Supercharged Trailblazer 4200 I6

[bruhaba]

I've had that pipe off already. I fought that pipe for about an hour and it finally came out when I welded in my wideband bung. It comes out without touching the trans crossmember(at least on my year) but the truck has to be pretty high up in the air. It was a jigsaw puzzle series of move, rotate, move, rotate back, tilt, move, rotate and rotate back. Took me about 30 minutes to figure out how to get it back in there too.

When I rework the exhaust, I'll hack the clogged up cat out of there and step it to 3" pipe. This state has no emissions regulations.

Thanks for the complements. I'll keep the thread going every once in a while.

 

[Envoy_04]

I've had that pipe off already. I fought that pipe for about an hour and it finally came out when I welded in my wideband bung. It comes out without touching the trans crossmember(at least on my year) but the truck has to be pretty high up in the air. It was a jigsaw puzzle series of move, rotate, move, rotate back, tilt, move, rotate and rotate back. Took me about 30 minutes to figure out how to get it back in there too.

When I rework the exhaust, I'll hack the clogged up cat out of there and step it to 3" pipe. This state has no emissions regulations.

Thanks for the complements. I'll keep the thread going every once in a while.

 

[bruhaba]

[video=youtube;gd7MbPi99DA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gd7MbPi99DA[/video]

You can hear once the throttle opens, the tires spin but not much really going on until it hits a certain point. I need more boost. I figure at some point, that slow throttle will be like launch control! I'm not there yet, need to crank it up.

 

[bruhaba]

ss rear end getting picked up this Saturday. Any of you folks done this swap? From what I gather, bolts right in but driveshaft has to get shortened and different U joint needs to get used. Anything else anyone is aware of?

 

[Envoy_04]

ss rear end getting picked up this Saturday. Any of you folks done this swap? From what I gather, bolts right in but driveshaft has to get shortened and different U joint needs to get used. Anything else anyone is aware of?

I looked but couldn't see nor could I remember - this is a 2WD TB, correct?

 

[bruhaba]

Nope, mine is 4wd. I just won't use the 4wd. When this thing needs tranny work, I'll fully convert to 2wd and remove all the unneeded stuff.

 

[HARDTRAILZ]

ss rear end getting picked up this Saturday. Any of you folks done this swap? From what I gather, bolts right in but driveshaft has to get shortened and different U joint needs to get used. Anything else anyone is aware of?

I believe its a Precision 447 joint.

Shaft does need shortened.

 

[bruhaba]

Got the SS rear...the second time. the first one I got from the junkyard had some water and rust in it ! This one looks good; wire wheel cleaning it up, por 15 paint and some fresh seals and gaskets should do it. Got a few irons in the fire so it wil be a little while before I get this completed. 4.10 posi should make a huge difference in launching and burnout fun factor.

 

[HARDTRAILZ]

They say the G86 limited slip is good on pavement. I really like the lower gearing.

 

[Fire06]

Very nice

 

[bruhaba]

Shortened the driveshaft myself, painted the rear with some por15 paint, fresh seals and fluid and we're good to go. It's raining right now but the thing changes lanes when it shifts even at soft throttle. I think I'll have to soften up the shifts now. Much more robust with the 4.10's instead of the 3.42's

I didn't balance the driveshaft but kept the weights that were on there from GM. Just took it up to highway speed++ and no vibrations. For anyone doing this in the future, I used ACdelco ujoint 45U0132 which is the same as precision 447. I shortened the driveshaft about 1.5". Could have probably used going 1.75 or so to get exactly back to stock location on the slip yoke.

rear diff cover gasket rds55387
axle seals National 4762N
I put some walmart 75w-90 and redline limited slip additive, took ~2.5quarts plus the 4oz bottle of additive.

Anyone want to buy a 3.42 G80 rear?

 

[bruhaba]

Conclusion after driving a bit in the dry weather...4.10's and posi totally rocks. Gets so much better traction and pulls so much harder! Highly recommended to anyone out there.

Downside, I think I have a noisy wheel bearing in this axle. I didn't hear it until after it displaced the grease I put on them when I reassembled....maybe 20 miles of driving later it started whining a bit on the highway(coast, drive, neutral, turn and straight so it's likely wheel bearings). I'll have to replace them both. Hopefully just replacing the bearings does the trick. The axle shafts looked decent when I had them out.

 

[jrSS]

Conclusion after driving a bit in the dry weather...4.10's and posi totally rocks. Gets so much better traction and pulls so much harder! Highly recommended to anyone out there.

Downside, I think I have a noisy wheel bearing in this axle. I didn't hear it until after it displaced the grease I put on them when I reassembled....maybe 20 miles of driving later it started whining a bit on the highway(coast, drive, neutral, turn and straight so it's likely wheel bearings). I'll have to replace them both. Hopefully just replacing the bearings does the trick. The axle shafts looked decent when I had them out.

What gear oil did you use to fill the diff with?? Use royal purple 75 90 synthetic or gm fluid. Has additive in it already.

Edit...oh my bad , read your previous post

 

[ConeKilrAutoX]

If you have time can you upload some more videos please !?!?! I wanna see and hear this beast!

 

[bruhaba]

Ok, I'll work on something decent in the next week or so.

 

[bruhaba]

It's getting a bit tough to hold the camera unless a straight holeshot. I took a couple videos punching it coming out of a turn and couldn't keep the camera in the ballpark with all the countersteering. Can't tell you guys how much better this vehicle feels now with the 4.10's. It pulls nicely and is good fun. Still need to build my header, open the exhaust(still puffing through the stock exhaust), add the water injection and a couple more pounds boost. It should get to what I envisioned soon enough! There is hope!

[video=youtube;JQJymd2cPNs]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQJymd2cPNs[/video]

 

[dmanns67]

She definitely moves. Love the winding of the supercharger

Keep the videos coming!

 

[IllogicTC]

That sound.

Should have a friend record you doing a driveby or a 0-60 time run or something, from outside the vehicle. Maybe even a a quick bring-up and then hold at speed limit in the city or something.

We can hear what it's like to be in the cockpit, I'm curious now how many heads it's catching from outside.

No rush though, just my curiosity. Wonderful build, I'd read all over how difficult any turbo/super would be, since (in certain years at least) the computer pretty much just calculates up how much air it thinks is going in based on tach and whatnot rather than have a MAF, which was added later I do believe. That's the word I heard anyway. So it's nice to have some sort of hope that something like this can be done.

 

[BoldAdventure]

Thread needs Dyno numbers and quarter mile time.

 

[bruhaba]

Dyno numbers will only disappoint me I'm sure. If I had run a baseline I'd be more into getting it dyno'd. Anyone have dyno numbers of a stock vehicle? Airflow numbers indicate about 80 hp over stock, so it's nothing crazy.

I did run it in the eighth mile around here. It ran a 9.4. With the 3.42 gear. I suspect with the 4.10 it would lop off near a half second. Puts me maybe a little under a stock SS. This is a heavy vehicle to be messing with!

 

[Playsinsnow]

http://gmtnation.com/f43/kooks-4-2l-i6-header-5341/index5.html

Here is a stock dyno with improvement gains with a PCMofNC tune and Kooks header.

Halfway down is a picture taken of dyno results from PCMofNC facebook page. I might dyno my stock tb at 130k this spring for fun along with a buddies GM 4.1 I6.

 

[bruhaba]

Picked up some trailblazer ss wheels with decent tires on them this weekend. My current tires are shot. I may be putting my current tires away in style. Been years since I attempted hooliganism like donuts and such. My V8 s10 was able to cause some serious trouble. I need to see if this vehicle is capable. I'm sure it won't be as good as the 2500lb s10 with no weight over the rears, but hopefully it's capable!

I'll do what I can to get it on video. I'm looking forward to spicing up the looks of the traiblazer a bit with the SS wheels. I really like those wheels, nice and clean.

 

[bruhaba]

You can see decent smoke at the end for a couple second burnout! Not much left of these tires. I think they will be retired this weekend and I'll put the new rims on.

[video=youtube;PlbNPjHtUbc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlbNPjHtUbc[/video]

 

[gmcman]

Downside, I think I have a noisy wheel bearing in this axle. I didn't hear it until after it displaced the grease I put on them when I reassembled....maybe 20 miles of driving later it started whining a bit on the highway(coast, drive, neutral, turn and straight so it's likely wheel bearings)

The SS rear is notorious for whine, mainly on decel and occasionally under load. Some were ok, some needed a lot of dealer care, a lot were the backlash and pinion preload. Not saying that's the case with yours but keep that in mind. How long was the rear sitting before the swap, are any of the seals leaking or weeping?

The SS calls for the vette LS fluid but there are other manufacturers that have good fluid that works, kinda trial and error albeit expensive.

If you need to pull the bearings, you also likely need to hook the ABS sensor (inductor wheel) with the slide hammer, on the backside of the bearing and it will likely be stubborn when wailing on it with the slide hammer.....mine was.

If you pull the cover again, check the backlash just to be sure it's within spec.

If you ever need to pull the carrier or need a rebuild, then I would recommend the Eaton Tru-Trac if funds allow.

Nice job.....sounds like a beast....love that SC whine.

 

[bruhaba]

Thanks! I'm starting to have some fun again. Really can't wait to do the exhaust, add the water injection and bump the boost to the 9-10 range. Should make it a lot MORE fun.

I replaced the axle seals. Pinion seal is good. I think rear was sitting a while. I've read about all the trouble on the diff. I don't think this is gear whine.

The cheapie supertech fluid and redline LS additive are working really well. No chatter and good posi performance. I put cheap fluid in there because I kind of expected to have to drain it again soon after the swap. Never really know what you have from a junkyard. It's working so good ill stick with it. Walmart supertech 75w90 semi synthetic and redline LS additive.

 

[bruhaba]

Maybe starting to look the part? Now it looks like it needs to come down 2 inches or so! Be a while before I'm able to do that. Anybody have suggestions for what to do with the grille to sport it up a bit? I'm not into swapping bumpers and what not because I have the intercooler packed in there and don't want to redo the fit. But if you have a suggestion on the grille or lower inserts pipe up. Thanks for all the support folks!

 

[IllogicTC]

I want to stay generalized to try offering a wider opinion than my own.

For the grill, ditch the crossbar. Get different headlights, I believe I've seen 07-09 years I believe where the crossbar does not extend onto the headlight assemblies.

Then the actual center part... I guess that's up to you. I myself actually kinda like the mesh look, but it's all about personal taste since you're the one in the cockpit.

 

[dmanns67]

Correct. 07+ TB LT headlights do not have a cutout for the cross bar since their grille does not have a cross bar.

Spec-D makes a nice mesh grille for the 07+ TB LT. Here is a pic of the Spec-D grille installed on my TB.

 

[Fire06]

Looks sharp

 

[bruhaba]

Just calibrated my speedo with GPS and then logged a 0-60 at 5.7 seconds with HPTuners.. The 4.10 rear knocked at least a half second off the 0-60 time. Last I checked, my runs ranged from 6.3-6.6.

 

[IllogicTC]

Feel free to come up this way sometime, I'd love to see that thing. Or maybe we could finagle you into coming to the Mid-Atlantic meet even though technically you're a bit south of this area lol.

I think it's pretty awesome you got the inline-6 0-60 time under what the TBSS factory-rated time was (somewhere in the 6 range, 6.6?)

 

[CobraMarty]

What are you finally using for tuning? How much boost and what is your pulley ratio/sizes? How much timing did you have to take out when in boost? About 1*/1pound boost? or more?

 

[bruhaba]

That's a lot of questions dude.

 

[IllogicTC]

That's a lot of questions dude.

It's his second post ever in 1 1/4 years, understandably he is quite excited about your build

 

[CobraMarty]

Sorry to offend, it's just 3 questions. I follow supercharged/turbocharged across 10 different forums.
I have 3 supercharged vehicles in the drive now and am looking towards my next vehicle, TB I6 4200 Atlas engine.
Just asking for some background information.

There has been several builds that never finished and several others which brolk their engines. I don't want to do either.
You have one of the few finished and working systems out there.

I have shortened the M112 snout up to 5" and can rework the rear corner and want to revisit the install of a M112 on this engine.

Cheers.

 

[Playsinsnow]

I have 3 supercharged vehicles in the drive now.

Pics!

 

[bruhaba]

Sorry to offend, it's just 3 questions. I follow supercharged/turbocharged across 10 different forums.
I have 3 supercharged vehicles in the drive now and am looking towards my next vehicle, TB I6 4200 Atlas engine.
Just asking for some background information.

There has been several builds that never finished and several others which brolk their engines. I don't want to do either.
You have one of the few finished and working systems out there.

I have shortened the M112 snout up to 5" and can rework the rear corner and want to revisit the install of a M112 on this engine.

Cheers.

No offense taken, I'd be happy to help you out when you get your project rolling. I used hptuners to tune it.

 

[bruhaba]

[SIZE=11.5pt]I've got about 8K miles on the supercharged setup now. Haven't opened the hood other than to change the oil and take a peek once in a while. Just been my DD. Time to start having fun again. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]General mock up with PVC[/SIZE]
[SIZE=11.5pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11.5pt]Then off we go to steel![/SIZE]
[SIZE=11.5pt][/SIZE]

 

[dmanns67]

Nice. Have not heard much about the project since your last burnout video. Glad to see you are posting some updates

 

[bruhaba]

Tube 2 fitted