My dad had an '82 or '83 Suburban, which he bought new and sold around '99. Except for burning a valve seat at 12,000 miles (that was his fault for not reading the owner's manual), a shimmy at highway speeds (probably needed a suspension overhaul), and an engine fire in '87 (mechanic's fault), we never had any trouble with it. He was going to overhaul it and keep on going, but the body work and repaint was going to be too expensive to really justify it. The last I saw it, it was still running fine.
He now has an '88 3/4-ton pickup he bought new (the Suburban was next to it at the dealer when it caught fire
), and an '01 or '02 Suburban, both of which run quite nicely.
Yes, they are more complicated and have far more things that can go wrong (the '88 has had a ridiculous number of electrical problems for a sub-50,000 mile vehicle), but they are still well-built. Just don't buy a vehicle during the first model year after introduction or a major redesign - we learned that lesson with the '88.
