khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Tonight's update, again I worked until it got too dark outside. Side note, I really need to get some lights to help with that. Anyways, I got the drivers side header in, only to find out that the collector ended right before the shifter linkage and that my fuel line was touching the exhaust. I pulled the fuel line away from the header, farther up into the tunnel between the trans and the floor. I think that after I finish the exhaust I'll be redoing the fuel lines, going through the SFC's (similar to Jbenge and MW66nova).





Once that was done, I dragged out my welder and started cutting up the 3 inch bend sections to build the Y pipe. Really wasn't too bad, and it turned out fairly well for only using a hacksaw and patience.



Unfortunately, all I was able to get done was the one side, and pull the drivers side header to cut about 2 inches off of the collector. I'm hopeful for tomorrow. It should be just a matter of building the drivers side of the Y and then hanging the rest of the exhaust.

On a different note, how did this engine even breath before. The bends in the old Y go down to 2 inches, and the collectors aren't much bigger.



If you're thinking about this swap, just use the Hawks headers from the start and install them before you drop the engine in.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Oh yeah, I almost forgot the open header start-up video. Pissed my neighbors off real good.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Day three of working on the car. I finished up the exhaust. Started out by continuing to measure, cut, fit, trim, fit and weld until I had the both sides of the Y connected to the headers. Then finished welding all of the seams. It's not pretty, and not for lack of welding skills, much more of a lack of skills with a hacksaw. At the end of the day, I'm very pleased with it. It tucks very well, and is way better than anything that pretty much any shop within a reasonable driving distance is capable of. Then, I posted on the local car club deal on Facebook, and offered up my scraps, so some dude in a bagged F150 came by and grabbed them. What a great way to clean up, have someone else do it for you? Without further ado, picture time.





I know it doesn't look like it, but the Flowmaster merge does have clearance between it and the Trak-Pak crossmember, about a 1/4 inch. Unlike the old system, which rested on it. Badly.



Everything clears nicely, and the Trak-Pak crossmember is still the lowest part of the whole car. I took it for a test drive after, and the first thing that I noticed is that it's loud. Rather loud. I underestimated how much louder it would be with 3 1/2 inch pipe and the Magnaflow. Also, it feels much stronger now that it can breath. But since the butt-dyno and the ear-dyno are a pair of liars, I'm going to run it at the track next weekend and see if there are any gains.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Went to the track last night for test & tune, and met up with a few buddies there. But perhaps I should back up just a bit. After finishing the exhaust, I took it to a friend to tune it again for me. He offered after meeting him at the track on my last outing. All night he was playing with his car, a 240Z with a LS6, and his friends Corvette. All night he was playing on the computer, and every pass they made they kept going faster. Anyways, had him do a street tune on mine and it really woke the car up.

So I get to the track and make a pass with the cut-out closed, and ran a 13.1 @ 106.2. So the combination full exhaust and a tune picked me up 5 tenths and 4 mph. Then I pulled back into the pits and pulled the cut-out plate and staged again. This time I got a 13.0 @ 106.7. I let the car cool off for about an hour before making another pass. This time I got a 12.8 @ 108.7. Nobody was wanting to race for cash at this point, however I spotted a Monte Carlo and watched him also run a 12.8. So I called him out, and he agreed. The funny thing is that it wasn't his car, it was a customer car that was brought into his shop. So between me and my buddies, we all had about $500 between all of us that I would win. My tuner dialed me up just a hair, and I ran a 12.7 @ 109.2. I decided to call it a night at this point, one because I wasn't getting any more cash races, and two because I had to work in the morning. It wasn't a good night for everyone though, out of the 5 cars that were there of my friends, there were two burnt clutches and a broken halfshaft. The car drove home just fine, never missed a beat.

Fast forward to this morning, and I'm almost to work and the car upshifts and then immediately downshifts again, and won't go back into gear. I was only two blocks away, so I drove it the rest of the way in 2nd. On the way back home, I was shifting manually and it seemed fine. I went back to leaving it 4th, and right before I got back home it then just seemed like there was nothing left in the transmission. If I stopped, 1st would work, but then it just wanted to free spin once it went into 2nd. Unless there is something that I'm missing, I'm fairly sure that I'm going to have to get a new transmission.

Anyways, on to what you guys really want to see, pictures and video.

First, the 12.8 solo pass.
Then the 12.7 grudge race.

And then the pic of the timeslips.

jazzdadss

Nice Runnin! My 4L60 did that and It had SMOKED the coast clutches after sucking one of the input shaft sealing rings into the pump :0

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Yeah, I figured it out. I lost the 3-4 clutch pack. At a minimum, not sure of any of the other damage. The transmission shop has a two week backlog before they can get to my car, but it will be built to handle 600-650 once they are done. They said they are going to use a bunch of 4L70 parts along with some aftermarket stuff.

jazzdadss

Well I had pretty much all of that in mine as well. Updated shell, 5 pinion planets and I beleive the kitchen sink as well. I,m not really sure at this point it matters so much to whats in it as to who builds it.

After talking to Dana If mine craps out again it will be replaced by one of his units - http://www.700r4l60e.com/ OR its getting the 4L80. Good luck to ya.
I can tell ya if you hit the rev limiter on the 2/3 shift you are damaging the 3/4s. Best advise he gave me was to leave it in 3rd when racing and let the trans shift out on its own. 1st gear/2nd gear burn out and pop into 3rd.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

I let the computer shift for me, I believe the guy that tuned it set the shift points below the limiter.

So I got some pictures from a photographer that was at the track the last time. I think they turned out pretty good.

jazzdadss

Very nice!!

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Thanks Jazzdadss.

BlueZee28

iTrader: (30)

It sounds really good now

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Thanks man. Both of those videos were with the cutout open. Both were cell phone video's, I forgot the mount for the gopro, so that's the best I could do. My first pass was a 13.1, I pulled back into the pits to uncork it, made no other changes and ran a 13.0 so it stayed off for the rest of the night. The new Magnaflow system sounds better than the old Flowmaster system, in my opinion and it's maybe just as loud as before. But, with the cutout open, I think it just sounds mean. Should be better if I cam it.

So the car is at the transmission shop, and they are going to build it into 4L70E that will hold 600 hp. They are also going to install the new torque converter at the same time. They still have a few cars to get done before it's time for mine, so we'll see how long before I can get it back. I did tell them that I wanted all the broken parts, add them to the collection.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Ok so I guess an update is due. I picked the car up from the transmission shop the other day. I broke quite a bit inside of there, but they replaced a bunch more to build it up. I burnt up the 3-4 clutch pack, which I was almost certain of, and the planetaries. The 2-4 band was also pretty well worn as well. They replaced the band with a wider one, the planateries with the 5 pinion from a 4L70E, replaced the clutch pack and added two more steels and clutches to the pack for a total of 8. The plastic accumulator was replaced for an aluminum one, as well as the corvette servo. While they had the trans out, they installed the Yank 4000SS converter that I picked up, added the TransGo shift kit, and filled it with Amsoil fluid. There may have been more, I just don't really remember at the moment. They were kind enough to put all of the broken pieces in a box for me to add to the rest of the broken car parts. So what I have now is basically a 4L70E built the same as what a few of the local guys are running in their 9 second street strip cars.



The ride home was interesting. Since the car has been at the shop for almost a month, I had forgotten that I put the car on the trailer with the cutout open. I was rudely reminded of this, and the fact that I left the plug and my tools at home 30 miles away when I started the car. It did take a little bit of getting used to driving with the new converter, since it spent most of it's time between 2,500 and 3,000 rpm whenever the converter wasn't locked. All of this meant I was fairly nervous driving back to the house through towns where the local cops have a hard-on for writing tickets to Army guys.

The car is going up on jack stands in the next few days until spring. In the mean time, it's getting a 100 shot installed, which myself and a few others think will get me flirting with the 11.50 needs a roll bar timeslips.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Another update if anyone is still reading this, the converter is about half broken in. Yank said to put 150 miles on the converter before going wide open throttle or brake stall the converter. Anyways I've put about 75 miles on it since getting it back from the transmission shop. I've replaced the steering wheel with another stock one in better shape. I also added a stock fog light switch for the nitrous system that is going in. Oh, and I've been putting speed holes under the dash and in the front end.

There is an event on the 10th, if I can get the converter broken in the rest of the way and get it retuned. If not the next race is in February.

DynoDave43

iTrader: (11)

Bet you can't wait to put your foot in it!

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Yes, I'm looking forward to it. I'm at my parents house in Missouri for the holidays, I left the car at home in Louisiana. I'm looking forward to driving it to finish breaking the converter in the rest of the way to say the least. There are a few guys that are taking bets on when the 10 bolt is going to give up the ghost.

silverstang84

"Speed holes"?

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

I'll snap a picture once I get back home this weekend, but it's drilling holes in stuff, like the bumper and some brackets.

silverstang84

Oooooooh. For lightening it up

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Exactly. I was thinking of trying to either found an original aluminum front bumper, or making one out of sheet aluminum. When I was drilling the steel bumper, I was wearing out the step bits rather fast. Then I remembered back to my auto body days, and steel bumpers are ultra-high strength steel.

Not real sure where the next steps are for taking weight of the front of the car, but I'll just have to crawl around the car some more in a few days. I should really weigh the car and get a base line number so that I can get a realistic number of how much more is like to lighten up the car.

FUELS94

I'm digging the picture since I work for BNSF and happen to have a Blue IROC myself.



Oh, and I forgot to post this picture. I took it maybe two months ago on the way home from work.

jbenge

iTrader: (2)

What else are you looking at doing for weight reduction? Maybe tubular k-member and arms or fiberglass hood? The Spohn k-member / a arms I had was heavy compared to some of the other brands but still saved about 30lbs over the stock pieces.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

I snapped a few pictures once I got done with work today of what I've done so far with the speed holes, but this is only what I could snap real quick without taking it apart to show whats hidden.

This first one is a bracket that is on the drivers side between the framerail and the the battery tray.



This second one is of the drivers side of the bumper, the passenger side is pretty much the same now as well.



This third one is of the bracket that holds the hood latch and supports the center of the bumper. I didn't go as crazy on this one, however most of the holes that I did put in it are hidden between the grill plastic piece (whatever it's called, ducts air from the grill into the radiator) and the plastic that goes where the TPI snorkels go. I forget the name at the moment.



JBenge, as of right now, the tubular k-member and control arms aren't in the budget. In the same vein, I don't think that a glass hood is in the works either, and I'd only do it if I can find a flat IROC style one. You know, for sleeper street/strip car. I think that I might go try and find a junkyard and see if they by chance have the aluminum bumper. I'm also going to take some out of the doors. I really don't think I'm going to try and cut anymore out of the bumper, I was wearing out bits faster than I was cutting holes. Honestly, I really need to weigh it and see where I'm at before I set a realistic goal.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Thanks brother, honestly I almost didn't stop for this. But, for some reason I thought it would be a cool picture and it turned out fairly well. It took some creative cropping in order to get most of the junk out of the picture that was in this guys yard.

Fender Bolt

Is that a 4th gen rear axle as well?

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Yes, for now. Once I come into some money I'll be ordering a correct width 9" from Moser. So here's to hoping that my tax return will be enough, if not I guess I'll be volunteering for another deployment.

racerkilla

Looks good, I like blue irocs

You have to had speed holes to the hood(simpsons episode)

You could always buy 4th gen wheels and run spacers up front. But with your combo how long is the 10 bolt going to last?

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Thanks racerkilla. No, I won't use 4th gen wheels. I want the car to look like it just rolled off the factory floor, or at least like nothing has been done to it. At the strip, the game is up, since the race wheels are street lites wearing MT's, but as long as I keep the hood closed most people are none the wiser when the street wheels are on it.

As for the longevity of the 10 bolt, who knows... sometimes they last into the 10's, sometimes they blow up behind a 305 with bolt on's. This combo is a stock LS1, with a full exhaust and a decent intake, and a pretty mean tune. The trans is now a 4L65E with a 4000 stall Yank converter. My guess is sooner than later.

Bullydawg

iTrader: (7)

Sweet ride! I thought I had recognized it! I had wanted to purchase it as well... I just picked up an 86 Ls1 T56 swapped Iroc and have similar plans to what you are doing. Subscribed for updates!

racerkilla

I like the idea of stock look. Irocs look good that way.

I have a 7.5 10bolt in my vega for years with right around 500 hp on spray with a 4 speed and only broke one pinion over the years. 6500 rpm and side step the clutch sheered the pinion behind the yoke clean off(in walmart parking lot no less). I would of thought the rear would of failed in first week. Your 10 bolt may go a day or years. You do have an auto so a bit easier.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Thanks man, BlueZee did some pretty good work on the car. There was a bit of work fixing some things that were wrong with it, or some things done poorly/stupidly, but I don't think that was the doing of him. It's definitely not the same car anymore. It's hard to believe the difference the suspension work made on this car.

True, having the auto should be easier on the rear. It's also part of the reason why I've been focusing on cutting weight out of the car. That and it will help it go faster. I also remembered the other night that I need to put a driveshaft loop in it before I take it back to the track.

racerkilla

A drive shaft loop is a good idea. Glad I had put one in a few months earlier. I don't even know what damage to floor and trans if I didn't have one.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

I got off work a little early today, so I thought I'd work on the doors a little. I probably could have done a little more, but I think I'm happy with it so far. I really didn't get as much done as I wanted, but I was hungry and it was getting cold. Here's the drivers side....



And compared to the passenger side, which I haven't cut yet.



It might not be much that I've taken out of the car so far, but every little bit helps. I'll work on it a little bit tomorrow, but I think I'm going to end up doing exhaust for a buddy with a '91 that just finished his 5.3 LS swap.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

So I spent Saturday working on the car. In the last post I showed the passenger side door before I started cutting weight out of it. I decided that I wasn't happy with what I did on the drivers side, and that I wanted to go farther. So here's the picture.



I spent about half the day doing that, then my buddy wanted me to weld up the exhaust on a 4th gen. So while waiting for him to come over, I fixed the tailpipe hanger on my "diesel exhaust". After finishing up that car, it was 1 am Sunday morning.

Sunday was spent doing domestic type things, mostly laundry, that I'd been neglecting since I left to go to Missouri for the holidays. Oh and watching the Packers beat the Cowboys.

Hopefully I can get off work early enough to finish up the drivers side, oh and pick up a new set of drill bits and step bits. The ones I have are either broken or worn out.

jchaussee

packers?? guess tommorow Sunday will be a sad day then.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Not a whole lot to update I guess. I had 4 days off for MLK day, so I celebrated by working on the car. Finally got to the DMV to get the registration and plates current on Friday, stopped by my tuner buddy so he could touch up the tune for the new converter, and continued to drill speed holes and cut more weight out. Once I got it where I'm finally happy with the weight loss, I put it all back together. I took it out for some full throttle play time now that the trans and converter are broken in and the tune has been done. I'll say this much, the street tires spun hard and the car feels much faster. I'm looking forward to the track opening back up in February. Oh, and I drove it around on Monday and took it to work on Tuesday. I was surprised how many people said they thought I sold the car.

Anyways, I was reading Hot Rod the other day, and came across this article about the IROC racing series, and I thought I'd share the link and the pictures.

http://www.hotrod.com/features/histo...e-seen-photos/















Funny story about that article, earlier in the day I'd been thinking way back to sitting on the living room floor in my Grandmothers house watching Wild World of Sport on ABC, and a race came on where they talked about having a bunch of drivers from a bunch of different series of racing in identically prepped cars. Grandma said "Now this is racing..." I was way too young to know what the cars were, if they were Camaro's or not, but I read this later in the day and thought it should be shared.

Oh, and Grandma had an IROC in the mid '80's, but nobody thinks any pictures survived. One cousin says it was green, and he thinks it was an '87.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Since getting the registration and everything taken care of I've been putting some more miles on her, and the weather has been too nice not to. Even took it to work the other day.





Earlier today I got around to installing the driveshaft loop. It wasn't too bad, but notching out the fishmouths by hand kind of sucked. One day I'll have a garage to work in, filled with all of the cool tools. However, I'm really glad I have a welder, or I'd be at the mercy of someone else for all of the little things that I've welded up for this car.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Ok, so it seems that it's update time. I've been accumulating parts here and there for a little bit now. The ones really worth mentioning are the line lock and the wide band gauge. My tuner pretty much insisted on me getting a wide band to stick in the exhaust before he tightens up the tune anymore, and as much as it picked up it still feels like there is more hiding in the tune. However, I was at a bit of a loss as to where to put it and still have it fit with the stock sleeper theme for this car. So here's the finished product.





As you can see, I removed the vent. I also had to cut away a bit of the ducting behind the vent in order to fit and mount the gauge back there. I then took the vent and cut off the two ***** that make it swivel and used some single sided foam tape to hold it in place. It fits in snugly, but allows me to pull it out so that I can see the gauge when I need, yet at the same time place the vent back in and close it so that nobody's the wiser.

While I was doing this, I also mounted the line lock solenoid and wired it up. Again sticking with the sleeper theme, I didn't want a switch and indicator light that stuck out, I wanted something that blended right in with the interior. Since my car only gets driven in nice weather now, I pulled out the defroster switch, cut the wire for that and used that to power the solenoid. It's an ignition hot circuit, so that switch is dead when the car isn't running and the line lock only pulls 3 amps. In addition, it has a timer, so the line lock won't be forgotten about in the on position (originally this was designed so that you wouldn't forget to turn off the defroster, since it pulls a lot of power and creates not an insignificant amount of heat on the glass) I also ran the wire through the C100 bulkhead connector and through the headlight harness, so that it would be as hidden as possible for a nice clean install.



Here's the line lock kit that I used, I bought it on here for $100. However, after doing the install there are some things that I'd do differently, or recommend that people do if they want to follow a similar route.

The Hurst roll control, aka Line lock, http://www.summitracing.com/parts/huu-1745000

The Hurst install kit, http://www.summitracing.com/parts/huu-5671510

The Hurst adapter fittings that are supposed to fit in our cars, http://www.summitracing.com/parts/huu-5671515

I ended up plumbing mine between the master cylinder and the proportioning valve, and used the supplied 24" lines and bent the whole shebang with a cheap tubing bender from Autozone. Don't forget about the 1/8" npt to 3/16" flare adapters in the body of the solenoid. Also, there is one hole on the side of the body of the solenoid that isn't plugged, and the plug that comes already installed in the solenoid isn't tight. Some dumbass (KHulsebus) didn't notice this until it puked brake fluid all over the place while bleeding the system. However, even with all the fittings that come in the kit, I was one short. This is where if you're following what I did would differ from the directions and the parts I listed. I needed one more fitting, a M11x1.5 to 3/8in-24. A quick search online gave me this, http://www.autozone.com/brakes-and-t...5283_156883_0/

SO, my recommendation would be to skip buying the pair of adapter fittings (HUU-5671515) and just pick up two of those from a local parts store. The part number (#BLF32C) interchanges between Pepboys, Autozone, O'Rileys, Checker, whatever you have near you.

Here's the finished product.



One last thing, I burnt up a second shifter cable since installing the new exhaust. I figured that 1" of clearance was good enough when I did the exhaust, apparently I was wrong. When I burnt down the transmission a few months ago, the shop informed me that I had broken the shifter cable and they replaced it. One day at work, the weather was nice so I went back and got my car, only to find out that I could only grab reverse, neutral, and 4th. I couldn't hit park or 3, 2, or 1. After checking out the shifter and the transmission for damage, the only part left was the cable. I picked up a new one, and wrapped it in some heat protective sleeve from Summit.



The only part that isn't wrapped up is the end of the cable that attaches to the gear select lever on the side of the case of the trans. The sleeve covers the boot all the way to the grommet at the top of the trans tunnel. If this doesn't fix the problem, I'm at a loss.

One last thing before I go, a few weeks ago Autozone was having a sale on the Gunk engine cleaners, so I picked up two cans of foamy degreaser and one can of shiny protectant. I think it worked pretty good, there was a lot of grime that was rinsed down the driveway. Here's the picture of a nice clean(er) engine. Jbenge still puts mine to shame.

jbenge

iTrader: (2)

Were your shifter cables that failed aftermarket or stock? My exhaust is super close to my shifter cable too, makes me wonder about mine. No problems yet but I better check it the next time I'm under the car.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Stock replacement.
http://www.rockauto.com/catalog/more...nid=551&jpid=0
On other cars that I've had, aftermarket cables didn't work any better than OE replacements. Sometimes worse. I've got a little over a foot left if you're interested. I bought the 1" that was about 3 foot long, and it was just a hair too small. In hindsight, I would have ordered something like 1 1/4" or 1 1/2". I just cut it down the middle and wrapped it around the cable, zip tying it every maybe 3 inches.

xpndbl3

iTrader: (5)

She's a beaut clark.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Thanks xpndbl3.

racerkilla

Car is looking good, Wish the roads around here were clean enough to take the camaro out. There is like 2-3ft of snow currently. Joy

Where is the nitrous?... and the hidden switch

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

I haven't installed the nitrous yet, but the arming switch is going to be the fog light switch, which is in place already.

RTGTA

Nice car man! I really like the direction you've taken it! 1 question though. If you do an LS swap would you be able to run the stock air filters and ducting? I've never done one and all the pics I see they are running a CAI so I was just curious.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

It's easier to run a cold air style set up. I wouldn't call mine a true cold air setup, while driving my intake temps are usually 10-15 degrees above ambient. If I were to go out the tray and stick the filter basically in front of the tire it would be a truly cold air intake, however for now I'm calling it good enough.

I seem to recall someone on here trying to use the stock TPI air box deal, and basically anything over idle it was choking it badly. It just couldn't flow enough air, and if I recall he had a tough time tuning it to idle. As for the cold air intake, the 04-06 GTO kit's seem to drop right in.

gsmarcano

nice looking car, you've got the stock wheels that everybody likes. And that "parts showing up and others disappearing is common in certain garages.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

I've got two sets of those wheels. One set has the street tires mounted on them, my drag radials are mounted on the other set of rear wheels. The front pair of that set are sitting in the shed.

khulsebus

iTrader: (2)

Yesterday I went to a different track than I've been going to, as they were doing a points race yesterday. So I went to one that was doing a T&T day. I decided to trailer it because the last time out I blew the transmission, and didn't really want to be stuck 3 hours away from home. Over all I was happy to see that a $2400 transmission and a $700 converter weren't a waste of money, as I had another personal best.



In the picture above, I was in the left lane, right lane then finally the left again. Now that being said, lets get to the negative part. Track prep just wasn't there, there would be 3-4 passes made and then they would have to shut down to clean up the track or something. Everyone was spinning, including me. I went sideways going through the traps on the 3rd pass, so I parked it and grabbed the camera to get these pics. Because all my buddies bailed on me, I didn't have a picture or video guy.









Also, even though all my so called friends from down here bailed on me, I met my Air Force buddy there. We shot the **** for a little bit, admired each others cars a little, and then lined them up for a pass (which was the third timeslip).





Oh, and one last thing. I was driving around on base earlier this week and found this. It's not perfect, but all of the expensive stuff is already done.

TEDSgrad

iTrader: (4)

I use the straight bar w/trak pak. Welded a little keeper on to keep the tube off.