1990 Suburban "The White Whale"

[Dieselwrencher]

After the birth of our son, and me getting tired of driving the kids around in a Ford Contour because the a/c doesn't work in my truck, I bought a 90 Suburban. It isn't the nicest, but isn't the worst. It's been sitting for 2 years or so I was told, and had a squeaking in the engine. when I went to look at it and we got it to start, boy oh boy. The squeak was a horrible knock with a side of squeak. I ended up working out a deal with the PO, bought an engine for it, and hauled it home. I scoured CL for an engine and found a TBI 350 from a 95 K10 that I could hear run. It had no blow by, no leaks, and ran great. I've been so busy lately I had my cousin swap engines. So now the burb runs, sorta, and needs a good scrubbing and cleaning. Here's some pics.














It has brand new tires on it, some one has rebuilt the front end recently, the fuel pump was replaced not long before it was parked, but it reeks of mice urine! Hopefully we can get that smell out of it. It runs and drives great, other than right now when you first start it up, you have to spray either or brake clean in the throttle body before it will fire up. I'm guessing it's due to the 2 year old gas that's been sitting in the tank. I'm going to replace the fuel filter and see if that helps. I may also dump some sea foam in it to try that too. It needs some tlc and I have to fix the a/c, and the LH rear door won't open. I plan on replacing the LH rear door, fixing some rusty areas, and giving it a Maaco paint job and call it good. What do ya think?

[Mattman2010]

Looking good man, but it sounds like it needs a straight six
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[Dieselwrencher]

No it doesn't.

[Mattman2010]

Trust me, I know you want to. I'm sure you have an extra motor setting somewhere that you could put in it!
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[Dieselwrencher]

Nope, fresh out of engines for my own burb swap. I'd finish the 76 before repowering this. This burb needs to be on the road sooner than later.

[Mattman2010]

Just use the 24v that is for the 76

[thirdstreettito]

White Whale! My 88 is the Polar Bear I had though about Vanilla Gorilla or Albino Rhino lmao

Nice score! Welcome to the Burb club! Need any tips/info, lmk.

[Dieselwrencher]

Thanks man, I'll keep that in mind.

[Dieselwrencher]

I got a lot of things done on this unit and started driving it. The wife's daily driver lost the timing chain, so we had to get this thing going. My wife cleaned the snot out of the interior, and now it needs it again. You can smell dog urine faintly now. We'll probably have to remove the carpet and power wash it to get the smell to go away. I found the rh front leaf spring shackle top bolt broken. I fixed that, replaced the oxygen sensor, spark plugs, 3 out of 4 head lights, new wiper blades, new to it hood and cowl panel, got the LH rear door to open, and now the rear cargo door won't open. We replaced the auto lock outs with new lock outs too. We took it to the car wash and gave it a bath, now it doesn't look too bad. Next thing is a u-joint at the rear axle. Napa is supposed to get the other head light in today, and I need to get the front bumper put on and my other grill to try to make it look a little bit better. Then to remove the HVAC box and remove the huge mouse nest. Oh boy these things suck when mice make houses out of them!

[Mattman2010]

Looking good bub, you actually have been working on a ton of stuff!

[spudz]

looks good!

[Dieselwrencher]

There won't be anymore progress on the white whale. My wife didn't like it and I was able to get it sold this past weekend. I enjoyed driving it, but not nearly as much as my F-350.