted the wheels high enough to not get any more grip. I now have a four wheel drive winter beater for those stinky deep snow days.