Towing with sbc 350!!!

dAT OBS said:

You work at the dealer in 90s or what?...that would be sweet

The glove box sticker is ruin..so I have to open the diff

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Yes I started in the late '80's and worked at a GMC dealership and later moved to a Chevrolet dealer when the GMC dealer closed.

Before I put the Tuned Port Injected 400 in it, I had been towing this 11k 36’ trailer Coast to Coast with the original 274k mile 350 Vortec.

dAT OBS said:

That a good truck right there!!!

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Heck yeah thanks man! It's been a fun truck whether I'm hauling trailers, cruising with my buddies, or climbing up to 12k feet in the rockies.

I had a 5.7 1995 G30 van I used to tow a 6,000lb enclosed trailer up the mountains here in Oregon. It was tbi like yours. The ram jet cam woke it up along with vortec heads. The engine required tuning with tuner pro. It was a fun project. The engine was not that bad after I got done, it was the awful 4l60e ratios that caused me to off it. I rebuilt it for towing, but the ratios were unchanged. Yes the light duty G30 in 1995 came with a 4l60e. Since you have the 4l80, with some minor mods you should be happy.

I have a 94 K3500 with the 5.7 and 4.10 gears. It was a city vehicle and I am the third owner. I used it in a tree business for 8 years, but am retired now. I tow a 5,000 lb travel trailer with it and it does struggle with grades, especially at high altitude. Sometimes I think about trying to get some more horsepower out of it but I don't want to sacrifice reliability.

stehansen said:

I have a 94 K3500 with the 5.7 and 4.10 gears. It was a city vehicle and I am the third owner. I used it in a tree business for 8 years, but am retired now. I tow a 5,000 lb travel trailer with it and it does struggle with grades, especially at high altitude. Sometimes I think about trying to get some more horse power out of it but I don't want to sacrifice reliability.

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its old, drive slower and look at the scenery. no magic bullet, it is what it is.

how many miles on it?

320,000. It had 180,000 when I bought it, I have put a motor in it, rebuilt the transmission, rear end, replaced the radiator 3 times I think, maybe four. Put all new air condition components in it, redid the seat twice, new headliner, new door panels, had it painted. Plus all the normal stuff over the years. The most recent repair was I replaced the tie rod ends. I see my front axle is leaking. I used to tow a dump trailer with it and I had a john deere tractor that fit in it and that was just under 10,000 lb. I have to say it has been a workhorse over the years and I am somewhat emotionally attached to it.

"emotionally attached", don't blame you, haha.
So unless you spend alot of $, its gonna tough to make it much better than it is already for towing. Back in the day that was almost the "top dog" for hauling.
Looks good for 320k miles.

About 1997ish I was a work-study at a technical college in an automotive program and the 'local' GM plant donated all their mis-stampings to the school. We went to the motor pool and checked out a '68-72 C10 with a 350. We drove a hundred miles towing a 30' gooseneck trailer with the engine running like crap. We loaded 10,000 lbs of unpainted steel body panels into the trailer and started driving back, 40 mph uphill, 60 mph downhill. Finally the truck start shuddering and banging. We stopped and found the driveshaft wobbling in the carrier bearing, but we also noticed two spark plugs hanging. We got under the hood and reattached two spark plug wires and found a third burned off. The truck ran like a champ on 7 cylinders, but we had to keep the speed down to keep the carrier bearing intact. We made it back just fine.

Twenty-something years later I won't look down my nose at a 350 when it comes to towing. We're too conditioned to think we need a 6+ liter diesel to tow anything heavy.

Bought my '94 GMC k1500 (3.73 gears, tow package) in '16, spent 3 years trying to tow with it, making improvements constantly, 2- 4" direct air intakes, MSD adjustable timeing control, dual exhaust (no cats), Fastchip. Nothing worked too good, kept cracking exhaust manifolds because I liked blasting up mountain passes in 2nd up to 4,000 rpm. So, replaced it last October with a 383 stroker. Now that is an engine for towing. Can tow a 5,000 lb travel trailer in 4th, has oodles of torque. Right now Old EFi is tweaking a chip for me using TunerPro RT. Got the remanufactured engine from S&J engines in Spokane for $2300 with roller cam, can't beat that. Now I can go as fast as I want when I want, but always keep it around 65 mph for the sake of the trailer tires and safety.