I am thinking about looking at a 1987 camaro Carb. car for a project. But I want to switch it over to TBI for fuel economy reasons. (I am not sure if the 305 is orignal yet as I am waiting for a call back) I will let you know what it is asap.

I have tried a search, I have found lots of things like the heads are the same as the TPI car if its an 1987 LG4, but not a real good description of the swap.

Has it been done?
What all would you need, i would assume the Fuel pump, manifold, TBI unit, ECM, wiring harness and vaccum setup.

Would you need to change any of the wiring for the guages?

its been done a billion times before, i'm sure.

Yeah that was kinda a retorical question, my bad.

Would an L03 from a 1/2 ton chev from 87-89 range work for a swap in engine. It seems like there the same engine, same hp and only 5 more lb/ft of torque. If that was the case I can get all the parts needed.

aside from the obvious, you're prolly gonna need to swap the fuel pump just to be on the safe side. but yes, the TBI setup (TBI, manifold, computer, wiring, etc) will go in. the guages will be fine. Although a fun project, it's not very useful. You gotta make sure the computer is tuned to your specs (IE same transmission) and a bunch of random garbage. I'd rather spend that time and money swapping in an entire engine, and I'd make it an L98. TPI is much more fuel efficient (I'm hearing 2-4 mpg) and it costs relatively the same price, a little more, for parts. Get a complete TPI setup for around $250-350 depending on what you need. If this car is a project car, why not experiment with rebuilding an engine? I have no clue your total plans or anything, but I'd avoid TBI. You'll regret it.

You can do many things to conserve fuel that don't involve reducing your HP with a restrictive TBI unit; different gearing, free mods, manual swap (or T-56 if you have a T-5). Try changing all of your sensors and tuning the car up. You can get almost the same economy with a carb that you do with a TBI if you just maintain it and feather the gas pedal.

I'm only getting 17 mpg city with the L03 because I drive like a maniac. Plus the previous tank I got my car stuck several times in the snow, and I always warm my car up in the winter. In the summer its more like 20mpg in the city. Seems like an awful lot, but then again I have 2.73 gearing, and a lot of weight reduction, and a well tuned car with some economy mods (full exhaust, hi performance electrical system, open element, synthetic oil, etc).

Stick with carb. Tune it properly and change your spark plugs and wires and do some economy mods. Stay away from this godforsaken TBI crap! hahahaha



sorry TBI guys, just my opinion, even though I'm keeping TBI even after my mods.

Hipocrite.

Steve

I was just thinking Fuel price wise and besides I could use a TBI system off a truck. A junked TPI car is kinda hard to come by this way. I could just tune the carb, and wait out a TPI system. Not sure about a 5.7, just because of gas will be around 75-85 cents a litre. But a 305 with TPI has a good amount of power to start with. As I would have no gains from Carb-TBI, but I would see quite a difference with the TPI system.

I should just do a complete tune-up, and do appearence mods for now instead. Once again I have to see the car, I will be looking at it tonight. Hopefully the condition will be as good as he said. New floor pans, and preped for paint, I am thinking he might have a divorce on the way and is trying to get rid of it, so she doesn't get it. But who knows' it might be a POS when I get down there.

sounds like a lot of fun. Like I said about the TBI swap- I'd rather spend my money with performance

I am putting an Edelbrock 1405 600cfm carb on my 305HO. It should bring me up from the 8-10 I am getting with the Quadrajet. The Q-jet when new used to get 20 mpg highway 14 city then it went down hill. It is the carb though. Borrowed the q-jet from my van for a week and got 17.5 mpg around town. I think I will get about the same with the 1405. I have found once a Q-jet starts performing badly it all down hill from there. If you can't tell I hate Q-jets. Carbs can do quite good on gas if you can keep your foot out of the secondaries.

Did it.
Takes some serious studying of the wiring diagrams but most of it is just matching up colors. I cut and grafted the harness to fit rather then replacing it.

Wound up with a CrossFire'd Firebird that ran mid 13s and surprised alot folks.....

Yes. it tool alot of work but it was alot of fun.