thats what alot of people are complaining about, its a pretty complex over advertised thing and it doesnt get any better mileage than the other ones. as far as your trucks if they have the 6 speeds and do alot of city type driving i think that would be more of a savings than anything to do with the engine.

Good thing I did opt for the 5.7 swap vs the 5.3.

Thank you everyone for your replies. I have decided I am going to try to just dig into the motor and only go as deep as I need to, to be able to trade the truck in. I'm hoping to find the bad lifter and replace it and that will quiet it down enough for me to unload it. With that being said... does anyone know if I am able to pull the heads off to get to the lifters without pulling the timing chain cover? I have read in several places that this can all be done with some common hand tools and some time. I have more than common hand tools and I believe I have the ability to do the job, but a $400 timing cover alignment tool is not common or cheap!!! I have tried searching and searching for how to'* on just doing the lifters, but I can only find how to'* on replacing the cam shaft too and that definitely requires pulling the timing chain cover. Any help, hints, tips, tricks, or links would be greatly appreciated! Thank you all in advance, you aare all a big help!

pretty sure you need to replace both. maybe if you found a decent used cam and lifters from an earlier 5.3 without afm, and had the pcm programed. i think i read somewhere black bear doesnt charge that much to just turn afm off. you will have to call them its not listed on their site. sometimes you can get around the oem tools with time and ingenuity.

Black Bear Performance :: Custom Tuning Solutions for 96 and newer GM Vehicles

Thank you.