It does on my stock formula power bulge hood. The map sensor is very close to the hood bracing and the TB just clears as does the 5.3 small case alt. But I run solid SBC mounts and my guess is they are a smidge shorter than the 3rd gen specific mounts. If that’s the case then no... your going to have to trim alittle perhaps.

Just wanted to update this thread. We had a random warm day last week... Wednesday with 70* temps so I called out sick and dropped the car off the stands and took her out. 30min of driving and have to say I’m impressed with the FItech ultimate LS EFI and the turbo system worked good as well. A good bit of smoke from the wrap getting really hot and broken in but the car felt like it had a lot more low end compared to the supercharger and the 1 3/4” LTs going to a dual 3” merge into a 3” catback. Maybe the smaller 1 5/8” turbo header primaries and the turbo with the 3” down pipe brought some low end back or maybe it was the self tuning EFI. Either way the car drove perfectly without one issue. The EFI felt like it’s been on the car for years and really tuned quick. I did a quick 15 min trip and parked to shut down and checked for leaks and used a IR temp gun to verify nothing was cooking. Waited a bit and then went 15 min Home but decided to get on it alittle to datalog boost tuning. Got up to 6psi on the datalogs with like half throttle and tuning was spot on. I did 3 quick boost spurts and everything seemed good. Didn’t really hear any turbo spooling but did hear the BOV a few times. Car is stupid quiet and pretty excited to really get her out come the spring. Car has been detailed and parked, battery removed and car cover on. Won’t be able to update till the warmer weather is here full swing.

According to my datalogs my on medium throttle I was getting into boost at about 3k. This would change once I really stomped it but to see me break into the 100kpa range at 3k means it could come in as low as 2500 with heavier throttle. Remember my cam is not a turbo grind but a custom supercharger cam 218/228 .561/.561 and 114.5+5.5. A triple 12 or something would prob increase spooling alittle.

wow that sucks. How much boost were you running when it popped? Thats a Shitty way to loose a motor. My guess is the plug wires aren’t clipping onto the plugs hard enough. I know when I yank the taylor firepower 9mm off the plugs it’s a hard *** time to get them off and to get them on... once they are on tho they don’t come off easily. I haven’t had to take the taylor spiral pro off the current setup so I can’t comment. Did you route the wires back and under the engine? How much boost are your running with that on3 and the CX wastegate?

18-20 is a good bit. Are you using a manual boost controller with the CX wastegate?

i remember you having issues with your EFI system in the beginning. Are you sure if was the plug wires? I would be changing up those wires for a $35 set of SBC wires that you can cut to length and pick up some taylor LS coil coil boots so you don’t have to worry again. Could be the angle and stress on the boots as I kno the CX headers leave no room for even my low profile taylor wires that worked on the supercharger headers.

The rod and piston that let go was wedged against the oil pan and crank counterweight
The windage tray caught some of the mess

The 76/65 .81 AR journal CX turbo seemed strong at 6psi. It’s only been driven once but it was quick to spool up. I just purchased a VS racing cast 78/75 .96 AR to replace it if needed. The smaller turbo makes street driving a lot of fun tho.

Got some seat time today with mine. Running pretty good. Logs show im maxing around 140-142Kpa. It comes in soon and just hangs out so I’m wonderinf if the wastegate spring that came in the CX wastegate was a lower psi spring? It says 12psi on the website but the mix has other springs. Any idea what spring gives what pressure? I read it’s like the tials and I will need dual springs to get into 10+psi.

Logs are showing about 60% injector duty cycle at the 142Kpa at 60lb so she’s movin and feels good.

thats exactly what I did. I had a simple spring/ball (ceramic) MBC that I just installed. I tried referencing the WG from the compressor to the manifold and literally no change which is great bc that means I have NO pressure drop at 6psi. I cranked down on the spring preload adjuster and basically almost maxed it out. Went out and it logged 8psi max so boost went up, the car is a handful with the 8psi as the tried break loose when boost comes in which is instant. I set everything back to the safe 6psi and referenced the WG to the compressor again but installed the MBC. Teed into the bottom line of the WG (side) and the MBC outlet goes to the top of the WG. Going to see what it puts down base boost with the MBC as I’ve heard they add boost even at the lowest setting. Waiting to see what it does on the next warm nice day that I don’t have the kid with me. I’d like to be at 10-12psi for the moment, 8psi felt good tho.

its bc the new crossover is pushed out too far. I would have or I always installed the downpipe before the crossover. I leave the pass header loosely bolted on for this purpose. But when I reworked my crossover to clear the truck accessories I had a similar issues with the WG dump. It literally rests on the down pipe and crossover and wedges itself against the sway bar. It’s like a jigsaw puzzle but it fits with absolute zero clearance. I had to dent the crossover and DP slightly to clear due to the thickeness of the header wrap.

All in all the turbo system works pretty good. I’m at 100kpa starting at 3k exactly but never under heavy throttle or load as it just breaks the tires loose. I’m aure a smaller 2.25” or 2.5” would increase spool a little quicker if you really wanted boost before 3k. But boost that low can bend rods pretty easily due to the massive tq increase.

check the header bolts. I thought I had an exhaust leak or a leaking clamp/lifter tick the other day. I removed my coil cover on the pass side and EVERY header bolt was loose. I mean the nut spun when I grazed it with my finger tip. I run stainless studs and remflex gaskets and the header stud nuts are serrated so they dig into the header flange and lock down. I never had this issue with the same motor and studs but using LT stainless headers with the centri supercharger. My guess is the extra heat, weight and backpressure with the turbo setup or just that the gaskets crushed and the nuts worked loose somehow. The remflex gaskets are amazing and they don’t require a 2nd tq down after heating up from the original 22ftlbs. I just cranked them down and went over to the driver side and did it as well while I was do it. They weren’t nearly as bad but a few were alittle loose.

Hopefukly thay was my “tick” on the pass side but I for sure can hear my sewing machine Morel 5315s going at it at idle.

Also my turbo is supported Ted with a simple brace that holds up 90% of the weight so it’s not dangling off the header bolts. If I remove all the piping the turbo barely moves if it’s floating my itself so I know the brace is helping a lot.

Still tho that’s pretty shotty luck. I just ran a spare 5.3 on my test stand a few weeks ago (had 90k on it) and it looked pretty clean inside. Had a nice tick/knock on the pass side. I pulled it apart and decided it’s prob lifters so yanked the cam and lifters and put in a used LQ9 cam and new Johnson stock replacement lifters and LS6 springs. Just got new speedmaster head studs and hoping to button it up and get it on the stand and see if it fixed itself lol.

You Tube

LS motors don’t come with cast iron water pumps. U can get a gen 1 SBC to run 160 all day easily. Doing that in an LS is a diff story. They just run hotter. I easily have 2x the cooling capacity of a stock LS setup and I still can’t get it lower than 170/180s.

i was just pointing out that u weren’t specifically talking about LS cooling system and that they tend to run hot. So even if he puts in the 4K Cfm fans it doesn’t mean it will run at the 160*F temp.

First off I have the derale fans, I ran them on my car for over a year and have them in my basement currently. They are fine but don’t let high amps determine air flow and quality of fans. Mine were dual 11” fans for a 24.5” core and pulled 3750 Cfm supposidly, derale doesn’t post static drop Cfm like SPAL so it’s really a crap shoot how much they actually flow at a given pressure. They are powerful and pull a lot of amps so I would assume they flow decent under restriction. More amps usually means more powerful motor but it has a lot to do with fan blade design, size and lots of other things. What are the size of your fans? To fit in a 3rd gen or LT1 rad core they can’t be bigger than 11-12” each right? So your going to tell me that my OE quality (lots more r&d and time invested from the biggest car manufactures in the world) fans aren’t as good as some aftermarket fans? I have to run a 27.5” core to fit these fans and the stock 3rdgen isn’t that big. The integrated shroud covers 100% of the core. Mine flow just as much as the derales but are quieter and will last longer at less than 1/2 the price. So stick to the facts, big turbo hp requires what in a cooling system? Capacity and airflow. Derale fans are good as I have run them so there’s airflow but you still need capacity which you don’t get with a stock single core rad. You will always gain by adding capacity to a system and good fans to pull air through a thicker core. In a cooling system you always try to fit the biggest that space will allow. There is a point of diminishing returns as not all rad cores are created equal so a champion 4 core with 5/8” cores is not as good as a quality dual 1” core and airflow would be reduced. Fin count and style of fins also affects cooling. The real stock rads are of decent quality (core and fin) and thus cool better than stock aftermarket replacements. But once you Double the hp and heat of the engine the stock rad will struggle to keep up. It’s all about BTUs.

Also have you ever tested the opening temps of actual thermostats? They usually don’t open till later than there rated temp. I know for sure bc I tested 3 different ones for my setup. My 160 cracked opened at 170+, 180 cracked opened at like 185 and a new stock vette Tstat (lower than Truck temp) opened at 198 I believe. So even with a 160 Tstat in the pump it would be really hard to run 160s or cooler than the Tstat opening temp even with good cool ambient air.