AWD 99 2 Door Tahoe Build

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Jnunez74

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I've got a single Black Magic fan on my build and it moves some serious air for its size. I think it's rated for 3000 CFM. You can feel it in front of the truck, no need for the paper towel test. 2 of them would really move air.

I have my fan programmed to come on at 200 and off at 195 and it only takes a minute or two to do it. I'll be switching to a colder thermostat soon and reprogram it.
I think I’m going to bump them up to 195 for the first and 205 for the second. The more I’m reading the more I’m thinking I might want to increase it. These are rated at 4500 cfm and as soon as I flipped the polarity it was pulling my shirt into the condenser. The kit I have is the dual 16” Extreme truck fans (jegs house brand). Oddly enough this ecu only has a set on off position. It turns on and off at the same temp which is odd to me.

My brother was looking for an electric fan kit for his 6.0 I’ll have to recommend the black magic if it is moving that much off of a single
 

Wh4t3v3rs

I got real bass!!!!
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May I ask if the inlet and outlet, to the radiator, is on the same side. If so, is it a true cross flow design? I've had teammates with your problem and it was because the radiator didn't force the crossflow and when driving, it would heat up.......
 

Jnunez74

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May I ask if the inlet and outlet, to the radiator, is on the same side. If so, is it a true cross flow design? I've had teammates with your problem and it was because the radiator didn't force the crossflow and when driving, it would heat up.......
According to cold case it is a cross flow, and it isn’t having the troubles anymore, put about 100 miles on it and it never overheated. Didn’t get over 190, and the fans are kicking on and off where as they just stayed in before
 

Jnunez74

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Lil update on it all

The cooling system has been sorted in its entirety, so that’s another check off of the list which was a massive relief.

Added a MSD 6AL that my brother had laying around from his old setup on his corvette into the ignition. Before it was in there the spark wasn’t necessarily weak but it definitely was not as strong as one would like. It integrated seamlessly into the proflow system, 6 wires, and now if you hold a plug a half inch off of ground you get phenomenal spark out of it.

Installed the cable for the posilok this weekend and also the floor shifter for the tcase. Right now it is just temped in as the plan is to build a console to integrate it into, but with those two installed the theory of AWD has been proven. In 2wd from a stop if you give her full throttle it lights the tires up and gets next to no traction, but as soon as you engage the front diff you lose all of the wheel spin. That was incredibly nice to have confirmed and I am confident saying that proof of concept has been achieved.

Has a bit of a discussion with a few guys regarding the hearing hose set up on 454s in the gmt platform and it was decided to route them through the intake manifold as can be seen in the photos. From my understanding this will ensure that the intake manifold is at the same temp as the coolant.

That’s really it for the updates, but it marks the end of the mechanical side of things and I will be moving on to finishing dressing up the wiring and getting it ready for paint, which will include removing the rear panel windows which will be interesting to say the least.

Thank you to all of those who offered insight to the cooling issue I was having and all of the other input that was given. The support of this community has made this project immensely easier and I can’t thank you guys enough.
 

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Jnunez74

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Maybe someone will have an idea on this, not the end of the world I don’t think but it’s definitely a funky lil situation.

Took the truck to a shop to get aligned when suspension was put together for the final time. It pulled together and surprisingly was in the green for stock specs despite the variety of contributing vehicles. It was a relief to see this but through the various test drives and moving it around it has been noticed that in reverse the wheels gain negative camber and toe out cause them to drag. We scratched our heads, pulled the front end apart and re torqued it all thinking it could be something that was overlooked in reassembly. After rolling it back and forth and getting suspension to settle, it goes back to alignment when moving forward but if you reverse for a moment they get pulled back out.

All I can think at this point is that the rear UCA bolt slots are so wallowed out from the previous owner that they aren’t holding when the opposite force is applied but that doesn’t seem right because it immediately returns to its alignment.

So far everything that can be torqued has been torqued so that’s out of the picture. Tires have been properly burned to flatness by the rear then rotated to front so can eliminate goofy misworn tread from the equation.

This thankfully isn’t affect its abilities to travel forward so not the end of the world but it has me scratching my head. I don’t want to have this spark issues later down the line and doubt that it will be anything more than a head scratcher but maybe one of you guys have some clue to what it maybe. I’ll get pics of it next time I’m home to give you a visual but imagine that it toes out a good inch and gains a half inch of negative camber when backing down the driveway.
 

Cpufreak101

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Maybe someone will have an idea on this, not the end of the world I don’t think but it’s definitely a funky lil situation.

Took the truck to a shop to get aligned when suspension was put together for the final time. It pulled together and surprisingly was in the green for stock specs despite the variety of contributing vehicles. It was a relief to see this but through the various test drives and moving it around it has been noticed that in reverse the wheels gain negative camber and toe out cause them to drag. We scratched our heads, pulled the front end apart and re torqued it all thinking it could be something that was overlooked in reassembly. After rolling it back and forth and getting suspension to settle, it goes back to alignment when moving forward but if you reverse for a moment they get pulled back out.

All I can think at this point is that the rear UCA bolt slots are so wallowed out from the previous owner that they aren’t holding when the opposite force is applied but that doesn’t seem right because it immediately returns to its alignment.

So far everything that can be torqued has been torqued so that’s out of the picture. Tires have been properly burned to flatness by the rear then rotated to front so can eliminate goofy misworn tread from the equation.

This thankfully isn’t affect its abilities to travel forward so not the end of the world but it has me scratching my head. I don’t want to have this spark issues later down the line and doubt that it will be anything more than a head scratcher but maybe one of you guys have some clue to what it maybe. I’ll get pics of it next time I’m home to give you a visual but imagine that it toes out a good inch and gains a half inch of negative camber when backing down the driveway.
Dumb question, but does this occur in both 2WD and AWD?

Anyways sweet build man, I'd love a 454 powered toy of my own someday
 

Jnunez74

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Every single part on the rig except for the body and frame has been replaced either with new parts (OE from Advanced Auto, or GM parts direct) bushings, ball joints, lowers, tie rods, idler arm, pitman arm, steering box, knuckles, CV’s all were new out of the box. Uppers were shortened an inch but bushings were replaced and so was ball joint. There is a bit of mismatching ( ball joint out of nbs in upper out of obs, lowers from nbs 2500, 2500 nbs knuckles, 2500 nbs cvs, 2500 obs tie rods
It sounds like you used old parts? With camber change I'd suspect control arm bushings or upper ball joints.
 

Jnunez74

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Been a long while since the last update to this thread. Did some tweaking on the suspension and managed to get it to not camber out as much. Got a plate on it and took it out for its first spin. Definitely had an interesting time.

The truck did wonderfully for 300 miles other than odds and ends like fill lines on the gas tank leaking, leakage from the eBay diff and leakage from the oil pressure fitting on the block. Got all odds and ends completed other than the diff as I don’t have ability to pull it at the moment and get it rebuilt.

Had an issue with a relay getting stuck and not triggering the fuel pump so got stranded for an hour or so waiting for it to unstick. The electrical has been troublesome as I’m still trying to figure out what I can snip. For some reason I lost tailights when I tried to delete the 4wd selector plugs. Odd, but I gave up on thinning the harness and opted to just hide all the obsolete plugs.

Got tires and rims as well. Managed to change the back glass as well. Reinstalled old grille and front bumper with the new lights in them. Having issues with them that I’ll go into once I can nail down exactly what is going on.

My painter has completed the hood, the grille and the new front bumper. Currently the truck is stripped down once more with no back glass panels or windshield. (Don’t recommend driving without one) headliner is out so I can bring the board to get recovered.

I have new carpets to go in it and dyna mat, but for now it’s all staying out so a factory paint job can be mimicked to the best of my ability.
 

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