Hi everyone, I'm new to the board but have been hot rodding for the past 35 years. Currently I have a 2006 GTO for a play toy. My goal for it is 475 HP at the wheels NA.

My son (19 yo) loves the Goat but wanted his own hotrod. He currently drives a 2003 350Z which is a quick little car, but it pales in comparison to the torque of the LS2. The high revving V6 in the Z just has a totally different feel.
Anyway, he and I picked up this '92 RS in early December to build into a potent little street car. We bought it as a roller and have a lot of work ahead of us. The previous owner included a TBI 305 that he planned on putting in the car, but we found a TBI 350 to rebuild. We also picked up a 700R4 from craigslist to rebuild.

The interior is in good condition, a little elbow grease and we decided to leave it as-is for now. The body is as straight as an arrow and is solid with the exception of the A-pillars. Both A-pillars have holes rusted in them, so we'll be looking in the wrecking yards for a car with rust free pillars to use for patch panels. The paint is in bad shape, but we'll worry about looks later on after we have it roadworthy.

We had the block bored .060", and assembled it with flat top pistons w/2 valve reliefs, stock crank and stock rods with ARP bolts.. A Comp cams XE274 cam was chosen since we wanted to stay somewhere between wild & mild. Comp lifters, springs, pushrods and rocker arms finished up the valvetrain. A set of Summit (Dart) Vortec heads and a Summit (Weiand) Stage 1 intake with a Holley 670 CFM Street Avenger carburetor top it off. Hedman long tube headers will direct the exhaust gases to the rear of the car. MSD's Streetfire HEI will give us the necessary spark.

The last of our engine parts should be rolling in soon, mainly just odds & ends, valve covers, breather, hoses and such. All of the stuff that nickel and dimes you to death.

Hopefully we will have the engine on the test stand next weekend for a break-in run! After that we'll start on the transmission overhaul. We'll be doing a high performance rebuild, making sure we address all the weak points. A 2,400 rpm TCI stall converter will be going in along with a UMI crossmember with a torque arm relocation kit.

We expect the rear end to grenade at some point in the near future with close to 3x the original power, when that happens a 12 bolt or 8.8 will be going in. Either will hold more power than we will be producing.

Here are a few pics of our project!


Our new (to us) project!!
TBI 350 in need of a rebuild.
Long block assembled
We're getting close now!!!

 

Welcome aboard kirk35! Looks like a great project.

Sounds like you have more hot rodding experience than me, but is 2400 stall going to be enough with those heads and that cam? That's nearly stock, isn't it?

Asking this so I can learn...not suggesting it's right or wrong.

 

The RPM range of the cam is 1800-6000 and Comp recommends a 2200 stall. With the torque I'm estimating, (425 ft/lbs +/-) the 2400 will probably stall a little higher than advertised. A stock converter would be around 1600 or so. I'm hoping we can keep the idle between 800-850 so pushing through the converter won't be an issue.

I don't get offended when asked about my decisions. Sometimes it's good to have someone question my plans, it makes me think about it a little more.

That's a nice looking car you have, hopefully we can get ours looking that nice soon.

 

Thanks Kirk. Sounds like you have a good plan then.

 

We're making progress, the engine is on the test stand. We should get everything else done this week and break it in this weekend!

On the test stand
Won't be long now!

 

nice engine test stand

 

Finally got time to break the motor in, we'll be dropping it in the car tomorrow.

 

 

Nice! Very nice!

 

Thought we'd drop the engine in today, but my converter that was supposed to have an 11.5" bolt circle was actually 10.75", so ordered a new flexplate with dual patterns. It should be in Wednesday and we can get back to work on this thing.
We went ahead and installed new motor mounts today, what a PITA. I didn't think I'd ever get a wrench on the nuts inside the crossmember.

 

I took so long to finish this project, that I had forgotten about this thread. Two replacement A-pillars, a lot of sanding, a little paint and a few decals later we called it done.


Patch panel from our donor car.



Donor panel still had some holes to weld up, but much easier to repair than the originals.



Paint is finished.



New decals and emblems all around.