For that $40 rental fee, this Silverado owner netted himself +57 HP and +78 lb-ft thanks to a larger engine.
Update 6/29/2020 – Joke confirmed. Wow, who called his university? Ya’ll need to chill.
A whale of a tale popped up on Facebook earlier this weekend from Chevrolet Silverado owner Justun Coyle on his epic post on the Chevrolet Silverado (Cat Eye Edition) owners group. Justun alleges he rented a Chevrolet Express U-Haul van for just $40, and, over the course of two days, swapped out the 4.8L small block V8 from his Chevrolet Silverado for the much larger 6.0L V8 sitting under the hood of that U-Haul rental. And, to make his return nice and tidy, he did the Uno reverse and swapped in his smaller engine into the rental before returning it.
I can smell a bu** s*** story from a mile away but this one brought a smile to many people’s faces, witnessed it shared dozens of times across multiple car groups, and is just the right amount of believable that it’s gained some notoriety making this post worthy of an urban legend.
Check out a screenshot of his post below.
The Chevrolet Express Van and Silverado Truck share the same platform and, by extension, several engines to meet the needs of its customers. The Silverado and Chevrolet Express Van both were offered with the Vortec 4800 (4.8L V8) and Vortex 6000 (6.0L V8 ) so it makes Justun’s story slightly believable.
Swapping out small black Chevys, although I’ve never done it myself, compared to Japanese imports, is probably twice as easy given all the engine bay space, availability of parts, and accounting for the sheer amount of knowledge about these iconic American engines out there.
The tale of the tape between these two engines, just looking at the peak power numbers, is a sizeable +57 HP and +78 lb-ft difference. In a dimension where this happened, if you pulled it off, for $40, that’s a deal of a power upgrade.
This is, of course, illegal to do. One U-Haul employee mentioned in the comments, if caught, they’d not only criminally charge you by the book but make you pay for a brand new van.
Of course there were commenters who think they could finesse the system by using fake IDs and whatnot but that sounds like a lot of trouble getting a slightly larger engine with an unknown amount of miles and abuse.
SBCs from the junkyard are a dime a dozen so, just pony up some dough on July 4 when there are deals at the Pick-N-Pull, and get yourself a legit engine for not that much more.
But neat story. Here’s Justun’s real Silverado, these came with 6.0’s from the factory.
Hehe, I was only pretending to be a thief under my real name. I’m so clever.
Legit just picked up a box van with a bogus DL,email,no cc or debit card,had to sign absolutely nothing, honestly had to speak to or see no one…it was absolutely nuts how simple it was and how little I had to give them. I have a yard full of Silverados, Sierras, Tahoes and Yukons and can’t afford parts to get anything running right now but I’m good w a wrench. The box and cab are coming off the box truck and an extended cab Silverado 1500 w short bed are gonna go on the chassis and I’ll have a 1500 HHD Silverado. I really could care less what anyone has to say about it. You don’t know me or my life so pass your judgement elsewhere. I would never steal from an individual but I have what amounts to an absolute duty to shoplift everything I possibly can. Corporations are fair game and I’ll even go as far as to call the majority them evil so I have no problem and no moral hang-up over it. It’s an awesome bonus that I’m gonna have a 6L 6L80 with a 14bolt rear-end 2001 pickup and I’m gonna cost the insurance company who has screwed more people than Magic Johnson a small chunk of money.