06 LBZ into a 02 Suburban Questions

[MIEZ71]

I have decided to throw in a 06 LBZ into my 02 Suburban and I have a few questions.
First, here is my set-up...
2002 Suburban K1500 4X4, 5.3 Vortec, Rear HVAC, Full Power
2006 LBZ/Allison Double OD, Manual 4X4 from a Silverado K2500 Single Cab Work Truck. I have the dash assembly, steering wheel/column, gas/brake pedals, full wire harness interior/exterior, all underhood components, HVAC components, Driveshafts, ABS system/lines, Fuel system/lines, On-Star Sytem/Mirror, ECM/TCM, and Gauge Cluster all from the same above said vehicle.
My questions are this,
Should I swap the dash's or is the wiring the same and I can just swap the gauge clusters and computers?
Does the Duramax use the same engine mounts?
Any onther usefull advice?
Thank you in advance for any support, its greatly appreciated.
I am not a newb here, I changed my email a while back and forgot my log-in info so I could not log in and I could not retreiv anything due to no longer having that email. So here I am again with my new handle. Great to be back!

 

[THEFERMANATOR]

Easiest way would be to find an 03+ 2500 BURB as the 1500 swap into an 02 will be fun to say the least. You'll have to contend with the vehicles wiring being different pretty much throughout. You'll need to make some brackets to offset the engine mounts as they will be off about 3 1/2" I believe Eric said. Also I highly doubt your stock 10 bolt rear end will live very long at all, so plan on a 9 1/2" rear axle upgrade at the minumum. The 01-02 trucks are a bit tricky to swap in an 03+ engine in all honesty from what I was told and found when I researched my swap.

 

[MIEZ71]

Not exactly the encouragement I was hoping for. :thumb:
I consider myself a experienced and talented mechanic as I have done a few late model Vortec engine conversions into 98' and older pickups and also seemlesly intergrated the two wiring harnes' so I feel I am up the challenge! I consider the electrical side of the project the most challenging as well as the most fun as vehicle electrical wiring seems to be my strength as I am both good at it and also have the patience for it.
I agree that if I do the swap that the wimpy 10 bolt would not last long under any abuse. I planned on "trying" to take it easy untill I could swap in the 11.5" rear from the duramax that I dont yet have. I dont plan on towing anything for at least a year so I think I should be ok.
I found an article in one of the threads somewhere on here that had a fairly detailed swap tutorial...... Wait..... After re-reading I did see that the Yukon he was using was a 2500 so maybe there will be some differences..... Anyways, I tore almost everything off of the donor vehicle that I could use so basicly this engine could run on a stand with no vehicle, meaning, that if the wiring is different I could just swap the wiring harness and deal with the rear HVAC later.
I have plenty of plate steel liying around so I am sure it wouldnt be too much to whip up a couple of new motor mount brackets if I need to and cut out the old ones. This could also possibly allow me to lower the Duramax further into the vehicle so I wouldnt have to lift the body??? Hopefully????
I know I would need new driveshafts obviously, and I would possibly need to swap the torsion bars from a 2500 to support the extra weight in the front. As far as everything else goes it should be just a matter of putting everything I took off the 06' onto the Suburban, right???? I know that GM uses a two piece chassis set-up in all of there trucks and the rear half is nearly identicle for every truck they make. That being said I should be able to just bolt up the duramax exaust as well as the dual tanks, and fuel lines, correct?
Any thoughts on all of this new info? I appreciate all the help I can get. I consider myself a great mechanic but I am also smart enough to ask for advice on something I have never done.
Unfortunately getting a 2500 Suburban is out of the question as this one I have now is on loan and I have no money to go out and purchase another one. So I am stuck with my 1500 02' model. I originaly planned on putting this monstrosity into my 97' K1500 Silverado but that project sat too long and eventualy someone came along and offered me the right amount of cash at the right time. Now I am stuck with a complete 06' Duramax Conversion that I couldnt get rid of even for the cheap price of $6500.00 and its just sitting in my garage without a home which is just unbearable to even think about in my realm.
Well, again, any help is greatly appreciated! I do plan on doing the swap, as in another year and a half I will be into sprint car racing and I know that 5.3 would severely struggle pulling a 30' enclosed trailer with a sprint car in it as well as plenty of spare parts. I couldnt even imagine fuel economy... Maybe 6 MPG. NO WAY!

 

[THEFERMANATOR]

The main obstacles will be getting the cluster and everything to talk with each other. 01-02 is a completely different animal as far as the wiring colors, plugs and vehicle protocol from the 03+. Even on the 03+ you still have to add in the CAN bus and I believe a few wires for the TCM power. Eric(TDIGUY at DP) specializes in these swaps, but I know he has said he wouldn't even attemp to put an 03+ engine into an 01-02 due to all of the differences in the wiring. He also said that the 2500 front parts won't even come close to working with the 1500 frame. Then you have the 6 lug wheels which limits you to the 9.5" semi floater 14 bolt rear end unless you want 6 lugs up front and 8 lugs out back. The swap is doable, but the 02-03 berrier is a pretty big obstacle to work around if you want everything to work like stock.

 

[MIEZ71]

Yeah, I understand what your saying. Like I said, I originaly bought the transplant intending it for my 97' Silverado so I made sure to get everything from the donor vehicle so I could just use all of the donor items and everything would work like it should. I appreciate all your advice, I will have to send Eric a PM to see what he thinks I should look out for.
Anyone else have any thoughts?

 

[turbo_bu]

Yeah, I understand what your saying. Like I said, I originaly bought the transplant intending it for my 97' Silverado so I made sure to get everything from the donor vehicle so I could just use all of the donor items and everything would work like it should. I appreciate all your advice, I will have to send Eric a PM to see what he thinks I should look out for.
Anyone else have any thoughts?

Ben will probably also be a very good resource for comparing the years of trucks and the necessary evils of GMLan, CAN, BCM, etc...

My guess right now is that you will end up having at least all the dash, the BCM, and of course the ECM / TCM for your 06 somewhere in the Suburban (almost as a standalone as you mentioned). The real trick then will be to get the Suburban stuff (HVAC, rear air, BCM, etc...) to work / talk to it, or around it. As others have said, not easy, but also depends on how much you need all the extra Suburban stuff to still work after you are done.

 

[dmax426]

I see this is an old post, with important information. After having gone through a conversion of an 01 Suburban and putting an 05 LLY into the vehicle, it was a project. I had the whole truck as it was wrecked so I could get parts off of it as I needed. I ended up swapping out the whole frame harness, the entire dash assembly, and body harness. I went this route for a couple of reasons, the first being less of a headache than merging to two systems together, and the second I gained the dual air system out of the truck. Would I do this cross year swap again probably not after having had the whole interior of the suburban out for tracing and making the needed connections for the rear hatch assembly. Also had to make my own harness connections for the rear air, as the 01 had auto air which ran through the front control head, so I installed parts out of an 05 suburban manual control and ran new wires.

 

[mngto]

lb7 in 03 yukon xl

hi everyone i'm a newby here ,not sure how to go about it ,but I have some questions with wiring on my 03 yukonxl2500 swap , i put in a lb7 out of a 03 sierra 2500 , and have it up & running but the cel lite says glow plug circuit fault and glow plug lite doesn't come on and scanner won't communicate with tcm and prndl doesn't show what gear it's in ...any help would be appreciated
steve

 

[THEFERMANATOR]

hi everyone i'm a newby here ,not sure how to go about it ,but I have some questions with wiring on my 03 yukonxl2500 swap , i put in a lb7 out of a 03 sierra 2500 , and have it up & running but the cel lite says glow plug circuit fault and glow plug lite doesn't come on and scanner won't communicate with tcm and prndl doesn't show what gear it's in ...any help would be appreciated
steve

The glow plug problem is probably because you didn't run the wire from the ecm to the cluster for the wait to stsrt light. It is a hard wired circuit like the check engine light is. The other oroblem sounds like a problem with your class 2 data bus connection to the tcm.