Whether you believe it or not, things happen for a reason. For Corey Lewis, an upcoming father, his ownership of his Chevrolet Corvette had to be cut short. Although he lost his pride and joy, surely something would come along and take its place, right? This is the story of Lewis’ 2011 Chevrolet Silverado 2500 and how it came to be.
In 2018, Corey and his wife were expecting their first child. As mentioned earlier, Corvette’s aren’t practical for hauling a child and the necessary items they require. “With my wife and I expecting, the Corvette had to go. I already knew what I wanted which made it nice,” Lewis said. “The search was on for a low-miles LTZ LML Duramax.”
Definitely not your average Silverado. Photo provided by Christian Heiston of Pensacola, Florida.
How Silverado Got Started
Driving up the interstate or even cruising through town, we see trucks like this all day long, but Lewis was precise about what he wanted. “For a year, I looked everywhere for a low-mile LTZ Duramax truck. I could not find a decent deal anywhere. If the price was there, the mileage wasn’t. If the mileage was there, the price wasn’t,” he says.
Lucky for him, he struck gold and found this rig in 2018. I understand some people are loyal to brands or specific engines, but why this one? Lewis explained, “I wanted this kind of truck because I was familiar with it. I am an Air Force Ground Vehicle Technician and I’ve had my hands on plenty of these trucks while deployed and that has prepared me and familiarized me with these platforms.”
Upon purchase, Corey knew this truck had been upgraded from the LMM transmission and a few other things. “This did have an upgraded transmission but there was still some slight doubt about this truck regardless of the familiarity due to the CP4 injection pump,” Corey says.
We have seen a lot of trucks but there is usually one area where the cleaning lacks but not on this one.
Two days after the purchase of this truck was final, Lewis was hit with a short-notice deployment, and within five days, he had to have his bags packed and ready to take off again. “It was certainly a shock and I didn’t even get a full week of ownership to really enjoy my new truck,” he said.
Six weeks into deployment, Lewis’ daughter, Baylee, was born. As if Lewis didn’t have enough going on with the birth of a child, being deployed, not enjoying his new truck, and more, Mother Nature had plans of developing Hurricane Michael to throw a wrench in the mix.
“With the hurricane headed for our hometown, there was a chance that the Eglin base would be evacuated. With inclement weather en route, I wanted to make sure my wife and child would have a safe rig to evacuate and keep their belongings safe. So, the first purchase for the truck was an Extang bed cover,” Lewis says.
If the base was evacuated, Lewis didn’t want his family traveling through that storm in her Toyota Camry in case there was a situation where four-wheel-drive was needed. Thankfully, they didn’t have to evacuate and Lewis was able to finish the rest of his tour and returned home to his then six-month-old daughter.
“When we took my daughter in for her nine-month checkup she was diagnosed with a rare form of ocular cancer retinoblastoma, so after that happened, all of our plans of getting out of the military were pretty much axed overnight, unfortunately,” Lewis said.
With his daughter’s health condition, there was just no way he could justify getting out financially. On top of that, Lewis’ need for the truck was slowly going away. Due to their proximity to St. Jude Hospital, and other surrounding hospitals, where Lewis’ daughter was receiving treatment weekly, he was permanently locked into Eglin Air Force base until retirement in 2028.
The Snowball Effect
“I had contemplated selling or trading this truck in for something smaller, but the truck stayed. I had a coworker mention lifting this truck but with my previous experience with lifted vehicles, I wasn’t really on board. The coworker reassured me if I invested money into a nicer lift kit, it would ride and perform much better,” Lewis said.
Clean. Simple. Functional.
Just a few days later, Lewis had a Full Throttle Suspension 7-inch to 9-inch lift kit on his porch along with other goodies. This includes the Full Throttle Boxed Upper Control Arms, too. He had already invested this much money into the truck, what is a few more bucks, right? Not loving the dull-black coating the parts came with, Lewis sent these parts to a friend to powdercoat.
As you can expect, things started piling up and the truck keept getting upgrades. For starters, the Silverado is fitted with a set of 24×14 American Force Octane wheels wrapped in 35/12.50R22 Toyo Open Country AT tires.
“With the new wheels on, I began to upgrade on the performance side of things. Things were looking up. I was upgrading, the truck was running good, and then life said ‘no,’ again.”
Remember that CP4 injection pump we talked about earlier? It happened. One day, the CP4 decided to fail without offering any warning, engine code, or anything. This inevitably led him to fix it, but with the better, more reliable CP3 conversion from S&S Diesel Motorsport. With the help of some good friends, Lewis’ Duramax was back on the road.
This minor setback was merely temporary as Lewis hit the upgrade list harder than ever. This 2011 is equipped with a AFE Power cold air intake, AFE Power 3-inch intercooler piping, Sinister Diesel intake bridge, Wehrli Custom Fabrication EGR Delete, PPEI up-pipes, PPEI 3-inch downpipe, MBRP 5-inch exhaust, FASS 165 lift pump, a Beans Diesel Performance sump, and a SunCoast Diesel deep transmission pan.
As for future plans, Lewis is looking to upgrade fully to a SunCoast transmission, Rear Cantilever Suspension with airbags or coil-overs, and if he does a large single turbocharger, he’s planning on building the engine.
