The Story Of A Cummins Suburban (Lots Of Pics)

[mosesburb]

Yeah, that's it.

[jbclassix]

Sweet! So what did I win?

[mosesburb]

Originally Posted by jbclassix

Sweet! So what did I win?

How about a free trail ride in an orange Suburban??

[jbclassix]

Sweet! I'll take it!

[justcuz]

I'm with JBX, as I recall the firewall used to be green.
What gears does Lances Suburban have? Hopefully not 4.56's if so, no wonder he can't pass a gas station. He needs an HEI with a curve kit in it so all his centrifigal is in by 3000 rpm. Its the curve that is published in the old GM Power Catalogues. I use it on all my engines that are not electronically controlled, really works well. Also what carb did he put on there? A well built quadrajet will get better mileage than any other 4 barrel that I know of.

Nick have you ever done the trip from Prescott to Seligman on County Road 5/FR6? It runs NE out of Prescott off of Willow Creek Rd.

[mosesburb]

He has 4.10's. Already has a curved HEI. He has on of those Holley off-road carbs on it. I hate Holley carbs with great passion, but this one seems to work well for him. If he so desires, I will build him a Q-Jet with all the mods, but if he goes diesel, a Q-Jet will do him no good. He is pulling down about 10mpg currently. Not too bad for a 6500ish pounds of carb'd non-overdrive aerodynamic cinder block.

I have not made that run. I was going to run it from Seligman to Prescott a couple months back, but road conditions did not permit it.

[justcuz]

I am thinking about running that route in the first week of July if I get time. I may be pinched though and might have to come back out later in the month or summer depending on my schedule.

I think the quadrajets primaries being smaller would help his mileage some. Is he back from Australia yet?

Oh and if I remember correctly there is a couple of 4x4 trucks behind the fence down the block from Adolfos. I think it is on the corner just visible in your picture.

[1985-GMC]

Originally Posted by mosesburb

What about them??

Never mind, I thought you might of painted that too while you were at it.

[FrankieD]

On the way out the next morning I noticed something odd. The power poles were very unique. I don't know if I have ever noticed them before, but if I did, it did not ring a bell with me.



Funny I was just reading this last night and my brother and I saw the same thing going to my buddy's place off rt 60 east he has a Miami address and has a sign hanging out front saying Sidewinders if you get a chance stop there he is a very interesting person an has some really diffrent stuff including his v8 bikes. he has a red 1800's RR car in the front.


me on the ZL-1 bike



We are loving the weather in AZ

[justcuz]

Nick I looked at the pictures of yours and Lances Suburbans parked next to each other. The front fenders and grille surrounds look interchangeable. I am asking because I have a line on a 1968 Suburban, but it has no front clip. Do core supports, fender wells, fenders and hoods interchange from 1967 to 72?

The one I am looking at is a 3/4 ton 2wd. If I get it, I will convert it to 4wd using longer 88 and up rear springs and 56 inch springs in the front. Most likely 350/4spd and some kind of married t-case, probably a passenger drop NP241 or if I can find a F*#d dana 44 8 lug front axle I'll just do a drivers drop NP241.

[mosesburb]

Originally Posted by justcuz

Nick I looked at the pictures of yours and Lances Suburbans parked next to each other. The front fenders and grille surrounds look interchangeable. I am asking because I have a line on a 1968 Suburban, but it has no front clip. Do core supports, fender wells, fenders and hoods interchange from 1967 to 72?

Yes and no. 67-68 Chevys used short front fenders and hoods which use a corresponding core support. 69-72 Chevys used a taller fender and hood which have their own core support. You can't interchange bits and pieces (fenders or hoods) between the two, but you can interchange whole assemblies (whole front clips).

Originally Posted by justcuz

The one I am looking at is a 3/4 ton 2wd. If I get it, I will convert it to 4wd using longer 88 and up rear springs and 56 inch springs in the front. Most likely 350/4spd and some kind of married t-case, probably a passenger drop NP241 or if I can find a F*#d dana 44 8 lug front axle I'll just do a drivers drop NP241.

Sounds like fun.

[mosesburb]

Originally Posted by FrankieD

me on the ZL-1 bike



We are loving the weather in AZ

I think I have seen that bike somewhere before. Has he ever taken it to car shows??

The weather is starting to get warmer now. I think it was 104 today.

[FrankieD]

Originally Posted by mosesburb

I think I have seen that bike somewhere before. Has he ever taken it to car shows??

The weather is starting to get warmer now. I think it was 104 today.

I am pretty sure he has probably Apache Junction or Globe. He used to do 1/4 mile smoke show's here in he midwest then hit some jet fuel and it almost killed him. He has a small block with Hilborn injection for a regular driver.

[justcuz]

Originally Posted by mosesburb

Yes and no. 67-68 Chevys used short front fenders and hoods which use a corresponding core support. 69-72 Chevys used a taller fender and hood which have their own core support. You can't interchange bits and pieces (fenders or hoods) between the two, but you can interchange whole assemblies (whole front clips).

Cool, thanks for the info!


Sounds like fun.

Maybe someday there will be three Suburbans in the Arizona desert.

[Dieselwrencher]

That bike is freaking insane!

[FrankieD]

Originally Posted by Dieselwrencher

That bike is freaking insane!

Here is a Vid put it in full screen and crank the speakers it will put a smile on your face.

Click on the pic

[PAWS 72]

Originally Posted by FrankieD

Here is a Vid put it in full screen and crank the speakers it will put a smile on your face.

Click on the pic

WICKED is all I can say.I want one ride.

[hgs_notes]

The definition of suicide machine.

[FrankieD]

mosesburb, how you guys doing with the fires? We only get little blurbs on the news out here they say there not close to any towns. I would love to do some trail driving out there someday looks really cool.

[mosesburb]

The state is on fire right now. I guess Crown King is not a town by their report?? Yeah, Monday I had to turn the evap cooler off and switch to a/c because there was so much smoke in the house--and that was from a fire up towards Payson. There are a couple pics in this thread that don't look like the scenery in the pics anymore.

Not good.

[PAWS 72]

hope everything is ok.

[mosesburb]

Well, I guess I am caught up to about March. My buddy Lance (the owner of the blue-ish Suburban that we ran Swansea/Signal with) put together an Arizona Old Iron Run, but before it happened he decided to have a medical issue and had to pass on his own event. That sucked, but we went anyways. It was set up for running some trail in the Hualapai Mountains south of Kingman. We loaded up and headed that way. We got in Friday and did a little wandering around town. I had been through Kingman a few times, but I never really slowed down (at all) to look at anything. I knew the Kingman Army Air Field had a museum, so we headed over to the airport to check it out. Unfortunately, it was closed. We did a little wandering around looking at the buildings that were original to the time. The control tower is original and pretty cool:



We wandered around the airport area and I managed to get us on a dirt(!!) road back to town.
The next morning we made it to the meet-up point:



Its kind of funny. None of the vehicles would garner much attention to an untrained eye, but they were all equipped/outfitted in their own way and quite capable platforms. I think the Ford had the smoothest running FE motor I have ever seen. It is a very nice rig. I really like the camper shell he has. The two-tone (blue/grey) is set up to run with a TBI 454, 4L80E and 3/4T running gear. The interior creature comforts have not been addressed yet, but kudos to him for running the rig in its current form for the distance he did. Just knowing how the interior of my rig is, I can only imagine his was like a tin can with a handful of marbles inside. Very cool that he chose to run it.

This probably is not an ideal message to read on the way INTO the mountains:



I don't know where we were, but it looked really neat:



Cool vegetation:



More scenery from an unkown location:



Same here:



The owner of the Ford and our trail guide, Mike, brought some heavy-hitting guard dog protection:



Right after we left what would have been our camp (for those that haven't seen my truck, my hood normally does not shine):



We had enough elevation that, at times, we were at the same height as the clouds out there.

Boriana Mine: (it was raining pretty good at this point as the water spots on the lens attest)





Not a running board friendly trail: (shortly before this pic was a chunk of ground effect plastic laying on the side of the road)



Not a grille friendly trail either: (this was recovered and returned to its rightful owner) Everybody looked at me goofy when I exclaimed "Hey!! I know what that is!!" and jumped out of the truck in the rain to gather up the bits and pieces and put them in the back of my truck (it was from Bill's Suburban).

[mosesburb]

On our way back into town from the trail, we passed some interesting things like the golf ball:



We got back into town and had a nice dinner together. We got a room right next door to the restaurant and after repairing the toilet, heater and faucet (I did not feel like fixing the exhaust fan in the bathroom, but it did need help too), we settled in and decided what we were doing for the return trip. We could go back the way we came or go across I-40 to Ashfork or Flagstaff, or we could roll across the longest remaining continuous stretch of old Route 66. I/we opted to go this route. I thought it would be cool as I had only run it in the dark at very high speed years ago and my wife and my boy had never seen it at all. In past years he watched the Cars Movie daily so I was explaining to him that Radiator Springs was based on this stretch of road (grab a teachable moment in any form whenever possible, right??) So we got up the next morning and looked at the snow on the mountains we ran yesterday, loaded up and headed out on the Mother Road.

The old Cozy Corner:



An old 76 Station:



Cool looking finger mesas with snow near Truxton:



The Frontier Motel:



Main Street in Peach Springs:



I explained to my boy that this was a huge gas station back in its day because it had two rows of pumps:



We started getting into more snow on the ground at this point. The roads were clear, but there was definitely more snow on the ground.
Grand Canyon Caverns:



At this point the road ahead of us is looking pretty dark even though it is not 0930 yet. But before we got there we got to see a snow covered Aubrey Valley: (pictures do not convey the beauty of this area in snow--the grand views with a visually sanitizing layer of white accentuating the beyond-grand scale views--absolutely amazing)



We hit snow about twenty miles out of Peach Springs: (visibility was not quite as good as the picture makes it out to be)



My wife wanted to stop and get something Route 66 from the trinket shop: (they don't use spell check on buildings there)



We drove in this from Seligman, through Ashfork, Paulden, Chino Valley, Prescott/Valley down into Mayer. We stopped somewhere along the way for some lunch and I snapped this pic:



We stopped at Sunset Point so I could grab a drink out of the fridge and I couldn't resist taking some pics of the clouds hanging over the valley:





So we get down to the bottom of the mountain and I figure we are done with weather. The roads are drying out, all is well. Well, not quite. About a mile from home we get absolutely drilled with hail. We had been through wind, rain, snow and sleet, so I guess hail was the next logical weather to expect:



It definitely proved the all-weather capability of the equipment. All in all it was a great time other than not actually camping. I think we made up for that in the extra-curricular travels we had and the other cool stuff we got to see. Fun stuff!!

[Mr Pops]

I love this thread! Awesome pics! Keep em commin!

[1985-GMC]

For sure the best thread ever!

How's the body roll without a sway bar?