so the more i finish up the project i'm beginning to rethink extending the wires to look more factory and hide the ecm. to keep a clean firewall it almost seems essential to cut a hole in the area and run the wires straight though which looks to be possible with the factory lsx harness.

what do you guys think who have done the swap as far as looking better..?

extend the wires with a new harness basically or cut a access hole in the firewall?

 

i replied in another post for you about this, i did the hole cause i didnt want to spend the extra money for getting the new one. Just pm me with any questions and i'll explain more of what you want.

Justin

 

do you remember how large you had to make the hole. if you get the time to elaborate a little i'd appreciate it.

 

I used a 2 inch hole saw, you CANNOT fit anything bigger in there. I made the hole just below the heater box but above the frame rail. I used a hole punch and punched a hole just below the heater box from in the engine bay, then i got inside the car and found the dent it made and i used that as a guide. Lined the top of the hole saw with the dent and drilled out the hole. I then smoothed out the sharp edges and used a 2 inch rubber hose as a gromet. To get the computer connectors threw you have to do one at a time and its a VERY tight fit. Then i connect the rest of the conectors on the harness to find out how much slack i had. Once i had all the slack out of it i was BARLEY able to get it up into the stock location of the computer. I removed the stock computer bracket to make room for the ls1 computer. It looks great now, you cant tell at all that i did anything. Hope that helps, if you have any other questions feel free to ask.

Justin

 

So all you had to do was cut a 2" hole down below the heater box and run the 4th gen wiring inside? Sounds easy... too bad my motor is already in the car. Think it could still be done? My main question is whether or not your heater box and underdash is all stock? Basically, is there room behind the firewall, under the dash, in a completely stock car for this to be done??

*Can you elaborate on exactly how much wiring has to be done? I can't seem to find anyone willing to elaborate on the wiring too much.

 

I also have my PCM right by my blower motor and at first I didnt really mind it, but the more I look at it now the more I feel like it just makes that side of my engine bay all cluttered... Same with the excess wiring that I didnt need off the LS1 Engine harness... I think I am gonna get another Engine harness and motify it so that I can have my PCM under the dash and I am going to remove any unnessessary and unused wiring from the LS1 Engine harness itself to make it look cleaner and fit better.

If I perfect this I would be willing to take members Engine Harness's from here and modify them for much much cheaper than Speartech.

 

much cheaper then speartechs $1,000+ it is possible. still expensive but competes with speartech, extends the harness and ties into "most" of the factory setup. should have it by next week so i'll have more details.

 

i dont know how much of the wiring has to be done(sorry can't help there) but the heater box and everything is stock on my 91 camaro. The harness i sent to speartech, but i will tell you that it is a VERY VERY VERY tight fit. The hole BARLEY fits below the heater box, the wiring BARLEY makes it threw the whole, and the computer BARLEY BARLEY makes it to the stock location, but it does make it and works very well. I had to cut a small notch out of the dash that bolts up to hide all the wiring where the computer goes so i could get it all the way up so you could have good leg room. After all said and done you can't even tell anything was done, to the average person it looks stock. Hope this helps, feel free to pm me if you need any help with this or the conversion in general.

Justin

 

are you in michigan or california? never seen the car here in michigan, i'd like to see it. thanks for the info.

 

The car right now is in california, but it will be drivin up to MI here on July 1st and will be there for at least a year(play hockey out there). I live on the border of saint clair shores and grosse pointe, so dont know how far that is from where you live, but i would love to come see yours and help you if you need any.

Justin

 

20 min north. if you have the car here you should bring it to superfest in ann arbor. www.camarosuperfest.com

anyhow thanks for all the suggestions everone, if anyone has any other suggestions i would greatly appreciate it.

 

i know you already know i did this but..... i did the exact same thing as 5.0Camaro....

 

alright that sounds cool, i'll give you a pm when i get back to MI in 2 weeks.

Mr. Dude thanks a lot fot the help, fuel system, and the hole in the firewall worked great.

Justin

 

So did Speartech just rework your stock 4th gen and 3rd gen harnesses and hook them together at stock length like Hawks used to do? I was going to Hawks do it like that and then just go thru that small hole you drill and put it all in stock location. Neil at Hawks was killed in that accident so now I'm trying to figure it all out. If this is what Speartech did, how much was it? $450? Any problems with this setup? Can you drill that hole in the firewall from inside the car?? My motor is already in... guess I might have to pull it back out?


let me know, thanks!
-Jeremy

 

to rework the ls1 harness was 450, then either you could tie it into your stock harness or have him do it for another 300. It was 750 total for me, i know that seems like a lot but it was a complete plug and play and made things real real easy for me. Honestly the wiring harness was prolly one of the easiest things for me, but some people do the harness them self which is fine, just depends on how much work you want to put into it, and how much you know.

Yes i drilled the hole from inside the car, but you will want to be able to look from the other side to find where to drill. It is really really tight fit. What i did was use a hole punch and a hammer and dented the the firewall right below the heater box. Then i went inside the car was able to find the small dent and drilled a real small hole using a 1/8 inch drill bit. Then i used that as a guide and lined the top of the 2 inch hole saw with the hole and drilled the hole.

After that i put on comp. connector at a time (right beind each other), then after that i put the other connectors threw largest to smallest (dianostic connector, tach box connector, and the connector that hookes up the speedo and other stuff). After that i hooked up all the other sensors, after i was all done with that i took all the slack out of the harness and pulled as much as i could of the computer connectors into the car. I unbolted the stock bracket that held the old computer (with it out the ls1 comp would fit). I had barley enough slack to make it up into the stock location, but it made it.

After that i bolted the dash back together, and noticed taht wires coming out of the hole wouldnt let the bottom of the dash come all the way up to give you good leg room. So i cut a little notch out of it where the wires came out and that allowed it to come up high enough. After all said and done it looks completly stock, from inside the car you had the same amount of leg room as before, and everything inside the car looks stock(doesnt look like i did anything).

Sorry for the really long post but i just got going. Its really not that hard to do, shouldn't take you more then a few hours to do, its just scary cutting threw the firewall, after you get that done the rest is easy. If you want any pics i'll try and take some for you.

Justin

 

Thanks for the reply, I don't mind long posts when they are that good! Could you post some pics, that would be great. I guess I'm going to have to pull my motor/trans back out then. This kinda sucks.... I should've known better though. I guess I just got anxious. I'm still not sure if I want to spend the $750 with Speartech or not. How long did you have to wait? How was their service? What all did you have to send them? How hard was it to finish hooking stuff up and getting it running? Last thing, you had the entire dash out of your car to do this or what? Let me know.


Sorry for all the ?'s... thanks for all the help!

-Jeremy

 

Speartech is a GREAT place to deal with, i've called him half a dozen times asking him questions and he was always willing to help. As for hooking it up, like i said it was basicly the easiest thing i did for the whole project. Took me prolly about a total of 2 hours or so to hook it all up(was extremly easy). It took 4 weeks to get the harness back(he says a 3-4 week turn around), but he said this was becuase he has been extremly busy. He might be less busy now. I sent him my harness off my ls1, and my harness off my old engine.

As for the dash, no mine was all in there. I had had to do was take the bottom part off(3 bolts), and pull down the carpet a little bit.

I'll try to get pics of it from the interior, dont think i can get a pic at all of it in the engine bay. Expect a pic in a day or so, i'll try to do it as quick as possiable.

Justin

 

I see, thanks! Maybe this won't be as bad as I thought it would. Get some pics if you can.

Thanks!

 

Any pics Yet?

 

almost finished, i opted not to cut a hole in the firewall. i used a 60ft pigtail and i have enough room to fit the ecm anywhere i please. for now i'm running the harness in the exact location of the factory harness, there are alot less wires so it hides under my a/c delete heaterbox for now.

 

5.0Camaro- Any pics yet??? I'm ready to cut the hole, but I'd like to see pics first??


Please???

Thanks!
-Jeremy

 

PICS PICS PICS PLEASE!!

 

Any pics yet?

 

i'm so sorry guys i've been so busy this last month, from moving from cali to MI, trying to get the car done for the move, going to spain, training camp, and moving again from detroit to upper MI i've had a lot on my hands. Havn't even had time to fix the small things wrong with my car, but i think i've finaly landed so i'll get those pics for you guys this weeknd.

Justin

P.S. sorry again.

 

so where are you at now. anywhere close to macomb area. you'll have to bring her out one of these cruise nights as i'd like to see it myself.

 

with a 60 foot pigtail you could run it in a car behind ya 750 bux would pay for my long tubes and I could live with the pcm in the engine bay

One day ill go that route but for simplicity I put mine where most of the lt1 guys put there computers just to the right of the pass side shock tower in the gap..

 

i was in grosse pointe(i'll be back some time in the next few months) but i'm up in alpena right now(where i play hockey). When i head back down there i'll let you know and we'll hook up. I'll have some tomorrow and i'll snap some pics for you guys.

Justin

 

it's an expression, much like a 3' extension and simplicity or not i was going for what looks the best. to each their own, on a budget indeed i'd just put it in the fender then rather then have it seen or at least drill the holes like mentioned above. but as an option having it mounted like some were saying behind the motor if you can do that isn't too bad. it just physically wouldn't even be possible with mine as i could barely fit part of the harness back there.

 

Any luck??