Hey thanks buddy, Sorry about the bad pictures I'll try to get some better ones this weekend. Here are the suframe connectors I am going with in case anyone wanted to know. Kinda pricey but it gives me a place to mount the torque arm instead of on the transmission crossmember. Besides, I bought a T-56 crossmember from Hawks and there is no way I can mount a torque arm to it. http://www.swracecars.com/store/82-9...70=40-600.aspx

Seemed to have missed this build. Build looking awesome. Subscribed.

I would strongly recommend getting an arp crank pulley bolt and torque it down to the right specs. If you believe all the other right ups about arp bolts coming loose than be sure to get a brand new crank pulley bolt from gm. And use the torque to yield process.

I also would throw away the autozone clutch and pick up an ls7 clutch. The money is well worth it and I have seen first hand how crappy an autzone clutch can be.

Have you figured out your intake ducting yet?

Ok thanks, Yeah we'll see how long the autozone clutch will last, then I'll upgrade to the LS7. I've always heard good things about the LS7 clutch, as for the intake I have more pieces coming from intakehoses.com. I just bought an elbow and threw a filter on after the MAF for now.

Here are some pics of the GTO trans in the car, since the GTO trans did not have a torque arm mount nor did the Hawk's trans. crossmember I bought, I had to mount my torque arm somewhere else. The pics below are the pics of the subframe connectors and torque arm combo I'm using, it looks like a pretty solid setup.

My dad and I also ran the car for about a good hour or so last week to burp the cooling system and to make sure the fans worked. My dad actually owns a GM Tech2 scan tool so we went in and manually turned the fans on and off just to make sure. I also stopped at Sears and bought a Mityvac brake bleeder to bleed my clutch hydraulics, I HIGHLY reccommend buying one of these to bleed the clutch hydraulics as it only took 30 seconds to do and I didn't have to lift the car. I plan to get some videos of me running the car and moving it, I'd also like to drive it around the block as well. Posted below are some pics of what I did with the intake system, I started with a 4'' to 3.5'' reducing elbow to a 3'' PVC pipe (painted it flat black) to a 3.5'' 45* elbow to the MAF and then a K&N 3.5'' filter.

You can also use the fbody torque arm mount

On the trans?

Youd have to make a bracket to sit under the trans mount, like the B&M Th350 kits

Theres nothing wrong with your SFC TA mount. Ive never seen one like that before, looks pretty slick

Looks like theres room for a rail style SFC too

Well guys I finally have a few videos, the first one is a startup and the second one is of me driving around the block. I had the camera clamped to the dash and you'll see towards the end of the video where i stomped the gas and the camera fell backwards LOL it even scared the **** out of me! anyways the car runs great except i'm still getting a MAP sensor code that i'll have to check out and this video is without exhaust. Sorry I know my camera's sound is pretty shitty.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcKz5si5HyY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VX4jYDCan8c

Sounds great, bet it feels good to get it going on its own

You T56 make me sick. My left foot is lonely

LOL yes it does feel good to finally get this thing going after a complete year of down time. I'm going to try and get another video next week with a different camera, I need to take it down town to get some gas.

You must have some mighty tolerant neighbors to be driving around with open exhaust.

Loved the on-the-roof shot. . .

But, what's with the driving through the water???

haha Yeah looks like the road is flooded.

looks like tons of fun- congratulations

LOL thanks guys, yeah the pond by my parents house always rises around this time of year. This is the first time i've ever seen it get so high that it actually covers the road. I guess my nieghbors are pretty understanding when I drive the car around without exhaust, it might be a different story if I pulled up like that around 11 o clock at night lol. It was kinda funny towards the end of that video, I picked the camera up off the seat and didn't realize that I had the damn thing upside down. I don't see how the camera came of the dash, I had a good size c-clamp holding it in place lol.

Well guys, not much going on with the car as of right now. Just got back from Hawaii last week and I'm buying my fiance' new tires for her car so money is a little tight this month. Anyways, the car still needs exhaust, struts/shocks, alignment, and a speedometer convertor. I've been doing some extensive research the past few weeks on a 4th gen dash swap and I think I'm really going to do it instead of paying $300 to buy the cable-x speedomter convertor box. Below is a pic of ShMaCk2004's firebird dash which is the same one I'm putting in my car, hope he doesn't mind me posting this:



Judging by the research i've done, it's really not that difficult to do, besides my IROC dash is cracked in a bunch of places.

On another note, I've had so much fun building this car and the knowledge i've gained about LSX engines is phenomenal. Once this car is completely finished, i've been thinking that I wanna do a 5.3/4L60e swap in my 1979 Malibu.



My dad bought me this car when I was 13 and we worked on it until I turned 16. I love this car to death but with gas being so expensive these days, i just simply can't afford to drive it. We put a 290 horse 350 in from GMPerformance parts, with a TCI Streetfighter TH350 transmission in about 5 years ago and it's only got about 3,000 miles on this new engine.

LSX Swap parts aren't very expensive for this body style and I can use 4th gen long tube headers. I'd like to buy a house first and then get started on this, but we'll see how tight money is around that time.

Here's some more pics of the IROC, these are pictures of an "almost" completed swap:

Looks like the front end settled down. Did it settle on its own, or did it drop after you installed those A-arms?

The front end dropped tremendously after I put the spohn a-arms on, a little lower than I wanted. It looks cool as **** but the drivability sucks with the eibach sportline springs, i'm thinking about picking up a set of pro-kit springs so I'm not scraping.

Really! That surprises me about the drivability. Just a really rough ride, or to much scraping? Looks good though, thats for sure!

Yeah it really does look good, i'm pretty sure i'm scraping because of my subframe/torque arm setup. It hangs lower than the header collectors, i MAYBE have 3-4'' between the ground and my tubular k-member so speed bumps are completely out of the question. The ride is kinda rough but I'm blaming it on the stock shocks and struts that are on the car right now, saving up for KYB AGX adjustable shocks. I hope i'll be able to get this car on and off the lifts when I go to get it aligned and get the exhaust done, I guess i'll take some wood with me and see how it goes

Hmm. Im thinking about leaving mine stock ride hight after talking with you. I have a spohn k-member going in as well, with the tubular A's. Wonder what others are running, and if there having scraping issues.

Yeah idk, I didn't think it was going to be that low. I'll grab a tape measure and snap some pics the next time I go up to the house. The thing I don't really like about the Spohn tubular k-member/control arms is that even the sportline springs were a complete bitch to install.

WOW how did i miss this thread? i need to do more creeping on this site.

i had seen your video of the camera falling off the dash on youtube about a week ago. Good stuff lol. There isnt many thirdgen videos on youtube i have not watched. im a bit of a whore.

Good work though! people kept telling me to do this build, but i dont have the wallet, or the know how. Cant wait for some more vids! you ROCK

lol you are gonna hear from my lawyer
kidding, your car is coming out very nice
Let me get those sportlines lol

LOL thanks man, I do plan to take some more videos of me driving it down the road, I just need to find someone to ride with me and hold the camera.... and not be scared lol. This car will pull like crazy! I highly suggest this type of swap for anyone who wants to do it. You should do it man! you won't look back....

LOL, I'm going to wait and see how they do with my new struts when I get them.

Let me get that dash! jk

what struts did u go with?

I'll be going with KYB AGX's

what kit is that? looks really sick,.. part number? and where you got it at would be shweet. looks durable let me in on this lol beautifull build btw,

Here's the link: http://www.swracecars.com/store/82-9...71=40-600.aspx

http://www.swracecars.com/store/Adju...71=40-606.aspx

Kinda pricey, I paid about $650 shipped to my house along with the torque arm kit. But let me tell you first hand, it was worth every penny! this thing is rock solid and feels like i'm on rails! I highly recommend it. Thanks for the comments guys

Here are some pics of the ground clearance i promised you guys, I have exactly 3 inches between the Spohn k-member and the ground, and the hawks headers are even lower than that

I also changed my intake gaskets today because they were leaking, and I installed the F-body oil pressure sensor while I was at it.







Also while I had the intake off I put some RTV around the knock sensor boots as this will keep moisture out, this is a VERY common issue with the 99-06 GM trucks. Matter of fact my 1999 Silverado 5.3 Z71 is throwing a P0332 code for the number 2 knock sensor. The GM service bulletin says to replace the knock sensors and harness and apply RTV around the boots.





Knock sensors are about $40 a piece and the harness is $50 so I figured I would go ahead and protect my wallet by doing this.

im jealous.... mines not running yet.

Lol don't feel too bad, I haven't touched this car for like 4 months now. I've got two car payments and school i'm paying for right now so I haven't had much money to throw around, but luckily i'll be getting a pretty big raise from my job in December so I can finally get this thing finished! Then I want to get started on the malibu with an LSX, so if you're looking to get rid of that 5.3 I'll be glad to take it off your hands lol. I'll let you know when the Iroc is done so we can hit the track!

Thanks, Dan

HOLY S*** THAT'S LOW!!!!!

Awesome thread!!! Thanks for posting all those pictures and explaining what you were doing.

yeah mines just as low. spohn tubular k-member and hawks headers. never scrubbed though. MY EXHAUST WHERE IT RUNS UNDER MY TRANS X-MEMBER IS ANOTHER STORY!!! glad you dont seem to have that proplem. but yeah get it done man! need any help with the wiring just hit me up. i'll help all i can

that kit looks neat i was thinking of it a swell. will you have enough clearance for a good y pipe? looks like the drive shaft safety loop might restrict that.

btw how did the tranny mounting set in place. is that an additional mount that is set in place on the sfc's?

Yeah it's WAY too low for my liking, I don't even know how I would get it on the alignment rack being that low, It all happened when I bought the spohn tubular a-arms as they dropped the car about 2 more inches. Here's what i'm most likely going to do: Leave the sportline springs up front and bolt the OEM a-arms back on and sell the tubulars, then get eibach pro-kit springs for the rear to raise the rear up a little bit.

No problem man, Sorry i haven't done much with the car in the past few months, should start throwing more money at it again here pretty soon!

I might just have to take you up on that offer here pretty soon once I get a 4th gen dash as far as wiring and dash mounting, seeing as you've already completed yours!

The kit itself was pretty easy to install, as far as the exhaust it's going to be close since i'm going 3" all the way back, but there is room on the passenger side to run exhaust but not much. The transmission crossmember is the new one that Hawk's sells, it has the dual humps to help clear exhaust. It's really going to be tight running the exhaust but i'll post pics when it's completed.

UPDATES???????????????????????????

Yes sirrrrrr!!! Ok, I got my spohn a-arms sold and I pressed new ball joints and control arm bushings in the stock a-arms, I put the a-arms back on the car along withe the stock iroc springs and now I have alot more room underneath the car. Here's how it sits:



And here's the a-arms:


I also got the exhaust taken care of last week, I took it downtown and had a custom Y-pipe made and I originally was going to go with a magnaflow bullet but couldn't seem to find a place to fit it underneath my car. So I went with a single chamber flowmaster race muffler and it sounds AWESOME!!! Here are some pics and a video, it sounds 100 times better in person though!







http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vm0l25mJjhU

Look forward in a couple weeks to doing a drive-by video and an in car video, i'll be ordering my shocks/struts this week along with a bunch of front end suspension parts and taking it to get the alignment done.

[quote=dynodanmanda79;4468000]Here are some pics of the GTO trans in the car, since the GTO trans did not have a torque arm mount nor did the Hawk's trans. crossmember I bought, I had to mount my torque arm somewhere else. The pics below are the pics of the subframe connectors and torque arm combo I'm using, it looks like a pretty solid setup.




do you think the gmmg chambered exhaust can be used along with using this type of set up??

No reason to think that it wouldn't, are you talking about just the mufflers, or the cat-back?

Yeah I don't see why not, I could've went with full exhaust but I just had it dumped before the axle.

However, I do not recommend the S&W setup if you have a lowered car. I had sportlines on my car with this setup and ended up throwing the stockk springs back in because I was scraping the ground everywhere.

Ist there a reason you welded everything together exhaust wise? What happens if you need to remove a header?

Yeah, I don't really feel like messing with a bunch of clamps and leaks right now. If I ever have to remove a header, I will use a sawzall and cut the pip where it meets the header and throw v-band flanges on the end of the headers and the end of the pipe along with a clamp. Hopefully I won't be removing a header for awhile, but we'll see.

I love that sfc/torque arm setup. I was really excited until I read the part that says "will not fit convertibles"

I'm hopefully going to be swapping out my cross member for that new double hump one like you have next year and would like to figure out the easiest way to either use my Spohn torque arm, or get something similar to what you have and add a second set of sfc's to the car.

Good job on the car dude