On the exterior, Al's Heavy Duty is close to original with a few custom touches intended to enhance the HD's style. Auto Center Auto Body painted the door handles, mirrors, and grille shell, PIAA lights were added, a Trenz grille insert was installed, then the truck's lower rocker panels were emblazoned with dice graphics. No radical body mods, to be sure, but the result is clean and eye-catching.
As stated, it's cool to realize that the General engineered its 2WD and 4x4 HD trucks in such a similar way that many of its parts and components are interchangeable. Certainly, lifting a 2WD truck with the already-proven 4x4 suspension components made the buildup of Al Mata's redhead a whole lot simpler and quicker, since there are few aftermarket manufacturers tooling up to fabricate complete 12-inch lifted suspension systems for late-model 2WD trucks, and scratch-building a 1-foot lift for a late-model IFS truck is a daunting task. Of course, now that the 2WD/4WD swapping secret's out, we can only anticipate a slew of radically lifted, big tire-shod two-wheel-drive HDs hitting the roads and trails around your town and ours - and that's just fine with us.
SPECIFICATIONS |
| Owner/hometown | Al Mata/Temecula, California |
| Make/model | Chevrolet/'01 Heavy Duty Crew Cab 2WD |
| Suspension | CST 4-inch lifted steering knuckles; CST 8-inch
suspension cradle lift; Fox Shox (two per wheel);
custom shock hoops (front); CST 8-inch lifted
spring packs; 4-inch blocks; Fox Shox (two per wheel); Firestone airbags (rear) |
| Wheels/tires | 16.5x9.75-inch Weld Stone Crusher/38.5x15.50x16.5 Mickey Thompson Baja Belted |
| Engine/transmission | Vortec 8.1L V-8 with K&N Filtercharger; Allison five-speed automatic |
| Additional features | Eclipse stereo; JL speakers; Phoenix Gold ampli
-fiers; The Other Guys Headers; Spin Tech muffler;
Line-Loc-actuated parking brake; braided steel brake lines |