The sun FINALLY came out in Texas!

We've had the wettest and coldest winter in 20+ years here in Central Texas.   It's actually snowed three times here in Austin, which is unheard of, and it has rained and rained and rained.   On the upside, there is no drought talk this spring, and we are supposed to have the best spring wildflower crop we've had in years.   ANYWAY the Roadmaster has been hiding safe and dry in my garage for over a month-and-a-half.   I've started it, but it had not seen daylight in some time.    Well the rain finally stopped yesterday, and it was in the 70's and gorgeous (today is too), so I could not resist backing the Roadmaster out.   I started right up, and drove perfect like always.  I drove it to work, and then to the lake yesterday evening.    Windows down and radio up, I still love this old car so much!    Took the pics below.    







Save the Whales!

-Texas Mike

Sweet

Awesome!!

Great pictures . I see I am not the only one wanting all of this crappie weather to go away .

I ended-up using the Roady as my commuter the past three days, and tinkering with it in the evenings.  I'd missed driving it a lot!    It's back in the garage today and I'm in my Burb.  I wanted to drive the Roady again, the weather is still great, but I'm determined to keep the miles down and use the car as a weekend cruise-in toy as I have the past few years.

I miss when it was daily driver back in 2007-10!    Made driving to work more fun, but I want to keep it forever....so back in the garage until the weekend!

-Texas Mike

Easy problem to fix,get another one.

Andebe wrote:

Easy problem to fix,get another one.

Naw, I really like my old Burb for commuting duty (other than the gas, ha!).



Will save the Roady for weekend fun!

-Michael

What kind of mileage do you get with the Burban?

I'm consistently seeing 9 to 12 in our 6.0 AWD Escalade. But I drive like, well, me.

12 is when mom does more of the driving. lol

RedandBlack wrote:

What kind of mileage do you get with the Burban?

I'm consistently seeing 9 to 12 in our 6.0 AWD Escalade. But I drive like, well, me.

12 is when mom does more of the driving. lol

I average around 14 in town and 16 on the highway.  I've got as much as 18 on a trip with the cruise set, but 16 is the average.   My Burb is about as "light" as they made them, it's a 2WD with the 5.3.    This is my 5th Suburban-ish vehicle (four Burbs and one Denali), and I just LOVE these.    GM got these RIGHT.    It's sad though, the 2007+ seem to have a lot more issues with variable-displacement motor failures, dashboards shattering, headlights fogging over, buttons wearing off on the dash and such.   I keep buying these 2000-2006 models.   Find them at around 100K miles, drive them to around 200K miles, then sell and start over.    Getting harder now that these are getting older, but my current '02 above only has 120k miles, so I have a good 2-3 years left with it!  

Here's my Burbs (and one Denali), in order for purchase, oldest to newest purchases.   The final picture is my current 2002 Burb and my 16-year-old son Eddie's 2002 Silverado 1500HD, because you have to start kids off RIGHT!  Ha!








I really would like to have a newer one, but I've had so many friends that have had major $$$$ issues with the 2007+ models, that I guess I'll just keep buying these 2006 and older ones as long as I can.   They just run and run and run.   I understand they DO rust up north, but thankfully, I call Texas home..  

-Texas Mike

Yeah our '02 Escalade is great. 195k miles, doesn't burn or leak a drop of anything, AWD works just fine (not really needed here, but 6.0 wasn't available with 2WD apparently), and considering I paid $2800 for it... it's a deal.

I need to find a 3rd brake light for it... if you find one in your salvage yarding 02-06 fit the same... haha

I loved the Lear leather seats, blackwood trim and general style and detailing of my white '01 Denali XL. It just looked great, and still does. I bought it at 114K miles, and sold it at 189K. From 114-180k the only thing I had to do to it was a fuel pump, but when it hit 180k the air suspension failed, and I replaced with new rear springs and gas shocks, and then it developed an oil leak, and I CURSED having to deal with the AWD crap under there. At 186k the transfer case failed, see below (that was a white-knuckle drive towing that best behind my Ram 1500, ha!). I replaced the transfer case and then soon after sold the Denali and swore-off 4WD or AWD ever again. Don't need it here in Texas, and it just makes everything so much harder to work on/around. That said, I loved the way that Denali rode/drove/looked, and the 6.0 in it was bulletproof and averages about 12-14mpg.




The Denali was really the only big GM SUV that gave me any real issues, and it was all due to Denali-specific upgrades (suspension/AWD). Will stick to 2WD and non-air suspension from now on.

-Mike

Oh I WILL say that the Denali towed my boat better than any other vehicle I've owned. My Burbs tow fine, but that Denali would yank that boat out of the water like nothing was back there! Ha!

Yeah I've looked at those spring replacement kits. Very intriguing. Ours still airs up fine, but I also don't tow with it at all.

Mines a southern truck,. I paid 1200 cdn for it, its 2 wd. Gives an honest 21 mpg on hiway 17-18 around town
It's diesel,..
I just put on the big mirrors, big difference

Haven't seen one of those in a diesel in YEARS.

Hadn't seen that one Nick! Nice! Too bad you can't still get that 6.5 diesel in the new ones!

High idle is nice for winter warmups,. And summertime front and rear air on high.

phantom 309 wrote:

Mines a southern truck,. I paid 1200 cdn for it, its 2 wd. Gives an honest 21 mpg on hiway 17-18 around town
It's diesel,..
I just put on the big mirrors, big difference

???  How come you don't have 15 pictures of your car / truck when you post?

Looks sharp Nick! There are still a lot of the 1991-99 era ones running around down here, but most have badly sunburned paint and the interiors are ratty. Yours looks great!

I like how the hand in the video looks like its being sneaky.