I have a 5.3 that i want more horspower. What are some good ideas. kinda on a limited budget. around 3000

 

Custom tune-Home made intake-LT headers-catback-gears/posi (depends on what you have to begin with as far as gears)-electric fans. I'd start out with intake/catback and a good tune then go from there to headers and maybe some efans, all of that would help your driveability and mileage as well provided you keep your foot out of it besides giving you another 50 or so hp

 

homemade intake??? i curently have 3.73 gears with the stock G80(which i think it needs a real Eaton)i getting duals soon. i heard about changing the thermostat. but i dont knwo if i should go 180 or 160. i live where it is cold in the winter i dont want the truck to be to cold.

 

Scrape up a little more money and buy the used STS in the forsale section. You won't need anything else.

 

it sure would be nice but man i would like to have other things also. hopefully some day ill buy something like that

 

First thing I'd do is get a custom tuned 02 PCM, made a world of difference in my truck. Do a search on 99-02 PCM swap. If you want to make hp on a budget, I'd also go for a homemade cold air intake, some lt's, and have a good muffler welded in...you might even have enough scratch left over for reman tb converter.

 

What he said.

You need to swap out the PCM. The 99's SUCK! Tuning them often doesn't fix their inherent suckiness.

No real need for a full catback either. Just buy a nice $50-$75 weldin Magnaflow muffler. True duals won't help HP at your level.

Homemade intakes are the best. Ghetto is the way to go

Electric Fans will help a lot durring the summer months to free up HP but don't usually do much for track times.

A good stall converter is a must for any non Radix truck.

From there LTs and a Cam are my power adders of choise when on a budget.

 

yeah except a new tranny and new rear tires about every 3000 miles like an oil change

 

anybody got pics of a homemade intake??? whats the difference between an 02 and 99 pcm??

 

Here's one that I found:
https://ls1tech.com/forums/showthrea...memade+ram+air
If you do a search for Homemade Intake, Homemade CAI, Homemade Ram Air, etc., I'm sure you'll find a bunch more.
As far as the difference between the 99 and 02 PCM's, there's a couple of things. One is that the 99-00 pcm's are prone to false knock which pulls timing and hurts performance (this is especially evident when a cam and springs are installed and valvetrain harmonics are increased) Also, I believe that the 01-02's have a different operating system and base tune which is much better than the 99-00's. My truck ran better with an 02 pcm with the factory tune than it did with the 99 pcm with a performance tune.