I'm wondering, if I buy my dad's '00 5.3l 1500 from him here pretty soon(which I might), what difference in power will there be with full bolt-ons, and then a good street tune (probably by green light motorsports)? I haven't looked a whole lot at the 5.3s to see what they are capable of yet, but I'm starting to get interested thinking about owning one of them. I'm really looking forward to working on the truck's engine after looking in there the other day having come from working on my WS6 in that tiny little engine compartment .

 

an 00 5.3 with full bolt ons should put down right around 300rwhp

 

325-340 with cam

 

Are you interested in keeping the engine internally stock? If so, all external mods like e-fans, LT headers, dual exhaust, intake box, throttle body, plugs, and a nice tune will give you approx. 300 rwhp. The stock heads and the intake are actually pretty good on trucks. Like trever1t said, a good cam would boost the potential even more. It's funny that you mentioned how nice it is to work under the hood of trucks. I'd really like to have a late model f-body too but there is absolutely no room under the hood of those things. It would be hard to keep clean too.

 

yep, 300rwhp with boltons and 320-340rwhp with a cam too.