Stock Vehicle Maintenance

Seems as though I opened up quite the proverbial can of worms posting about this! Lots of good information though! Thanks everybody!

Long as mine stays running good, I don't think I'll be getting around to messing with anything until November or so. Moving into the busy season where I work, and that means sun up to sundown 7 days a week usually.

270k on my original 97 vortec. No major issues at all. Stock dizzy, I pulled the heads at 252k to have an exhaust manifold bolt drilled out before installing headers. Everything looked great in there. Still have the poppet style spider but it is in need of the updated part. I used to get 10mpg and it seems to be dropping as time progresses. It's no longer my daily either so I don't have to worry about issues as much.

I bought it with 175k on the clock. Switched everything to synthetics the same week I got it. Trans is original too. Never been in it. Now has a deep aluminum pan and a temp gauge to keep an eye on the slushbox.

I'm a firm believer in preventative maintenance. I grease it every oil change. And still have the factory front suspension parts that passed the last alignment check 10k miles ago although the rag joint is very worn making the steering a bit sloppy.

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Tyler/T-Unit

Sampuppy1 said:

270k on my original 97 vortec. No major issues at all. Stock dizzy, I pulled the heads at 252k to have an exhaust manifold bolt drilled out before installing headers. Everything looked great in there. Still have the poppet style spider but it is in need of the updated part. I used to get 10mpg and it seems to be dropping as time progresses. It's no longer my daily either so I don't have to worry about issues as much.

I bought it with 175k on the clock. Switched everything to synthetics the same week I got it. Trans is original too. Never been in it. Now has a deep aluminum pan and a temp gauge to keep an eye on the slushbox.

I'm a firm believer in preventative maintenance. I grease it every oil change. And still have the factory front suspension parts that passed the last alignment check 10k miles ago although the rag joint is very worn making the steering a bit sloppy.

Sent from a flagged XT1254
Tyler/T-Unit

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I like hearing stories like this. Mine is kind of my daily since it hauls my tools around, but it doesn't have to be since I have my pickup and toaster shaped car as well. So it really isn't critical if a part like the distributor suddenly causes problems, I can park it for a while until I get around to fixing it. I'm like you, I grease everything that can be greased on all my vehicles every oil change as well, and check everything over pretty regularly.

I picked up an ignition cylinder a few days ago, I'll be putting that in when I get a chance.

Also another quick question while I'm thinking about it. My voltage gauge constantly reads low, and tends to vary a decent amount. But rarely does it ever show 14 or higher, typically more like 12-13.5, doesn't seem to matter whether I just started it, or have been driving for a long time. I've probed the back of the alternator, and checked voltage at the battery with it running before, and the charging system is working as it should be. But obviously the voltage gauge is not accurately reading how many volts the alternator is actually putting out.

Is this a common issue or do I have something weird going on? It's been like that ever since I got the vehicle, and I never worried about it since the charging system is working properly.

The accuracy of the gauges is questionable at best. I hook up the scanner and remove the needles from the volt meter, oil, tach, speedo and temp gauges. I get a long straight stretch of road and set the cruise. I then put the needle on the tach according scanner, speedo based on my phone's gps and then I pull over and do the temp and voltage from the scanner reading. Lastly I shut the engine off and turn the key on to set the oil pressure to zero. I have my sweetie call out the information on the scanner because this is really unsafe to do on my own.

seanb98 said:

I picked up an ignition cylinder a few days ago, I'll be putting that in when I get a chance.

Also another quick question while I'm thinking about it. My voltage gauge constantly reads low, and tends to vary a decent amount. But rarely does it ever show 14 or higher, typically more like 12-13.5, doesn't seem to matter whether I just started it, or have been driving for a long time. I've probed the back of the alternator, and checked voltage at the battery with it running before, and the charging system is working as it should be. But obviously the voltage gauge is not accurately reading how many volts the alternator is actually putting out.

Is this a common issue or do I have something weird going on? It's been like that ever since I got the vehicle, and I never worried about it since the charging system is working properly.

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I would check the ground going to the cab, these trucks are getting old.

skylark said:

The accuracy of the gauges is questionable at best. I hook up the scanner and remove the needles from the volt meter, oil, tach, speedo and temp gauges. I get a long straight stretch of road and set the cruise. I then put the needle on the tach according scanner, speedo based on my phone's gps and then I pull over and do the temp and voltage from the scanner reading. Lastly I shut the engine off and turn the key on to set the oil pressure to zero. I have my sweetie call out the information on the scanner because this is really unsafe to do on my own.

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That sounds like a good way of setting them to where they should be. But I'm wondering the actual cause as to why the gauges, (or at least the voltage meter in my case) is so far off to start with. I can't imagine it was that way to begin with off the assembly line, so why is it that way now? The other gauges may be off as well to some extent, temperature always seems to read a little low even after the new thermostat. I think my speedometer reads a little high.

Even though it isn't critical for what I use the suburban for, I would be kind of interested to see what your scan tool says about the actual reading values as compared to what the gauge displays. Can you do a sweep of the gauges with your scan tool to reset them or does that just determine whether or not the needle has the full range of motion? Maybe I could pay you sometime to plug your scanner in and show me what the real time data shows, and what capabilities are there.

michael hurd said:

I would check the ground going to the cab, these trucks are getting old.

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That is an idea. Several months back it pooped out on me. Was going downhill, so I just let it go. Blew through the stop sign at the bottom of the hill and coasted into a driveway that was right across. Wouldn't restart, so I left it there. On my lunch break I did a bit of troubleshooting and found out that there was no visible corrosion, but just enough internally on the battery connections that it didn't have enough voltage to keep the electronics happy. Cleaned and coated the terminals, and everything was good to go after that. Checking the grounds is definitely a good start.

I know that I can command the fuel gauge in 10% increments but I don't believe that I can do any others. Sorry but I won't charge you. I'm not a shop, just a guy with some tools.