I suppose I owe this thread an update although I really am reaching a point in the build where it is no longer LTX related...

I have decided not to sell the car after much deliberation. Instead, my brother who lives in Norfolk has taken the car to school with him to escape my parents driveway. Since then, I have decided to invest more into the car because I plan to hang on to her for quite some time.

A few weeks ago I bought a new set of tires for the car which as Pocket mentioned earlier was more expensive than it ever should be thanks to the 18s in the rear.
Tomorrow the car comes back from having all of the weatherstripping replaced. Which wasnt cheap either

I also just purchased a pair of Sparco Sienna seats with sliders and brackets. After the Christmas break I will be having them installed with an 8 point roll cage and harnesses.

The overall idea is to move the car more towards a weekend auto x car but maintain its driveability for the street. The antique registration ensures that it will never really be illegal so the sky is the limit.

Next week when I return to Virginia my brother and I are going to rebuild the exhaust since we recently acquired a welder. I ordered a Hawks double hump crossmember to replace my spohn one, so we will be able to run a dual system with an X pipe still turned down before the rear. I will be on here more often with pictures and info as I continue to work on the car.

Cheers,
Steven

 

my brother picked these up today:


Can't wait to get them in.

On that note, I think that I may remove the stock door handles/armrests that stick out super far from the doors and come up with a slimmer alternative to allow for the door braces of the cage to fit more easily, as well as the seats.

I'm hoping they wont take too much modification to fit since they are larger than stock.

Steven

 

Hey man long time no see. How's she running?

 

As far as I know everything is running fine. I don't return to Virginia until saturday and I havent seen the car since thanksgiving.

my brother started test fitting the seats this afternoon- they look great.


If I have the time over break I am also going to repaint my T-top edges and a few other small trim pieces.

(only one more final exam and then I can go home)
Steven

 

Hey guys, I am Steven's brother and figured I'd make an account so I can keep you all posted on the progress rather then Steven having post everything. I am just waiting for my friend to come over w/ his grinder/welder so we can start fitting the passenger seat. If all goes well we will move on to the driver side. The goal for tonight is to just get everything tac'd in place since he just has a crappy fluxcore MIG welder and then I will have access to a good welder tomorrow and finish weld them. Then this little project will be done and I will be sure to post pics of the finished product!
-Will

 

Heck yeah buddy. I had finals last week. Fun!!

My engine should be done by the end of January or so. Can't wait to post pics of the beast.
Ill have my tranny next month too. It's all rebuilt and ready to go.

I'm getting the Hawks crossmember too and am gonna have a guy here in Casper build me a nice set of custom "tri-y" headers as soon as the engine and tranny are bolted into the car.

Those seats look nice. I just started tearing into my front end yesterday. Good times!!!

 

Good to see this thread brought back to life!

 

 

Well guys I'm currently at a stand still until I can locate some drill bits. My current set is with a friend and he is no longer in Norfolk for the holidays..I may go try and buy a small set really quick. I really want to finish these today or tomorrow at the latest.

 

last night we stayed up late and got to work on the new exhaust. Unfortunately I am waiting until brackets arrive to install the seats

old pipes (~2 inches of clearance...)


new xmember and heddman extenstions:


right after finish welding the x pipe:


we came within two welds of finishing and ran out of wire in the flux-core... We will have to go out today and wrap this up later.




Merry Christmas!
Steven

 

Looking good!! Merry Christmas.

 

Unfortunately my welder seems to have shorted somehow. While I was replacing the wire spool the torch sparked and blew the internal fuse. 4 fuses later it still shorts as soon as the power switch is flipped..

Guess I will just have to pick up a new welder after Christmas.

~Steven

 

moral of the story is don't buy crappy welders from harbor freight. It sucks but it's worth paying for a decent welder from a respectable company.

 

Good point.

Some people can get by on a cheap one for quite a while. But its always a good investment for a nice one

 

Take it easy guys. he he he

 

I'm his brother, I can say those kind of things haha mainly because he agrees with me..

 

Bought a new welder and zipped everything up today. Got it on the car as well, but having some clearance issues at the turn downs. Planning on ripping it up again tomorrow morning to tweak things around. The X pipe and up past the transmission tucks up quite nicely though. All in all a great foundation to perfect in the coming days.





oh, and it sounds like a monster too

~Steven

 

I didnt mean anything harsh about it. Im not bashing you for getting a cheap one , I was just stating sometimes they work out great, sometimes they dont. But its always a good investment to get a nice mig welder.

exhaust looks good btw.

 

After a few new cuts and angles today the whole system is finally installed and ready to roll. I managed to tuck the mufflers up considerably higher than they were yesterday, and I have exceptional ground clearance the whole way.

I am so happy to finally put all of the worrying about scraping and bottoming out behind me, and to also bolster the muscle car sound provided by the dual powersticks.










Couldn't be any happier for a home-made setup.

~Steven

 

Nice! Any plan for more modifications? (cam, heads, etc)

That would be wicked

 

After the cage, seats, and harnesses are installed I may need to give the wallet a rest for a bit. Perhaps an LT4 hot cam and some heads are in my future though, we will see.

Today ordered a new steering box and will put that in within the next week. In the meantime I am waiting for the seat brackets and trying to fix my high idle problems. I suspect it is a combination of the IAC and a vacuum leak.

~Steven

 

Well before you stated modding the lt1 did you have and good races, Street or dragstrip you want to share? Was just the stock lt1 feel fast compared to your older 350? I ask this because you was going to sell the car at one point, and just wandering if the performance had anything to do with that decision other then collage.

 

Haven't had the car at any races yet. This summer I will likely start trying her out at auto x and maybe a few passes on the quarter mile.

Compared to the previous motor there was a world of difference with the bone stock LT1. I still havent made any significant changes to the stock motor other than supporting mods, and the car is a blast to drive.

I suspect it could be made even faster with a proper day being tuned by somebody that knows what they're doing.

~Steven

(I will post pics later of my t-tops since I painted the side bars today with the nice weather- also installing a new IAC and steering box tonight after I pick up a pitman puller)

 

That's exactly how i feel man, it's night and day difference, your build thread was awesome it helped me a lot looking back on the wiring i was reading every thread i could find

 

I'm glad to hear that my project helped!

and also- the new IAC brought my idle back to around 700-800 rpm

now im in the middle of replacing the steering box- maybe ill finish while its still 2011- gotta get in that last part of the year.

~Steven

 

There is only one thing though that i have to ask, sorry if i missed it but whats up with the sluggish starts? Was the battery low or was you using a fat starter? It just seemed like it was dragging more then it should.

 

old power steering box out right before i transferred the fittings and pitman arm over.

after more careful inspection it became obvious that the slop in my steering is from the rag joint not the gear itself- no worries because the new box is still an upgrade to the 2.5 turn quick ratio.

going to pick up a new rag joint to rebuild it tomorrow and put it all back together.

Happy 2012
~Steven

 

Finished the steering project today. New box is in and flushed/filled, and the new rag joint is assembled and installed.

The rag joint was a bear to work on- drilling out the four rivets was the most time consuming part of the entire day. After that things werent too difficult other than the pain of getting the pitman onto the new box.

here is a picture of the new rag joint I assembled


After bleeding the air and whatnot the steering felt effortless at the wheel- something I have never experienced with this car. It was almost disconcerting.

Didn't get the chance to really drive her and see how it fares- I will get out tomorrow and find out just how different it is. I also confirmed that this box is indeed 2.5 turns lock to lock (I have heard of reman parts claiming to be quick ratio and in fact not be, not the case with this autozone piece)

~Steven

 

Wow. It's like having a whole new car with the new rag joint and box. The steering effort is so low its crazy, and there is no more wandering and looseness in the steering. I finally feel in control of the car!

That combined with the proper idle made driving today a blast
I might try to fix my speedo or a few other little things in the coming days but really I'm good until the seat brackets come and the cage gets welded in.

~Steven

 

GET ON SKYPE!! I don't know how else to try and contact you...China blows

 

Everything is pretty much sorted out at this point with the seat brackets (they took a month to make it to me...), the cage, and the harnesses.

I have also opted for a whole new set of black carpet to be installed/modified with the cage.

The car is going in next Monday and should be done within a week with the new cage, seats, harnesses, and carpet- I can barely contain myself.

Pics to come,
Steven

 

car is dropped off at the shop! I will update with pictures when I have them.

 

It has been great reading through this thread and getting a better understanding of just what is involved in these LT1/T56 swaps. I'm picking up a 89 Iroc that's already been converted so my only real project will be reversing the factory AC delete. (I live in TX and AC is required Convertible or not )

Truely an amazing effort and I'm quite glad you took the time document your journey.

 

thanks alot- this project has been amazing for me over the last two years.

I just got a sneak peek from the shop this evening



~Steven

 

Another photo confirms that I am rust free along my floors (sigh of relief)

~Steven

 

more shop photos:




Steven

 

almost done with the plates..

 

Now it's starting to come together.

 

harness bar is in- they just have to fit the door bars and then zip everything up

 

Two more points to go

 

They should be done with the whole thing tomorrow afternoon. My brother should have the car picked up by wednesday at the latest.

 

My brother picked the car up a few minutes ago and we are ready to get going on the suspension as soon as we order parts.

The plan at the moment is a full set of Koni yellows, ground control weight jacks with 850ish lb front springs and 175ish pound rears (still deciding on rates), and adjustable upper strut mounts.



~Steven

 

I will take some pictures and post them up tomorrow! Once I get a chance to see it in the sun and look over some things.

 

quick teaser

 

hey could u please show me were the rad hoses n heater core hoses go?

 

try earlier in the thread for more info, here is a good picture of the water pump connections. heater hoses run from the core on the passenger side up to the pass. side of the radiator.


Just ordered a set of Koni yellows for the car today

~Steven

 

ground control weight jacks, 825lb fronts, 125lb rears, and j&m upper strut mounts on the way.

I'm really excited to lower the car and drive with a real suspension setup. Also bought LCA relocation brackets, now just need to swap out my PHB for an adjustable one.

~Steven

 

I really like what you did with your car. I'm in the process of doing the same to my '89. I was wondering if you had some part numbers for the exhaust, I want to do something similar. Did you get the parts from summit? Thanks for any help.

 

the x-pipe and heddmen extensions were from summit- I had bought a universal xpipe kit roughly a year before I built the exhaust... I think the whole kit ran me ~100 dollars. The heddman extensions are ball and socket to match my headers, and they were roughly 30 bucks. The rest of it I made out of straight stock pipe. I ordered 8 feet of 2.5" pipe and 4 feet of 3" pipe then went to town cutting and welding.

Steven

 

My brother just finished the install of my konis, weight jacks and upper mounts. He put the jacks all the way down to see how it looks and here it is:








on to the fronts:





and FINALLY:








Better pics of the whole car (plus it needs a bath) at some point soon.


Steven