I don’t have the p/n’s and yes they’re just the ones called for.
2004 Tahoe LS - Street Touring Style
- Thread starter jeffg
- Start date
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Congratulations! I like your thinking on this build and the reasons for it. My "midlife crisis" was forced on me due to a transplant. During recovery, at the hospital, the Hot Rod Power Tour blew into town for the last night. The power tour became a bucket list item with intentions of driving my 70 GTO with RA IV, turbo 400, 4.33, 40 year old muscle car, or my 04 yukon xl with 8.1 and 4.10. Due to unknown future health I sold the GTO and picked up a used 04 CTSV and my wife became long haulers on the 2010 Power Tour.
My takeaway is this: safety, reliability, comfort, and attitude.
Let's take attitude first because it is free. While taking the suggested routes we encountered numerous traffic delays with plenty of bumper to bumper traffic, narrow roads with limited shoulders leading to small towns in the middle of nowhere. The towns were lined with spectators young and old wishing they were you. Many want to see burn outs etc. The desire was strong and you should have seen their jaws drop when a four door Cadillac did a smoking burn out. Imagine the reaction doing this with a forced induction 04 Tahoe!
Safety is a must for all the right reasons. I would utilize the best brake system possible and hope you don't have to use it. (more to come, have to pick up the grandkids)
Ohannon7
Member
Any pics yet?? 
So far things are moving along, albeit slowly. There isn’t a lot of progress to show, as I am really just in the planning and parts gathering phases. I keep making plans, then remaking plans as I discover parts being unavailable or discontinued. I do have a few milestones to show off, so as they say… on with the show.
Getting reasonable audio in the Tahoe, along with the ability to utilize phone apps for navigation and streaming audio is critical. This Tahoe was an LS model and did not come with either Bose or OnStar, so luckily interfacing with the factory electronics was simple. A Pioneer head unit, some old school PG amps and Alpine speakers were added to the factory locations. This gave me an opportunity to repair several broken door clips and panels. For those following along my other threads, I also added lights to the rear doors to replace the reflectors. I used the factory wiring from a suburban and added the missing pins to the connectors at each door sill.
Low end responsibilities are taken up by a Soundstream 10” sub in the factory rear panel location. I had hopes that the OEM enclosure could be used, but its too small. A run to the pick a part yielded rear panels from a sub equipped Yukon.
A bit of cardboard engineering resulted in an enclosure that should be close to .6 cu ft, which will be perfect for a small, sealed setup. The cardboard box will be cut apart to use as templates for an MDF enclosure.
Lastly, I found a set of 20” GMC Sierra wheels on marketplace for a cheap and used those to replace the 17’s and AT tires that were previously on the truck. I kind of like the aggressive tire, but I fear that would cost me during the long road trip.
Waiting in the wings are many more parts that still need to find a home on the Tahoe.
My LQ9 will be back from the machine shop in the next couple of weeks. I am also having them do a set of square port heads. I am contemplating have both setups run on a dyno to see if we lose anything with the 799s. Using a square port head would make the supercharger install easier and remove the adapter plates needed for cathedral port heads.
I picked up an 4L80e to put behind the engine. It is going to be gone through and a shift kit will be installed. New cooler lines were ordered, and I am still waiting on word back from BTR on whether I will need a converter. My tuner feels like the cam and supercharger combination might be a bit rough and a 3000-stall converter might smooth things out. I ordered a bunch of rebuild parts for the transfer case so that I can mate everything together based on recommendations from this forum.
The suspension is almost all here, so hopefully I can work on getting that done in the next week or so. An Eibach rear sway bar, -3 rear springs, DJM relocating and shock brackets, and Bilstein 4600’s will handle the rear. The front is a bit less finalized. I am going to try lowering keys and another Eibach sway bar in the front, but I have doubts it will end up like I want it to. I had a couple of conversations with a fab shop in SoCal that has done a lot of coilover conversion on GMT800s and I will probably end up taking the truck down there to have them go over the whole thing. This will include cutting out all of the stock front suspension and welding in new brackets and upper mounts to run a full length coilover. They will also make matching rear bars to replace the factory links and panhard bar.
Getting reasonable audio in the Tahoe, along with the ability to utilize phone apps for navigation and streaming audio is critical. This Tahoe was an LS model and did not come with either Bose or OnStar, so luckily interfacing with the factory electronics was simple. A Pioneer head unit, some old school PG amps and Alpine speakers were added to the factory locations. This gave me an opportunity to repair several broken door clips and panels. For those following along my other threads, I also added lights to the rear doors to replace the reflectors. I used the factory wiring from a suburban and added the missing pins to the connectors at each door sill.
Low end responsibilities are taken up by a Soundstream 10” sub in the factory rear panel location. I had hopes that the OEM enclosure could be used, but its too small. A run to the pick a part yielded rear panels from a sub equipped Yukon.
A bit of cardboard engineering resulted in an enclosure that should be close to .6 cu ft, which will be perfect for a small, sealed setup. The cardboard box will be cut apart to use as templates for an MDF enclosure.
Lastly, I found a set of 20” GMC Sierra wheels on marketplace for a cheap and used those to replace the 17’s and AT tires that were previously on the truck. I kind of like the aggressive tire, but I fear that would cost me during the long road trip.
Waiting in the wings are many more parts that still need to find a home on the Tahoe.
My LQ9 will be back from the machine shop in the next couple of weeks. I am also having them do a set of square port heads. I am contemplating have both setups run on a dyno to see if we lose anything with the 799s. Using a square port head would make the supercharger install easier and remove the adapter plates needed for cathedral port heads.
I picked up an 4L80e to put behind the engine. It is going to be gone through and a shift kit will be installed. New cooler lines were ordered, and I am still waiting on word back from BTR on whether I will need a converter. My tuner feels like the cam and supercharger combination might be a bit rough and a 3000-stall converter might smooth things out. I ordered a bunch of rebuild parts for the transfer case so that I can mate everything together based on recommendations from this forum.
The suspension is almost all here, so hopefully I can work on getting that done in the next week or so. An Eibach rear sway bar, -3 rear springs, DJM relocating and shock brackets, and Bilstein 4600’s will handle the rear. The front is a bit less finalized. I am going to try lowering keys and another Eibach sway bar in the front, but I have doubts it will end up like I want it to. I had a couple of conversations with a fab shop in SoCal that has done a lot of coilover conversion on GMT800s and I will probably end up taking the truck down there to have them go over the whole thing. This will include cutting out all of the stock front suspension and welding in new brackets and upper mounts to run a full length coilover. They will also make matching rear bars to replace the factory links and panhard bar.
iamdub
Full Access Member
Square port heads FTW. Yes, they're not such an improvement over the cathedral port 799s when you have boost. But, they'll compliment a cam and yield power when cruising off boost.
Not a lot for updates. With all of the rain and trying to get the ranch sorted out for the summer I havent found much time to work on things.
The only real update is I did secure a spot in line at Westside Machine Race Engines for my build. They had an 6.0 on the engine dyno while I was there and made just shy of 750hp and 650lb-ft. This was with an NA carb'd setup and a single plane manifold. With EFI we should have a lot more control over the fuel and timing and they thought they could do slightly better numbers. And this will be before we add the supercharger. The down side is they are 6-8 months out. I am hoping to have the fully built motor back by the end of the year.
They are also strongly recommending that I look at a 408ci kit. Since we are doing everything by the crank anyway, doing there is almost no reason to not just do the whole thing. I think I might just throw my existing LQ9 in the truck and get it tuned and running and then find another iron 6.0 block to use for the build. It would be much easier to just swap the motor into a running 6.0/4l80 setup I think.
Lastly I am working on getting JD Fab to handle the suspension setup. They have a lot of experience with offroad suspension for these trucks and they seemed open to the idea of using their coilover conversion setup with street stocks. I will also do tubular, adjustable arms in the rear and then match a rear spring rate. I am hoping this will allow me to dial in ride height and stiffness to get the truck handling like I want it to.
Question, is anyone running spacers or a lower wheel offset to get a wider stance? I think the weight of these trucks would benefit from a wider setup.
The only real update is I did secure a spot in line at Westside Machine Race Engines for my build. They had an 6.0 on the engine dyno while I was there and made just shy of 750hp and 650lb-ft. This was with an NA carb'd setup and a single plane manifold. With EFI we should have a lot more control over the fuel and timing and they thought they could do slightly better numbers. And this will be before we add the supercharger. The down side is they are 6-8 months out. I am hoping to have the fully built motor back by the end of the year.
They are also strongly recommending that I look at a 408ci kit. Since we are doing everything by the crank anyway, doing there is almost no reason to not just do the whole thing. I think I might just throw my existing LQ9 in the truck and get it tuned and running and then find another iron 6.0 block to use for the build. It would be much easier to just swap the motor into a running 6.0/4l80 setup I think.
Lastly I am working on getting JD Fab to handle the suspension setup. They have a lot of experience with offroad suspension for these trucks and they seemed open to the idea of using their coilover conversion setup with street stocks. I will also do tubular, adjustable arms in the rear and then match a rear spring rate. I am hoping this will allow me to dial in ride height and stiffness to get the truck handling like I want it to.
Question, is anyone running spacers or a lower wheel offset to get a wider stance? I think the weight of these trucks would benefit from a wider setup.
iamdub
Full Access Member
I ran 1.5" hub-centric spacers for a little while when mine was lifted 2" to give it better proportions. Never a problem. They've been on my brother's Sierra 4WD for over two years now. If you get spacers, definitely get hub-centric. My personal preference is to not go more than 2".
You wouldn't be lifted with a street touring style, so clearance will be the kicker. I think the GMT800 has a little more breathing room than the GMT900. I rolled my rear fender lips and trimmed the plastic just for my drop on stock wheels.
It’ll be the front you have issues with if you use spacers, depending on how much of a drop you do and what size tires you go with. I was running 205/30/26’s with a 2” front drop (spindles) and caught a fender lip when going from street to a driveway that angled uphill. That was with no spacers, stock offset. It’s best to try and keep the tires inside the fenders unless you’re lifted. My .02.
Thanks for the feedback regarding spacers. It just seems like the Sierra wheels I have on now are set a lot more inboard than the aftermarket wheels I had previously. If I have room in the fender I would like to be as wide as possible. With that said, its going to be a small spacer if anything, probably no more than 1/2".
ivin74
05 NBS Nali
Any updates?
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