I was thinking about this a few minutes ago.
Is it possible?
You'd have to run an Electric water pump of course, and everything else should work, right?

 

I am not sure if the optispark setup will fit on to the old SBC setup. I have never seen a side by side comparison of the hardware but I am positive the cam shaft would have to be changed out along with everything associated with the gear drive required for the opti.

There is a company offering a LS1 style coil setup for the LT1 that eliminates the need for the optispark. Since it integrates with the LT1 PCM it may be a viable workaround.

 

The LS1 coil pack setup still uses the Opti portion of the opti spark for the firing position of the injectors.

The dowel pin in the cam shaft is what drives the opti, so all you'd need for that is an LT1 style cam, like the LT4 hot cam, or even the stock LT1 cam.

Reason I asked is that I was looking into maybe putting a sbc 400 with a modded LT1 intake and electronics into my car.

 

I'm afraid you will not be able to do that.

The dowel pin that is on the camshaft drives the water pump and gears that drives the optispark. the timing chain is very different for a regular one, I do not think you will be able to install that, even the housing that hold everything together looks to be different.

Also, if you ever get the opti part to work, you will have to drill holes in your lt1 intake for cooling that beast down.... a remote thermostat would be needed.

 

you can install the LT-1 induction system on a sbc, its not all that hard if the car already has TPI on it, you have to modify the intake a little to allow for the use of a HEI dist. and you have to install hose connections for the heads. I don't see anyway you could use the opti-spark (even if you wanted to). check out www.lt1intake.com, they have some good info about this very swap. the good part is with minimal effort you can do away with the TPI "brick wall" at 4000 rpm and really turn up the motor.

you would end up using the stock sbc water pump and whatever fan setup you have, your basicaly switching intakes to a higher performance version.

 

The dowel pin ONLY runs the opti. Waterpump is driven by the gear on the cam gear. I am running an Electric waterpump with a Cloyes Double Roller timing chain for a regular sbc.

Are the timing covers that different? I thought the bolt pattern was the same.

 

the 93 and 94 non vented optis are run off of the timing gear top sprocket with a small keyed pin. The 95 and newer vented units run directly off of the cam dowel pin.
Kory

 

When you manage to bolt an LT1 timing cover, and opti to the reg sbc block, you let us all know.

 

I will, just need to find a block to play with.