1991 Suburban front grill on a CUCV

[DrJekl]

I did a quick search and did not find any references. If my search skills just suck, let me know!

For all of your hard core guys that think I am committing sin and should have my head removed with a rusty knife, my truck, deal with it! opcorn:

Anyway, I picked up a front grill from a 1991 Suburban and I am going to put it on my 86 M1031 CUCV truck. I think that front grill assembly looks great so I am going to do this!

My radiator was seeping and I just got my spare serviced and ready to install so no better time than the present.

The radiator support is out and needs to be cleaned and POR-15'd. I'll get that in then get the grill painted and cut for the slave recepticle. I am using the black out light as a plug for my winch so it may go away altogether to keep from having to cut more of the grill out.

I'll get some pics up ASAP. The weather blows and I have a CJ5 in the garage right now so my space is limited.

Off the the car wash tomorrow! POR-15 tomorrow night, then paint, and I hope to have the old core support out in a few days.

Attached are photos of the current front end and the grill assembly on the doner Suburban.

 

[mikes47jeep]

well, i'll be the first

"its your truck do what you want"

i pesonaly like my MV's stock thats just part of the charm of them, the slave cable and B/O light in the grill. the rough paint, the slow ride

i wouldn't change it but thats just me

Mike

 

[allenhillview]

DrJekl, where did you get that bumper? I like it. Maybe not for my 1008 but for another farm truck.

 

[Warthog]

I have a CUCV brush guard and bumper w/shackles on my 1990 Burb.

I'll post pics later

 

[plym49]

I like it. Nice.

 

[therealsundance]

Get the front clip wiring harness, no sense hacking into yours if you can unplug it and replace it with the one that matches the new light set up. You will need to swap your core support for the burbs as well.

 

[scrambled]

I just installed a front end from a 91 burb today. Picked it up from Pull a Part on Saturday.

I unplugged the wiring from the firewall on the donor, but the plug was different from my 1008. had to splice the wires, but all the color matched except for the horn.

The 91 front clip has dual horns also. Much better than my little factory horn.

65 bucks for the front clip
90 bucks for all new bulbs/ headlights

It is nice to be a little different. Too many CUCVs around town.

Travis

 

[hilber]

Looks fine to me. I however like mine original as there aint nothing like the real thang..

 

[bjsmith]

 

[plym49]

Maybe take the opportunity to trash the mechanical fan, and replace with an electric unit. Faster warm-ups and you can switch it off when fording.

 

[DrJekl]

BJ, there are pics and more to come. Keep your pants on man! I can't take photos of crap I have not done yet.

As far as the harness goes, it did not make much sense to take it all out of the core support and leave it. Plus, you need 90% of it anyway because the lights use different plugs. The end that plugs into the firewall is different, as stated by Scrambled, so you can't just plug it in.

Good point about the fan but I'll stick with what I have today. Maybe later. Plus, I don't do much fording. Never cared much for Fords either. I may install the seperate power steering and oil radiators though. We'll see. I have a unit from a 99 model but I am not sure the ends plug into the engine (oil) the same way. I believe the 86 has a nut on the line while the 99 was a plug in and clip type.

Scrambled, thanks for the input! The wiring harness was the next point of order. I have some spare harnesses at the shop so I'll put one together from one of them rather than cut into the one in the truck now so I can keep my old core support together.

 

[jdeoliveira74]

Maybe take the opportunity to trash the mechanical fan, and replace with an electric unit. Faster warm-ups and you can switch it off when fording.

yeah my fan clutch went today and it was $39 to replace sucked but glad i caught it before the fan went thru the radiator

 

[Warthog]

Here are the pics of the Stock CUCV brush guard on the 1990 Burb.

I am thinking about modifing the guard to match the headlights. Ot switch out to the CUCV grill.

 

[wallew]

You will find that you are going to have problems with the head lights

specifically going from high to low beam

your CUCV uses one headlight with both functions in one light and the 91 uses two- the wiring is NOT compatible that I am aware of. they made some kind of change

I will hope you find a good alternative

I own both and love them both

 

[scrambled]

The problem is the parking lights. Both years used one wire to power the high beams and one wire to power the low beams. These wires are the same colors from both years and you can connect them right together.

The 91 uses an extra parking light, so it has 2 dark blue and 2 light blue wires where the 86 has one of each. Twist them togeter before you butt connect them, and you are good to go.

The Horn wire is green for the 86 and black with yellow tracer on the 91.

 

[DrJekl]

wallew,

Scrambled hit it but the wiring is basically the same concept in a two and four head lamp system. Each lamp in the four has two pins, a two lamp system has three. Basically a ground and a power lead for low and one for high. In the four lamps, each light will have a ground and a power lead. Low beam is on all the time (when the lights are on), and high beam comes on when you turn it on. Same thing but different if you will.

I am glad I posted this! Scrambled has solved all of my problems and answered all of the questions I have on my list to answer. I was going to get the two wiring diagrams and compare them next but it sounds to me like it is time to start cutting!

I washed the core support tonight. Sorry but I did not take photos. I assumed most of you guys know what that looks like. I won't take photos of the painting either. That is about the same no matter if you are tagging your neighbor's house or painting a core support, rattle cans are pretty straight forward.

I am thinking about going back and grabbing the GMC grill! I'll just make this into a GMC to go with my GMC tail gate I recently picked up! All I'll need is the GMC dash plate and we're good. But, then again, I don't want to be the cause of a riot and a string of heart attacks!

 

[rlwm211]

I have a CUCV brush guard on my 1991 Burb and the headlights work fine. There is no shadow in the high beam at all

 

[Cliffinator]

Thats funny, Ive got a 86 m1031 and im installing a burb grill also

 

[rlwm211]

To be quite honest, I would rather have the CUCV grill and headlight setup. The small headlights on the 1991 suburban are expensive and with as many miles on my truck as I have had to replace all of them. They are not as durable nor do they light the road as well as the big rectangular headlights do.

 

[DrJekl]

Maybe but I will have an extra ten cool points when I get this done!