To explain my “issues” when it comes to subrbans, (mostly the diesels), when I was 21, back in October of 1999, I bought a brand new GMC K2500 barn door diesel suburban, it was black with maroon leather, it had the SLT package, so it was loaded, also had 4.10 gears (posi rear of course). I used that truck for two and a half years, but I hurt my back pretty badly and had to sell it.
Maybe ten years later a good friend bought a black K1500 Chevrolet Suburban with gray interior, riding in it was very fun and reminded me of my old burb. He decided that he wanted it to be a GMC and have maroon interior, so he found another burb, swapped the entire interior and had a GMC grill painted to match. That made things worse for me as it was essentially my original burb.
I started looking for diesel burbs, found one in Connecticut, a total twin to my original, had 150k miles on it, bought that one, drove it for a while, but it lost oil pressure so I parked it while trying to figure out what I was going to do. It had the 4.10 gears, so we called it 410.
In the meantime, I found another black one in Queens, New York, it was black, had gray interior and a tailgate (NOOOOO!). It had 3.73 gears, so it was called.... 373. It needed head gaskets, but I still drove it for a while. During this timeframe, I became injured with an unexplained issue and almost everything in my life got upended. Both burbs were parked and I started making a plan to make one out of the two. Once the Doctors figured out what was going on, it took a while before I was really able to do anything again (except acquire projects). I started ripping and tearing the burbs apart, but the further in I got, the worse things were, the trucks were both rustier than anticipated in places that were going to be expensive to fix, my injuries were still slowing me down and stressing me out. Things got put on hold again.
Then my friend with the remake of my original burb asked if I wanted to buy his, I did that, drove it for a few years, it had 3.42 gears, so it was called 342. At his point I still had the other two burbs and was essentially planning on buying a rust free one to build my "dream" version. The same buddy happened upon a non diesel K1500 burb that was rust free, I bought that one, but the color really wasn't my thing and after much thought, I sold it.
Then I stumbled on the maroon burb, this one was in decent shape, a bit of rust, but not too shabby, 342 was essentially a yard plow at this point, plus the new maroon burb was also a 3.42 geared one, so that made my naming of the burbs all screwy.
I then found the black yukon and bought that, it was a 1995 with a factory diesel and maroon interior, I truly only bought it for the parts, it was very rusty. That was a crazy event, halfway through the sale, the owner about died in a motorcycle accident and his mother stepped in to finish the transaction.
A little while later, my friend (yup same one), texted me a craigslist ad. It was my original suburban, the one I bought new, I bought it more for sentimental reasons, but I bought it. This one has been called the "OGMC" Original GMC.
Then I found the Virginia burb, it is truly just a carcass, but has no rust and literally has never been driven on the road, this was to be the frame for the "perfect" project burb.
Next was the white burb, bought it just because it was semi local and completely rust free, as we all know (do we really?) this one is still in limbo, but I am leaning towards rebuilding the 454 and trying to make a chunk of change on it.
Today was the latest acquisition, it is pretty much what I need to start on the project of creating my "rust free" OGMC, it might not be as clean as the white one, but it will be a much better start than any of the others were. I am also finding that it is tough to get a black burb from rust free places as they are generally hotter areas where black vehicles are not as common. So this is my suburban story so far, I suspect there will be more to it in the future.
