2014 Chevy Silverado 3500
The 2014 Chevy Silverado HD is a mainstay in the full-size heavy-duty pickup segment. The Silverado may be a brute at its core, but it delivers a quiet and comfy ride. In addition, the Silverado’s steering feel is worth mentioning, having one of the most responsive and accurate tillers in the business. The Silverado 3500 HD is available in a single-rear-wheel or dual-rear-wheel configuration and comes in regular cab or crew cab body styles. The standard engine is a 6.0-liter gasoline-fed V8 motor pumping out 360 horsepower and 380 pound-feet of torque. Available in rear-wheel-drive or four-wheel-drive, the gas V8 has a six-speed automatic transmission. The Chevy Silverado 3500 has an optional 6.6-liter V8 diesel (397 horsepower and 765 pound-feet of torque) connected to a heavy-duty Allison 1000 six-speed gearbox. Properly equipped, the Silverado 3500 HD can tow up to 18,000 pounds or up to 23,100 pounds with a fifth-wheel trailer.
Sturdier Legs
Without a doubt, the 2014 Chevy Silverado 3500 HD is a large and heavy truck. The standard semi-elliptic 7+1 multi-leaf spring suspension is good enough for most towing and hauling applications. Still, the rear suspension can squat when carrying heavy loads, and the weight imbalance could affect vehicle stability while on the highway. The least you can do is to upgrade the shock absorbers. You don’t need a lift kit to change the shocks, and you get more features in return with aftermarket shock absorbers. Most aftermarket shock absorbers have larger pistons and a monotube high-pressure design to fortify your truck’s underpinnings. When thinking about buying new shocks for your Chevy 3500, make sure to only purchase dampers suitable to your rig's ride height. If your truck has a four to seven-inch lift kit, you’ll need adjustable shocks with customizable damping settings to preserve the ride quality.
Cover It Up
Truck bed covers or tonneau covers have come a long way since those fiddly snap-on soft covers became popular in the early 1980s. Now, you have an almost endless assortment of bed covers for the 2014 Chevy Silverado 3500 HD. Soft rolling bed covers are among the most popular, affordable, and easiest to use while still providing full bed access when carrying an ATV or heavy tools. On the flipside, hard-rolling covers operate similarly to a soft-rolling bed cover. The difference is in the construction. Hard-rolling covers come with reinforced aluminum slats, allowing you to carry lighter items on top of the bed cover. You can also get a soft or hard-folding bed cover if a rolling cover is a bit too old-school for your modern taste. Tri-folding covers segment the box into three distinct sections that can be individually accessed by flipping the tonneau panel that is covering it - no need to lift the entire cover.
Performance Cooling
Yes, all Chevy Silverados have transmission coolers from the factory. Still, it would help if you considered a transmission cooler upgrade to preserve and enhance the integrity of your truck’s gearbox, especially the Allison 1000 gearbox unit that comes standard with the 6.6-liter diesel V8 engine. Bear in mind that excess heat is the primary killer of truck gearboxes. Every 25-degrees increase in temperature while towing or hauling will significantly reduce the service life of any gearbox. Aftermarket transmission coolers have a higher capacity than stock and offer more square inches of cooling surface area. Also included are high-pressure transmission cooler lines and adapter lines. At the same time, some kits have thermal bypass valves that skip the running the oil through the cooler until it has reached normal operating temperature. From there, the valve opens and begins its job of maintaining the oil temperature exactly where it needs to be (in effect, working exactly like the thermostat does for the engine coolant).
