Both Randy and Kevin worked for Starling at his own shop, Starling Enterprise, and continue to have a good working relationship with Starling; in fact, they still work at Starling’s shop from time to time.

The Tahoe has come to be known as the Madillac, since it looks more like a modern Nomad, but with a Cadillac grille. It was the brainchild of Kevin, and was originally built in about three months. We say originally, because the Madillac was completed but has since been refreshed with new paint and a new interior. In fact, as we go to press with this issue, we were told that the SUV is going in for another stereo system redo, which could well be in the process as you read this.

When looking at Starling’s Tahoe, the first thing most people notice is the radically chopped top. To give the Chevy its unique look, Kevin and Randy chopped 3.5 inches out of the A-pillar, 3.75 inches out of the B-pillar and 4.5-inches out of the C-pillar. The team then removed sections of metal from both the front and rear of the roof to lay back the windshield and lay forward the rear hatch. The additional rake added to the windshield and A-pillars gives the big Tahoe a sleeker, more car-like appearance and really complement the truck. Tapering the rear of the roofline also takes much of the bulk out of the truck, and by laying the C-pillar forward, the fabrication team was able to retain the factory rear hatch frame and glass.

Additionally, the crew at Custom Concepts installed an ’00 Cadillac Escalade front end on the truck, including the grille, fenders and hood. When it came time to choose the front bumper, Kevin and Starling decided that the Escalade bumper sat too low for the air suspension and were concerned that it would get damaged when they lowered the truck. To remedy this but maintain clean, tight lines, Kevin and his team narrowed an ’01 GMC truck bumper by 3 inches to make it better fit the front end of the truck. Now Starling can completely air out the suspension without doing any damage to the front bumper. At full deflation, the bumper is close to the ground without actually touching.

Moving on to the front doors, the Cox family had to rework the upper doorframe to match the top chop and did so perfectly. But they weren’t finished, they also molded-in the mirror mounts and integrated sleek Chevy Malibu rear door handles to continue with the smooth flowing lines rather than the more harsh lines of the square factory truck door handles. Just past the driver’s-side door, the team frenched in a billet shorty-antenna mast into the Tahoe’s B-pillar. The fab crew also smoothed the windshield cowl vents, and that really gives the truck a smooth, finished appearance. At the rear of the truck, Randy and Kevin removed and filled the factory taillights and installed a Sir Michaels rolled pan. To replace the taillights, they installed a 48-inch LED strip by Hytech in the Sir Michaels rolled pan. Finally, they relocated the tailgate handle to the inside, smoothed the tailgate and recessed the license plate into the driver’s side of the tailgate.

After all of the body mods and bodywork was completed, Kevin and Chris Brankel laid several coats of DuPont Lamborghini Diablo Pearl Yellow paint on the Tahoe. After the paint was sprayed, the body was color sanded and buffed to perfection. But Starling and crew felt the truck was still lacking something, so they had Billet Accessories Direct in Tulsa, Oklahoma, fabricate custom Chevy Nomad-style exterior trim. The custom polished exterior trim strips adorn the Tahoe on each side of the truck at the beltline, and run front-to-rear horizontally as well as vertically on the tailgate—similar to a Nomad—and on the roof’s center ribs.

We’ve seen many heavily customized trucks like this one that look great from the outside, but are bone stock under the hood and on the inside. Not this one. When you lift the Cadillac hood on Starling’s truck about the only thing stock you’ll see is the block. The engine bay features a polished aluminum dress-up kit from Empire Motor Sports as well as painted components to dress up the under hood space and tie it to the exterior. The Vortec 350 small-block Chevy V-8 wears Empire Motor Sports billet aluminum valve covers and is capped off with a polished ProCharger, pushing 8 pounds of boost into the TBI injection. Intake air is filtered through a K&N filter, and the engine exhales through a Flowmaster 2-into-1 muffler. A Hypertech programmer is used to electronically enhance the engine management, to make it work well with the ProCharger supercharger and to reliably deliver plenty of power. John Barrett Racing Engines in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, performed the engine mods, and estimates the engine output to be north of 400 hp. Starling’s Tahoe packs both good looks and big power, and going the supercharger route, engine power enhancement allows him to drive the truck to and from shows and events on a regular basis.

The potent Vortec engine is coupled to a beefed-up 4L60E four-speed automatic transmission. Ace Transmission in Springfield, Missouri, built the transmission to adequately handle all the power from the supercharged 350. To help maintain proper transmission operating temperature, a B&M Racing trans cooler was installed. The combination of the supercharged Vortec engine and the four-speed automatic transmission yields 20 mpg. Rather than shift the new trans with the factory column mount shifter, a B&M Racing Street Bandit shifter was installed in a custom-fabricated center console more reminiscent of a street rod than a modern sport truck.

The highly modified Tahoe body rides on a factory Chevrolet chassis with an Ektensive Meltdown rear frame notch to allow the truck to be dropped. Up front are Belltech 2-inch dropped spindles, air bags and KYB shocks. In the rear, the stock 1/2-ton rear axle and 3.42 gears were retained, but the leaf spring suspension was scrapped in favor of a custom two-link setup using a Panhard bar. In the rear is also a pair of KYB shocks and air bags, and to make room for the air supply tank, the floor pan was raised so the tank doesn’t hit the ground when the truck is laid out. A staggered wheel combination with 20×8.5-inch front and 22×10-inch rear Bonspeed Laguna wheels are wrapped in Dunlop 255/35-front and 305/35-rear tires.

Inside Starling’s Tahoe is as amazing as the outside. Multi-time USACi and IASCA sound competition champion Gary Biggs, and associate Mike Maxwell, from Tulsa, Oklahoma, designed and built the interior, including the one-off hand-fabricated dash, door panels and audio system. Before the team installed the new interior, which incorporates new hand-fabricated panels, the interior sheetmetal was lined with Dynamat sound deadening material.

The dash Biggs and Maxwell built features a center-mounted instrument cluster from an ’03 Chevy truck, painted and modified to work with the ’96 Tahoe components. They custom molded the flowing shape for the dash from wood and fiberglass, then painted sections while upholstering others. The door panels are built in much the same way with sections of upholstered fiberglass and sections of painted fiberglass as well as custom door pulls/arm rests. The Tahoe uses reupholstered Pontiac Fiero seats, reshaped with the headrests removed. Four of the bucket seats are installed and upholstered in lambskin leather on the seating surfaces and matching tweed on the sides. The floor and headliner are also upholstered in tweed.

Biggs and Maxwell fabricated a custom center console cover for the B&M shifter that is also painted and covered in lambskin leather. They also built a center stalk that holds the power mirror switch as well as power window switches. They used the switch plate from a Chevy Suburban so that the front two switches could be used for the windows and the other two switches used to control the air suspension. The molded stalk is painted to match the exterior. To accent the interior, Billet Accessories Direct created custom billet aluminum trim, and a custom billet steering wheel matches the Bonspeed wheels.

The audio/video system starts with a Pioneer in-dash receiver paired with a Pioneer in-dash DVD player. Video signals from the DVD are carried to a pair of Clarion video monitors on Tsunami video cables. One video monitor is mounted in a custom-molded overhead console for the rear seat passengers. The second monitor is installed in the rear of the Tahoe to show videos when the truck is on display. Audio signals flow through Tsunami RCA cables to a pair of Memphis competition-quality 30-band equalizers that are used to precisely tune the sound of the system for competition use. From the equalizers, the signal is handed off to three Memphis amplifiers that power the front and rear speakers as well as three 12-inch Memphis subwoofers.

All three subwoofers are mounted inverted to show off their chrome baskets and are housed in a custom-fabricated enclosure molded into the rear of the Tahoe. Flanking the subwoofer enclosure, you will find a pair of Memphis component speakers installed to play for onlookers when the Madillac is displayed at shows. All three of the Memphis amplifiers are mounted on a shelf that spans the width of the truck above the subwoofer enclosure. The center amplifier is motorized with a linear actuator to move up and down to reveal a Tsunami fuse block status display built into the amp rack.

In any high-end sound system the front speakers’ quality and placement are critical to sound quality. In the case of the Tahoe, Biggs and Maxwell opted to use a Focal 6.5-inch Kevlar mid-bass speaker, installed in each kick panel in custom molded pods that properly position the speaker for optimum sound quality in the critical mid-bass and mid-range frequencies. To faithfully reproduce high frequencies high-end Focal TLR tweeters are molded into the A-pillars. The electronics team also integrated a Directed Electronics security system to not only protect the truck but also to control the remote start, operate the power windows, pop the rear hatch and control the amplifier motorization.

So there you have it; by combining a rather ho-hum Chevy SUV with a bit of old-school hot rodding flavor, a full custom interior, an amazing audio/video system, a supercharged powerplant and custom suspension, Custom Concepts and Biggs Audio Design built a modern classic truck that’s a real head turner. But more than that, Starling’s Madillac is a driver that he enjoys driving all across the country. And we are not the only ones who think the truck is cool; it has taken top honors at every show Starling has entered.