Rebuilt Frontend

76BBSub · April 4, 2001

Rebuilt the frontend suspension on my '76 1/2 ton Suburban over the weekend. I get every-other Friday off work, so Thursday night I pulled the control arms off. Friday morning I took them over to a friend's shop and used his tools and press to remove the bushings and ball joints. I pressed in the new urethane bushings (upper and lower control arms) and the lower ball joints. The upper ball joints are bolt-ons. I also replaced the tie rods and tie rod ends and the idler arm. Painted the arms while they were off to make them look nice, and put it all back together, finishing up Saturday morning. Then I went to NTB and got an alignment and some new Michelin Cross-Terrain SUV tires. These are the quietest, best riding light truck tires I have had. My '96 had Tiger Paws, which sucked, and my '99 had Generals, which wore out in 25K miles, but handled better than the Tiger Paws.

So now the old Suburban rides and handles better than new. That combined with the mods I've done on the 454 and she'll keep up with most any other truck on the road (except for the gas mileage!).

Anyone else working on old stuff?

Jeff