Anyone using an 8.1L Suburban/Silverado or a V10 Excursion as a tow rig? I am planning to scale back to 4-5 events a year for the next few years so I'm letting my LML Duramax go, rather than have it sit around. I'm going to keep my 24ft enclosed so I need something reasonably inexpensive that will still tow 10klbs. Not worried about fuel economy as I won't put enough miles on it each year to care. Best rigs I've found are the 8.1L Suburbans but they're tough to find so I'm also considering V10 Excursions as they're more plentiful and thus easier to find in nice shape. 6.0 Chevys are everywhere but I've heard theyre absolute dogs with 10k on the bumper. Looking for a 100k-ish mile truck, 12k-ish budget, so diesel is out.

 

The v10 is a total turd. The 8.1 chevy is a great motor. Kinda thirsty but not terrible.

Edit:
I currently have a 6.0 Silverado with big *** lift and it goes fine with 10k. I have 20k was noticeably a lot of weight. And I hauled 30k once and I wont do that again with the 6.0

 

Don't give in. Keep the diesel. You will miss it.

You can store it at my place. Storage fee of ~10k miles on it a year 😁

 

I dunno man. Your Duramax is so, so nice. 4-5 events per year is still quite a few, and the truck will last forever...

I don't have behind-the-wheel experience with the V10 fords while towing but I know they like to blow spark plugs out.

 

This. Plus, with all the uncertainties of another used vehicle, it may not save you much in the long run. IIRC, both the big block GMs and V10 Fords will come with older, less durable transmissions... could be a big expense, and not an unlikely one in the mileage range you're looking at.

 

The V10 yes. The 8.1 either had the 4L80 or the Allison, both are very tough trannies.

 

IIRC, the 8.1 is available with the Allison in the Silverado, but in the Suburban it came with the 4L80E

--Ian

 

^that's right. Something about not enough room for Allison under the suburban body, which was also the main reason the Duramax was never offered there.

Then again, there's the whole Durburban swap, not sure how they fit it.

 

The LML is definitely leaving. I've been thinking about it for months. It made tons of sense to own when I was putting 15k miles a year on it, but I've put less than a thousand miles on it since April. My wife has a CX5 that will do family trips and I have an eGolf as a daily, so the truck is really only used when I need to move my trailer. I can sidestep into a gasser with the same mileage for less than half the value and put $15k+ in the bank. For 3-4k miles a year of usage, I just can't justify keeping it. I will definitely miss it.

8.1s are scaled up gen3 LS architecture, all the way to the coils and ECU (same as an LS1 PCM). They have a good reputation for being reliable gas hogs. Trans is an Allison in the truck or a 4L80E in the Burb so they're both rock solid. I've already owned a 250k mile GMT800 3/4 ton, my last truck was an LLY Duramax, so I know exactly what I'm getting into with chassis/suspension maintenance. The Excursion is more of an unknown so I'm going to keep hunting for a clean Suburban.

 

This makes sense, my only counter would be what is "a few years?" If in 2-3 years you get back to needing/wanting the diesel to make your trips easier or because you'll be back to towing more, will you have really saved that much by making the trade? Meaning, if you have to trade again out of the gasser for another diesel?

 

I would probably just avoid the Ford V10. I've had I think three friends that picked them up for racecar hauling duty and every single one of them have blown a spark plug out of the head at one point or another.

 

I had forgotten they put the Allison behind the 8.1 gasser... that trans is definitely bulletproof.

 

For only 4-5 events per year, I would strongly consider renting from Enterprise Truck. I did it once when my Titan was at the dealership being a piece of **** and it was awesome. Brand new <1000mi F250 crew cab with 8ft bed. I know a few guys who have done it for a season or more of racing and had nothing but great things to say. Yes it's another item to add to the prep list during the week before going to the track, but it's less hassle than buying/owning/maintaining a vehicle that barely gets used. Track weekends are usually planned far enough in advance to set the rental up and guarantee you'll have a truck waiting.

 

It's $15k+ of equity I can deploy in other places for the next few years. That could be investments, it could be the down payment on a Gen1 Viper. Depends on how irresponsible I'm feeling next summer after we're settled into our new lives as parents (baby arrives in November). I could be wrong, but I don't see myself getting back to a 10-12 event schedule any time in the next 5-7 years. I easily got $15k of cap-ex benefit out of the LML when I was doing 1100-mile round trip tows to Socal, but those days are behind me for the time being.

The thought crossed my mind, but it's worth owning a truck for the convenience and certainty. Most of my use of the truck is towing to/from events, but I definitely use it for other tasks. 5 events a year is ~2000 miles, I'll put another 1500-2000 miles on it over the course of 12 months doing dirty errands or the occasional day trip that's out of range of the Golf. It's also $500+ a weekend to rent an F250, with no hard guarantee that the truck you reserved is actually going to be there (ask me how I reserved a VW GTI and ended up in a BMW 520d for my Autobahn daytrip in June).

 

Well.

Speaking from experience, no matter how irresponsible you feel (unless your capacity for such vastly outweighs my own, which from my personal observation, evidence indicates a negative) down payment on a Gen1 Viper with a very young child will not happen. You have a race car in hand. Unless lottery winnings or other life circumstance changing events occur that allow for significant toy budget and significant toy storage space capabilities, would not plan on gen1 Viper any time soon.

That being said, at this particular moment in time we are entering truly uncharted economic territory. If you have a place to park a Gen1 Viper, and a source for said Gen1 Viper, who could know. My fathernlaw bought C2 corvettes in the 70's. One needed a clutch, soft top, and had a cat living in it when he bought it. The other needed frame rail straightening. He bought them because he was at the time a man of a certain age, and he thought they had timeless styling. And he could. He was not in any way thinking of college costs for his daughters or as those cars as an investment. They were toys. And he had a rock solid job. But his long term investment was undeniably sound.

 

Pretty sure the viper was a joke.

 

Found my truck. Was looking through CL flying back from the east coast on Friday evening and came across this in Orange County. '03 Yukon XL 2500 SLT, 8.1L Vortec, 4wd, 83k miles. Verified a couple of details with the seller, flew down yesterday morning, and drove it home last night. It has a few small things that need to be corrected and some maintenance to catch up on, but overall it's in incredibly nice shape. The undercarriage is unbelievably clean, the interior looks near-new, no dings or dents, no leaks. It definitely doesn't have the thrust of the LML, but the motor is a tank and it will do the job.

 

Avg mpg from OC to the Bay?

 

~11mpg at ~80mph. No more diesel upcharge since it takes 87 octane, but yeah, that will be the last time I calculate mileage. Some questions are best left unanswered

 

Double digits! That's better than @Scaxx

Good find.