Hey, newbie here. Looks like a great place for info!! A little background, my wife has a 2002 Tahoe Z71, I've got a F350 crew cab dually and a 03 Cobra. I have a hoot modding them all!

Anyway, looking to do a few things for my wifes 5.3 Tahoe. 1st of all it has a steering wheel clunk, I've looked around and it seems to be that the shaft needs to be lubricated, does that sound about right? Also I'd like to do a few things to add some ponies. The truck is stock right now except for a magnaflow muffler and tip. Looking for a CAI and maybe do a cam or something. What are the biggest bang for the buck mods on these engines? I know with my Cobra anything you can do to up the air, in and out, helps out alot since it is FI. Not sure if the same holds true with a NA truck. I had a 97 ramair Trans AM vert which I did a few things to but that is the extent of my GM modding experience. I live a mile high so I don't make a whole lotta HP! Anyway, thanks for the help, looking forward to getting her truck to perform a little better! I'll post some pics soon, I've done a few appearance mods you might like. Thanks

 

Welcome to the boards!

I would suggest a set of long tube headers, maybe a UPD lid or a Volant air induction. That will help it breath a little easier. A really nice upgrade would be a new torque converter, I would suggest a Yank TT2600 since it's a heavy truck. It also sounds like you want 100% drivability mods rather than just make it go faster. That converter is a really nice one and has excellent street maners. To top it all off you might look at a programmer like a Hypertech or Diablo if you plan on keeping it for some time.

 

Thanks for the tips! What is the new torque converter going to do for me other than possibly making things smoother?? What is the cost of the CAIs that you mentioned? Thanks again, just new to the 5.3 mods. It is very important to remain streetable as it is my wife's daily driver

 

The converter is a really sweet converter. It will stall at about 2600, doesn't kill your economy much at all, still retains full factory towing limit, and has the lock-up clutch in it. Once you put it in and get used to it, you will swear it should have come from the factory with it in. IMO it made it much more fun to drive and a lot more drivable. It kinda band-aids how GM likes to short shift them and not kick down til you get your foot way into the throttle.

The CIA run typically about 250 for any of the good quality ones on the market. Headers on the other hand are a little bit more expensive. My The Other Guy headers ran about 700 and I had them coated after I bought them for another 100. I would suggest getting them coated no matter what you go with. The ASM headers come coated already.

Check out the sponser banners on the right side over there, they have some good deals and some of them list some good products for trucks. TByrne's is a good place to get ideas for trucks as well as Thunder Racing.