So I've been in the market for a Duramax for about 8 months now. I have a 2005 1/2 ton with the 5.3L that I'm looking to trade in on the Dmax.

I started out saying nothing but an LBZ, then maybe an LLY, and now I might even go LB7.

I live in a small town, and I want to get something through my local dealership, since my family and I have been buying vehicles through them for 20 years, and their service is awesome.

They just got an '03 LB7 with 81,000 miles on it, bone stock. I planned on putting a chip of some sort, CAI, and straight pipe on it almost immediately.

I'm about ready to take the plunge, but I've just gotta know, am I going to get in my truck every day wishing I went with an LLY? Or is the difference between the two engines with the mods mentioned not really going to be very noticeable?

Well if your injectors go bad and the dealer wont cover them under warrenty you'll be wishing you had a LLY, but since you said their service is good you might not have a problem. The LLY's had an overheating issue but I think there is a fix for the problem. The earlier LB7's had head gasket and water pump issues, and they all have injector issues. Do a search on here about them you'll find a million threads about it, or simply click back and check all the recent posts im sure there will be a few. I think the LLY was rated at 310hp and 605 ft lbs. while the LB7 was rated at 300 hp and 520 ft lbs. The LB7 will more than likely be cheaper so you can throw more mods at it and make it just as fast or easily faster than a stock LLY. GM extended the warrenty to 7 years or 200k on the injectors so the truck you mentioned has still got plenty of time left if the injectors do go bad. Stock for stock the LLY is a little more powerful.

I have an 03 with the LB7 and it had the injectors replaced 50,000 miles ago, but has had no other issues since. Also, with what little dealings I have had with my D-Max and GM, the warranty procedure on the injectors was pretty simple. I guess it happens alot...:P...lol

I forgot to mention that I have the Edge Juice w/ attitude and a strait pipe and love it. Other than the hastle of having to send my edge box in and diesel being 4.00 bones/gallon, I love it. I am getting almost 20mpg, and run the edge on level 2, which makes plenty of power for me. Either way, if you go with a duramax, a chip, and a strait pipe you'll enjoy your experience. Good luck.

If you need to have the latest greatest then yes you will regret it but if you get in to the vehicle you are driving, ie; learn all you can about it, you will be happy with any version of the Duramax. They are all great engines, good luck.

Also know that not all issues with injectors are covered under the s.p. for the lb7 only a few conditions are covered, so you could have bad injectors that are your reponsiblility.

I don't really know much about the LB7, but my LLY's been in the family for two years, and has never been serviced for anything engine related.

Another question, are the injectors going bad caused by something else in the system making them fail? Or is it the injectors itself?

If its just the injectors itself, could going aftermarket fix the problem? Industrial Injection has a set that will run off the stock fuel pump, and give me more power at the same time. They are spendy, but I've been told that an injector fix with OEM parts is about $2000 anyways.

But I don't want to spend money on custom injectors if its something else in the system causing them to fail.

And thanks for the help so far guys.

well there are no aftermarket injectors for duramax's i believe they are stock injectors with bigger tips so I think they can still have problems. As for 2k for the injectors....maybe just the injectors themselves then you have to add labor....try about 4-5k for the dealer to do it. When we changed my brothers ourselves we had 2300 in it and that was just the cost of the parts.

Other than my LB7, I have no other diesel experience, but I'm happy with mine. Quite a few, if not most of the LB7's came from the factory with no cat, egr, dpf crap. Not as much power stock as an LMM or LLY, but you can fix that.:naughty:

Buy the LB7 if you are not going to buy the LBZ. I have run them all, own an LB7 and like that one the most. stuff for them is inexpensive, you have plenty of time on the injector warranty. No head gasket problems with the 2003's and they get the best fuel mileage of the bunch in my opinion.

Just my $0.02