1971 Chevy Suburban Redux

So the choke’s working now, it was a pretty easy fix, and now I’m easily able to start the truck up and maneuver it around the driveway and as far into the garage as I can get it. The next task to make this classic Suburban more drivable is to lower it.

Did I mention this thing is friggin’ huge?

Several inches away from fitting in the garage…

The previous owner of this heavy Chevy had installed some sort of home-made lift kit on it. It basically has lift blocks under the leaf springs on the front and back. There are 4″ blocks on the front axles, and roughly 8″ of blocks on the rear. The ride-height is tall, but pretty level, so I’m not sure if the rear leaf packs are just worn out, or perhaps the front springs are heavier, from a big-block motor setup (it’s got a small-block Chevy 350 in it now). Regardless, my goal is to just remove the blocks altogether from the front, and shorten the rear blocks.


This front block/spring is covered in what I think is brake fluid, although it might be steering fluid. The rear block appears to be welded onto the perch on the axle. Totally a home-brewed setup.

So I’ll start with the fronts. These proved to be pretty simple, as expected. Biggest problem was getting it jacked up high enough to get the wheels off. The u-bolts were easy to break loose and spin off with an air ratchet. Then I lowered the axle down enough to pop those lift blocks out, and bolt it all back together with new, shorter u-bolts. Couldn’t be much easier…

Now so far, the day has gone pretty smoothly, but something had to go wrong. It was clean livin’ after lowering the front suspension. Tire clearance seemed to be ample, even with the big tires and losing 4″ worth of clearance (makes me wonder if I ought to remove one leaf from the pack to lower it down a bit more even). With the front complete, I fired the Suburban up to back it in the driveway, making the rear axle more easily accessible from the garage.

After maneuvering the tank into position, I crawled underneath to inspect the rear suspension. Looks reasonably straightforward – I’ll remove the u-bolts… grind off the weld holding the blocks in place, and go from there.

Just as I get started I run into trouble… I don’t even recall why I did it, but I gave a little tug to the brake line and it snapped in my hand.

Now there’s a river of dirty, years old brake fluid forming a reddish-brown puddle on my driveway. It couldn’t be avoided I guess… an unexpected trip to the parts house.

It was late afternoon by now, and I did manage to get a new brake line bent and flanged, and installed on the truck. Tami helped pump the brake pedal so I could bleed the lines. I only bled the left side, and there doesn’t appear to be any air in that side at least, but I probably should bleed the right side as well (the brake pedal still feels a bit squishy).

So… that caps off the first day of work on the ‘71 Suburban project. Things didn’t go badly I suppose. Next weekend I’ll start back up where I left off… lowering the rear suspension.

Weekend 2 goals: lower rear suspension; install front seats. I really should add installing mufflers to the top of the list too so I don’t have to feel like a schmuck starting the Burb up early in the morning. With those glass packs on there it sounds like you’re at a tractor pull at the state fair, and I’m afraid to wake the neighbors up.

More to come…

This is *after* lowering the front by 4 inches (I’m 6′ tall)…