This is NOT an Ordinary Suburban: This Is One Of The Greatest Classic SUV's Of All Time!

it's probably no secret to you at this point that i absolutely love these 1990s gm full-size trucks be it the pickups or the tahoes or the suburbans they're just the best vehicles ever made they look amazing they're super comfortable they're dirt simple and incredibly reliable but when it comes to the king of them well this is it the suburban 2500 now what are we looking at well this is what they call a gmt-4 and gmt-400 was the internal code for this generation a full-size general motor vehicle now this one is a gmc suburban and you're probably thinking huh not a gmc yukon no back in the day you had chevrolet suburbans and gmc suburbans kind of a marketing disaster if you ask me but largely the same vehicle with some different styling and interior tweaks now this one is a gmc truck and that is one of the coolest things about these older models [Music] so brendan thanks for coming out and bringing by your uh suburban today yeah i really appreciate it so i know you bought this vehicle pretty recently but what kind of drew you to this model of suburban you know they're just kind of uh they're hard to find um i've been looking for one of these old gmts and uh when i saw this 2500 pop up i was just like oh man that is what i have to have no totally and you know the funny thing about these right is the half tons the 1500s they're everywhere right and they're like three four grand everywhere but the 2500s are pretty darn rare yeah yeah i in my search i'd been looking for one for a few months for like a good one and uh this was the first 2500 i had seen so i just i knew it was something rare i don't i don't know how rare they are but i hadn't seen them before totally now this one has 160 000 miles which is actually pretty pretty darn low for this era vehicle yeah people would get these things and just drive the pants off of them because they were just a family hauler that hauled everything and so when you do find these old suburbans they tend to have a ton of hard miles on them absolutely yeah and like a lot of them were used um by construction companies even right like because they just have so much room and it seemed like the 2500s were used harder than the 1500s because the only reason you buy a 2500 is that you have a need for the towing or the hauling capability um or you were just like super into big block v8s which is just a very valid reason right who isn't now this vehicle could have been had with a couple of engines in this generation there was the big block v8 and there was also the 6.5 liter turbo diesel but i think it was pre-duramax back then um but the first thing that strikes you is just how comfortable this thing is absolutely yeah they just don't build these seats like they used to i've sat in some of the the newer suburbans and these are definitely far more comfortable oh they're fantastic now stepping inside the suburban we see one of the most comfortable interiors of i think any era this is a time gone by of when these vehicles were designed to be basically lazy boys on wheels that just make you pour from gas money but will get you down the road in ultimate comfort now let's talk about some of the really cool things on the inside first of all this is one of the few suburbans of this era i've ever experienced that doesn't have the saggy door hinges very common issue with the hinge pins where they start to sag and you really got to slam the door but listen to this action as you close the door what a beauty really pretty good now this one does have the leather upholstery this is an slt trim it's very common to see these get torn up over the uh over the decades for some reason the cloth holds up much better on these gmt-400s than the leather but as you can see this one is actually really quite nice and the seats are just the best seats in the world they really have pretty much no support from like a bolster standpoint but they are just so incredibly comfy now this one is a 1996 so we do have some modern technologies like we have a driver's side airbag which is uh you know a good thing from a safety standpoint although i don't believe we have a passenger side airbag the interior lots of plastic but these gm plastics do hold up very well over time so like the rams of the air we see these horrible crack dashes the gm trucks really did quite well gauges super simple easy to read you got your tax speedometer oil pressure fuel battery and then engine temp um and then of course you got the best feature of any on these older vehicles which is the crotch vent what an invention that general motors did that really should make a comeback but apart from that pretty simple interior design too high four high four low on this model um we do have an aftermarket uh radio deck they're not a huge deal and then our ac panel down below that here we've got cup holders so pull them out we've got a little useless one and a slightly bigger useless one that's where those live and then if you actually want to keep your drinks do it down here in the middle you get this little cubby which lifts up and there's like a little cup holder attachment that goes in there this is a funny feature i always get a kick out of this this was meant to be a little little notepad holster kind of funny you clipped in notes right there pulled that back and then this folds up from the side even the latch is here that's pretty cool and then that you know pops back down in the middle three power outlets not one not two but three and then up on the dash we have more useless cup holders from a passenger side perspective so you don't get an airbag in this but you do get uh your big gulp in your crotch when you accelerate even a little bit too hard but apart from that a great place to spend time um power locks power windows they've got these big like door of the explorer my first window switches really like these big ridiculously chunky buttons and then up top here lots and lots of cool stuff airplane style lights that you can turn on like that something out of like a boeing 727 this is where your clicker goes for your garage very simple design you velcro it to the top here and then you push it on that button that simply pushes in on the button on the clicker and then we've got sunglass holder and then this is your cd holder back here all right so that big block's got a lot of low end torque and you know when you prod it it goes pretty good yeah it does they pick up and move i mean considering you're essentially moving a house right no absolutely true and they also make a lot of grunts at you know fifteen hundred two thousand twenty five hundred rpm so whereas a small block if you're towing a trailer you'd have to rip it out to four or five thousand this one you can probably get the get the job done at a much lower rate um one thing i will notice is that the steering is considerably heavier than the 1500 suburban i have so that's got like super light steering this one definitely is more of like a heavy duty steering and even though it's very comfortable i think the ride is a little bit stiffer just because it has to be able to tow seven thousand pounds right yeah i'm sure they had to beef up a lot uh but still that's got kind of a cool sound too i mean it's like a wave of torque this only has a four-speed automatic so it's not like a modern car where it's like trying to shift to stay in the power main range basically you hit the throttle and then it just lugs itself until you get where you're trying to go you know what i mean right now this right here is really what makes this suburban so special the 2500 axles so a standard suburban 1500 will have a six lug setup this has an eight lug setup and simply count the number of lugs they also have like a slightly different hubcap design and wheel design this one's got little chevy hub caps on here but it really doesn't matter it's an eight lug design and the idea was right so you're hauling heavy or towing heavy why leave the heavy hauling and heavy towing to the pickup truck why not be able to do that with your suburban now these vehicles are really really really popular with like fleets cities governments that needed to tow big trailers and haul a lot of weight they went out and bought 2500 suburban so you see a lot of them in really basic configurations they're also somewhat popular with people that had like big campers horse trailers i probably think that's what happened with this one because this is kind of a glitzy one with some nice options on it but this is probably the biggest differentiator between a half ton and a three-quarter ton although not the only because what under the hood is something special as well the gmc did have a different front-end design than the chevy different grille look i actually think the chevy's look a little bit better but it's just a matter of preference they all have the four stacked headlight design now let's talk about that engine because this is something really special the vast majority of suburbs of this era are going to have a 5.7 liter v8 the small block chevy fuel injected and that's because of course uh they're half ton suburbans but this 2500 well this has the big block the l29 7.4 liters over 450 cubic inches of america you're probably expecting like 500 horsepower but you got to remember this was 1996 and this was an engine designed to last a super long time and be fairly under stressed this was like the definition of the no replacement for displacement so while a half ton engine probably made right around 250 horsepower this one only made like 290 horsepower so it wasn't a huge bump from going from the 5.7 to 7.4 except when you look at torque because 290 horsepower but 410 pound-feet of torque which was really quite a lot now big glock v8s are really becoming a thing of the past in 2022 we've got emissions requirements we've got cafe requirements and both of those things just don't align with seven liters of fun but the advantage of these is if you needed to tow a trailer for a long amount of time they just kind of trundle along getting 8 to 10 miles per gallon until they run out of gas from the 42 42 gallon fuel tank so one of the coolest parts about this era of suburban the barn doors now some of them had like the liftgate i think that was pretty rare let me know in the comment section below and i typically see those like i think on the tahoes maybe by the liftgate whatever the barn doors are really cool and i love the way that gm actually kind of did this rounded glass at the top it looks very kind of 1990s retro futuristic and it's just a great look especially in black how it's kind of one continuous line to the side windows but let's go ahead and open up the rear gates you got a handle back here and then the barn doors swing open and i don't know if you can see this over here cole but there's actually this little sticker that says to open the door fully have door open part of the way and then you basically pull on this little check strap and check this out that'll allow you to open the door completely to the side so if you have like really really big items you're trying to get into the rear of this vehicle you can do it that way now to open this door there's a little handle here and i love these old trucks but i i don't know if i've ever seen one of these handles that works the way it's supposed to work you either got to like yank on them or you got to do this thing where you push in on the door to open them um half the time they don't work at all but you know general motors was still working on some stuff back in the day they're not perfect they're not perfect now this door will do the same exact thing so move the little check strap and then check this out look at that access truly incredible a couple of funny things in the rear for some reason in the 1990s they couldn't figure out let's put the spare tire underneath they always put them in the passenger bay jeeps did this ford did this for a long time and general motors did this but just he didn't have to stare at the spare tire they gave it this like uh carpet condom thing to keep it tucked out of the way and nice and secure now you'll notice that the amount of space in the back of this is truly insane and this does have the third row installed you can push in on this little lever and you can fold it down and then with this handle down here you can actually remove it all together super super easy to take the seats out but that's not the coolest thing the seats do the coolest thing is actually in the second row now when you fold the second row of seats in a suburban to do that what you have to do is kind of lift up on the seat cushion first and then you can fold down on the backrest but of course if you wanted a flat load area where you didn't have this hole for your feet for the third row you can actually push a little switch and then fold down that little bridge so now you have a perfectly flat load floor if you've got really long items to load up in here but uh the rear seats of these suburbans are awesome they're really really spacious for what they are so even at six one these seats can be all the way back and you have plenty of leg room lots and lots of headroom you've got these little headrests which will do practically nothing in the event of an accident even if they do come up a little bit like that and then gm was really big on air vents back in the day there just lots of weird placement of air vents so you got the ones in the ceiling you got ones also in the ceiling over here you got ones in the ceiling again for the third row just lots and lots and lots of air vents and lots lots of like little storage nooks and places to put things so you got this one right here for your your bible and your 22 if you're in texas you got to pull this down you got this little thing i don't know what this is for but you know it's it's there and then you got cup holders back here so air vents and storage cubbies was definitely a general motors trait 30 years ago i i really do think that this is a vehicle that is right on the cusp of blowing up in value yeah i mean there are so many of these off-roader type vehicles and hauling type vehicles that are just shooting up in value like right now like the toyotas we were talking about and they're just becoming unattainable for some people whereas these are still at an attainable price uh it may seem expensive to some getting you know an old suv but when you compare it to some of the similar off-roaders or towing vehicles of the same generation um these are pretty reasonable and the thing is for a long time the collectible gm trucks were like the square bodies or the the ones from the 70s but now those have exploded in value right and a good square body suburban a really good one's going to be 30 gram plus 25 gram plus this in my opinion is a sweet spot in the gm trucks because it's old enough where it looks cool it's very boxy it's got the forehead life and it's it's got the old-school v8 so you got that old world charm but then you've got like fuel injection right yeah and you got airbags you got real brakes and real gauges and that really is appealing a lot of folks absolutely well brandon thank you so much for bringing this bourbon down my pleasure thank you for letting me drive it it drives well it drives as good as it looks doesn't it yeah it's really good uh and we'll uh we'll stay in touch so brendan had that really cool voyager and he is like the go-to guy now for these cool like retro vintage 80s and 90s vehicles so yeah trying to see what i can find out there stay on the hunt buddy okay now overall i mean you can't really go wrong with the 1500 suburban and then you give it bigger axles and a bigger engine and it just makes everything that much better now if you want to own this exact suburban brendan's actually going to be selling it i'll be sure to post a link when it goes live here um you know fairly soon and you can check it out but ah i just love it i mean downsides the fuel economy is terrible um but apart from that if you even in modern era if you had a little trailer you wanted to tow if you had a lot of kids it's hard to beat the luxurious plushness of the 96 suburban 2500 only downside is they are really pretty hard to find now because they were used up and thrown away and unfortunately prices are getting a little expensive on them because people are figuring it out and i'm realizing now that i am not helping that cause let me know what you guys think in the comment section below as always a huge thanks to brendan for bringing out this magnificent beast of a suburban and we'll see you on the next classics video you

Channel: TFLclassics

Views: 432,102

Keywords: suburban, chevy suburban 2500, suburban 2500, chevrolet suburban, chevy suburban, review, suburban 2500hd, chevy suburban 2500hd, car review, 1995 chevy suburban 2500 review, 2013 chevrolet suburban 2500 review, chevrolet suburban (automobile model), 2500 suburban, 2003 suburban 2500, 2009 suburban 2500, 2010 suburban 2500, 2015 suburban 2500, suburban review, 1995 chevy suburban 2500, 2005 chevy suburban 2500, 3/4 ton suburban 2500, 2017 suburban 2500 diesel, TFLtruck

Id: YW83D6pMO9Q

Length: 16min 38sec (998 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 13 2022