Ownership Verified: Truck life! 2004 GMC Yukon

Sevs753

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jul 16, 2009
Messages
2,788
Location
Metro Detroit
Car(s)
'13 Subaru BRZ, '04 GMC Yukon
So after my first year of owning a house, and the prelude developing more problems, I decided i need something more practical. At first i was looking at things like crossovers so I could pull my jetski, but I decided that if i was going to get something big, I would go all the way. This started me looking into trucks that could tow a car on a trailer. Since I plan to take the BRZ in a more track-focused direction, and start going to further and further away tracks, being able to tow it became a valid use case.

After looking at trucks for a while, my friend ended up buying his wife a tahoe. Since he knew I was looking at trucks as well, he offered me a test drive. After the test drive, I decided that going for a full size SUV would be the more comfortable option than the truck while still being able to tow what i need.

After a bit of searching, I found this 2004 GMC Yukon SLT for sale in North Carolina. It looked good in the ad and after I called about it, I got some photos of the underbody arranged for an inspection. After that came back good, I placed a deposit and booked a flight to go down and buy it.

The drive back felt like forever and I had to take several stops to stretch and avoid falling asleep but i mad it back after 13 hours on the road. For whatever reason, Waze decided to take me up and down a mountain road. It was a better driving road that anything I've driven in the BRZ. Too bad i was in an SUV and it was raining. I also got a nice detour through downtown Toledo.

The truck is the SLT trim which is the second highest trim and has just about every option you can get without going up to the Denali trim. After far as I can tell, the only option missing is the sunroof.

The only issues I have found are that the steering is a bit off so if you let the wheel return to exactly center, it pulls to the right. The front diff is also wearing out and making some noise. Apparently thats common in cars with the stabilitrac AWD system (not the usual 4x4 system) so I'll have to get the front diff replaced or rebuilt. Not a huge deal since its just the noise right now and i used it to negotiate the price down a little. Overall, I believe I got a fair deal and am happy with it.

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Even has a brake controller for a trailer too!
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proof
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Nice!
 
An El Camino would be better. :p


Nice find. What are you going to do to protect the underside from the harshness of the Michigan winter?
 
An El Camino would be better. :p


Nice find. What are you going to do to protect the underside from the harshness of the Michigan winter?

Planning on spraying the important bits with an underbody spray. Ive heard good things about #M's professional grade stuff. My friend also works at a place that does undercoatings just over the river in Canada so i may take it to them if i feel lazy.
 
So while i was on my way back home from NC, I discovered that a previous owner had already added an AUX in port to the car. Since I didn't know about it, I didn't bring an aux cable with me and couldnt test it out.

9tXxgLw.jpg


After I got home, i grabbed an aux cable and went to try, only to find that I couldn't figure out how it was hooked up. I verified that it wasn't done the usual way by tapping into the output from the XM module and i also verified it wasn't done by tapping the CD player, like my friend did in his corvette. Puzzled, i tore apart the dash today and when i traced the wires behind the stereo, i found this.

stgxtGS.jpg


It's a hardwired FM transmitter. Tune to the configured radio station and youre good to go. Sound quality isn't the greatest but it's good enough for me. I might replace the stereo with a new headunit somewhere down the line when a good one with android auto comes out but until then, this works.
 
I find it rather amusing that it appears that the FM transmitter is a Ford part.
 
So while i was on my way back home from NC, I discovered that a previous owner had already added an AUX in port to the car. Since I didn't know about it, I didn't bring an aux cable with me and couldnt test it out.

http://imgur.com/9tXxgLw.jpg

After I got home, i grabbed an aux cable and went to try, only to find that I couldn't figure out how it was hooked up. I verified that it wasn't done the usual way by tapping into the output from the XM module and i also verified it wasn't done by tapping the CD player, like my friend did in his corvette. Puzzled, i tore apart the dash today and when i traced the wires behind the stereo, i found this.

http://imgur.com/stgxtGS.jpg

It's a hardwired FM transmitter. Tune to the configured radio station and youre good to go. Sound quality isn't the greatest but it's good enough for me. I might replace the stereo with a new headunit somewhere down the line when a good one with android auto comes out but until then, this works.


That is what I am waiting for too. The old FM transmitter I have been using for more than a decade seems to be having problems so I am hoping that it will be sooner rather than later.

You might be able to get it to work better if you tie it directly to ground. Are there any screws on the backside? I would not use the one between the RCA connectors, unless it is the only choice.



I find it rather amusing that it appears that the FM transmitter is a Ford part.


Who cares who made it, as long as it works.
 
I had my first experience towing a car on a trailer yesterday. My friend went to the Silver Lake sand dunes on the west side of Michigan with his XJ Jeep and learned the hard way why having a snorkel is a good idea. He underestimated how deep a water pit was and hydrolocked the engine.

Since I had nothing better to do yesterday, I volunteered to tow the car back home to Detroit. It was about 220 miles each way and the Yukon didn't skip a beat. You definitely felt the weight and accelerating was a slow task but once we were on the highway, the truck was perfectly comfortable sitting at 70mph. We even averaged 12.6mpg on the way back with the jeep. The brake controller that the yukon came with is old but it worked perfectly. I can't imagine trying to pull a load that big (approx 5500lbs) without trailer brakes. Before i tow something that big again, I'm going to upgrade the brakes just for piece of mind. The brakes performed flawlessly and I never felt like I wouldn't be able to stop but it would be nice to know I could really count on them.

The only thing i would have changed would be to have a weight distribution hitch. It would even out the load a bit and tame the little sway i would get when going downhill and turning at the same time. Overall, I'm definitely happy with my decision to buy this truck.

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