I'm looking into replacing my 200,000 mile '85 LG4 with a '69-'85 Goodwrench 350 PN#10067353.

I talked to a guy at a nearby dealership and he told me that this engine does not have a place for a knock sensor and that it will not work with the computer.

I don't trust this guy to know what he is talking about, so can somebody that has worked with this engine tell me whether or not this is true? The computer is staying, so don't bother with the rants.

EDIT: If you're interested in details on an LG4 to L05 swap, read on.

 

I talked to a guy at a nearby dealership and he told me that this engine does not have a place for a knock sensor and that it will not work with the computer.

The knock sensor goes in the drain hole at the bottom of the block. All small blocks have this. You need to do nothing except change the metering rods(secondary.) There is a knock module for the 350 that you may consider but the big question is did your lg4 have a knock sensor. Not all did.

The bottom line is swap it, get the correct metering rods and knock module(zz4) and don't sweat it.

HTH

John

 

cool thanks

I do have an esc system, and I actually already have the zz4 module.

According to that same guy, I will need a new harmonic balancer (8" cast iron for SBC; internally balanced 305-350 PN#6272222), and a new flexplate (168-tooth internally balanced for up to '85 engines).

Is that correct? I don't trust this guy at all, and I want to be sure before I start spending money. It seems like the flexplate I have should work, but that's why I'm asking.

If that is correct, then I believe that for this engine to run one would also need these (assuming one has an esc system and wants it to work well):

harmonic balancer
zz4 knock sensor (10456288)
zz4 escm (16128261)
350 oil dipstick

Plus miscellaneous parts(gaskets, etc.) and some serious tuning(rods, chip, etc.). Can someone that's done this swap please verify?

 

He's giving you partially-correct information (edit - I mean the guy at the dealership). The knock sensor response above is correct.

You should use a 350 damper, although that part comes up as "305-350". A new one would be a good idea.

The engine uses a two-piece rear main seal crank. You do not, however, want a 168-tooth flexplate! The 153-tooth piece you have on your 305 now will work just fine (assuming it's in good shape).

The engine has low compression and a mild cam. It should work fine with your setup. It should have more power than the LG4, but without exhaust work, it will be choked. And, with an upgrade cam to go with the exhaust work, it would run even better.

You probably won't have to do much if any tuning. Your rods/hanger should work well.

 

Thanks a lot, that's what I needed to know.

I completely replaced the stock exhaust, so that's not really an issue.

Do you know where I can get my hands on some DR rods? The dealers around here say they don't make them anymore. I've already got CK and CC rods and B and G hangers, but I've heard that DR's have better throttle response.

 

Did you change your sig? I don't remember seeing the headers. I could have missed it, though.

I got my DR rods out of the Edelbrock q-jet I used to have on the '57. I understand Edelbrock carries them seperately as well. Careful, though, there have been reports of severe screw-ups when ordering directly from them.

 

theyre all right about everything bolting up just fine... I just did this swap to my '88 and put my efi system on it (will see how it all works next week when i get the headers on it) and even that didnt requre much to get it all to bolt up. My brother swapped one of these in his '85 camaro and it didnt require much tuning to get it to work with all the stuff from his 305. I beleive the hp output is 205 hp and 318 ft-lbs of torque. This felt about right by the way his performed.

P.S. What kind of prices have you seen? The dealer i got mine from origionally wanted 2700 dollars for it because it was "recently changed to an out of production item" . After i told them in a nice way to shove it they gave me the motor for around $1325 under the guise that they had one laft from the older stock

 

Didn't change the sig, thanks for the tips though. What kind of severe screw-ups? Did they screw up the order or screw up the rods?

dimented - did you mean 205 hp or 250 hp?

The dealer I usually go to said they dont usually carry that engine, so he couldnt give it to me for less than the list price ($2400), but he gave me the phone numbers of dealers in the area that could give it to me cheaper. One of the other ones I went to gave me a price of $2000, but the last one I checked said he could give it to me for $1500. There's one more I need to check, but $1500 isn't bad even though I have to put up with ignorant people who didn't even know that they made carbureted cars that had computers.

 

Check out www.scoggindickey.com They have the Goodwrench engine for $1480
http://www.sdpc2000.com/cart.asp?act...id=128&pid=110
Also, since you're in Texas they will ship it for free to your nearest shipping center and then you just have to go pick it up. When I talked to them they seemed very helpful and like they knew what they were talking about. I ended up going another route, but if I was going to get a GM engine, I'd go through them.

 

I missed the headers part then. Sorry about that.

The stories I heard about the rods & hangers from Edelbrock were two different (and both wrong) rods in the same bag, hanger not what the package said, hanger bent up, etc. One never knows how much to believe what people say, though.

Your CC's are richer at full-open than the DR's, but the DR's bring the fuel in sooner. That's one of the reasons the DR's are so nice (you're probably never getting the AV fully open with the 305).

 

If the shipping is free from sdpc, then it's only about a $20 difference. Also because they're in Texas, I'd still have to pay sales tax. In my opinion, it would be easier to pick it up locally rather than have it shipped from somewhere else.

I'll probably just double-check the local dealers for those rods, and if they don't have them then I guess I'll try Edelbrock.

Does anyone know a good place to get a 350 oil dipstick and which one? Would one out of any 350 work or is there a specific one?

 

That engine has the passenger side dipstick. At least, the one put in my van a few years ago did. Your current dipstick should work on it.

Have you considered the Caprice replacement engine? P/N 12513151. It's about $100 more, but it has a roller cam (much better in the long run). Center bolt valve covers, too, which seal better.

It will also have a one-piece rear main seal, which is also a better design. That will require you to use a one-piece, externally-balanced, 153-tooth flex plate, but that's a small price to pay for a better design (I happen to have such a flex plate that I'd be willing to part with for a good cause, like yours).

The center two intake bolts on each side will also be at the different angle, but it's fairly simple to modify your manifold to get around that.

Okay, it has a couple of more issues to address, but in general, the later design engine is probable worth it.

 

as for the dipstick, this motor will, or at least the one i got, accepts both RH and LH dipsticks. I just blocked off the side i didnt need. I did mean 205 hp. THe cam they use in these is pretty mild and the engine has pretty low compression (8.5:1). With a cam it would put out more. Probably 265 or so. If you plan to use this as a daily driver for a long time then maybe getting a long block with the one piece neoprene seal isn't such a bad idea. The lo5 aint a real hot performer in the stock form but it has potential wiht heads and a good cam. The one piece seal didnt even show any signs of leaking on my old 305 after 120k some odd miles. Im just gonna rock mine out till the end of college and probably a year or two from now ill buy a nice daily driver and make this a project car. In light of that, oil contol as improtant when its not gonna be driven that much.

 

Do you know if all of my accessories and their brackets would bolt up to the L05 without any problems?

Apparently the L05 comes with a balancer, while the older style doesn't. That's $75 right there, so the engines cost about the same (except at my local dealership, who wants $2389 ).

Also, I've been thinking about getting a new intake manifold. The choices for an '87 and up (w/cast iron heads and EGR) design intake manifold for a carb seem to be pretty limited.
Edit: I guess I could still elongate the holes on a pre-'87 manifold, couldn't I?

Is there a difference in power between the two engines? I've seen the specs for the older style engine, stating 249 hp, and i found possible specs for the L05 in a different post for 195 hp (it is an old post though, and I'm not sure what induction was used to get these numbers):
https://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/sho...&highlight=L05

 

gm claimes 249 hp for this engine but i have a hard time buying that... i suspect its in the low lower 200's. 195 sounds correct for the lo5 considering the lo3 puts out around 170, basically, each one of these engines has good low end torque but they fall flat on their faces after around 4500 rpms or so. All your accessories should bolt up fine to the lo5. the only difference is that the older heads have two less holes on the pass side. I had to move my ground and i just left one of the studs out considering that my pass. side bracket only has an idler pulley on it (no a/c or smog crap). The heads on the lo5 have a shroud on them to induce vorticies in the combustion chamber, which, in short, mean they suck a fat one because they flow so crappily at high rpms.

 

I've been doing some research and I think I just might go with the L05. I'll worry about pulling power out of it later, but for now I just need something that doesn't burn 3 quarts of oil per week.

five7kid, how much would you want for that flywheel, and what condition is it in?

Does anyone have anything else to add about swapping from an LG4 to an L05?

 

Am I also going to need a melonized distributor gear?

 

With roller cam, yes.

 

Well, I ordered the L05 from Scoggin-Dickey and it came in a few days ago. I'm not planning on starting this swap until the 19th, but I wanted to get it earlier to make sure I had everything. It's a good thing I did, because this engine has no provisions for a mechanical fuel pump, so it looks like I'm going electric.

I don't have one in the tank, so I'm going to have to wire one up. Not a big deal, apparently Painless Performance makes a relay kit for about $30, and I can probably get an oil pressure switch from Autozone.

It appears that none of the aftermarket electric fuel pumps have an outlet for a return line, but I'd like to keep it. Does anyone have any ideas for the return line other than capping it off or buying a $75+ pressure regulator with several outlet ports? Also, does anyone have suggestions for a good pump set-up (without dropping the tank)? I noticed that both Holley and Carter make a pump that outputs about 4.5-6 psi, but I could also use a Holley blue pump with its regulator.

Out of curiosity, what would normally go in this hole (driver's side oil pan)? EDIT: an oil level sensor

 

flyway190

You have mail.

John

 

it really has no provisions??? My lo3 had a spot for it but there was just a plate blocking it off.

 

It definitely has no provisions. I'll post a pic this evening.

 

Here's a pic:

 

wow... i guess in that case youll definatly need that switch down by the oil filter and an inline pump.

 

As for the fuel system, I've decided to just run a Holley red without a return line.

If anyone's interested, I put together a quick page with a few pics of the L05. http://people.smu.edu/mstandfi/enginepics/

If anyone wants a closer pic of a specific part of the engine (external of course), just let me know before the 19th.

 

That engine is made to be run with a TBI system.No place for fuel pump.I head that it will not run good with a carb.The cam is made for TBI.Check this be for buting it in car.I went with the two peace seal 350. (Mulehead from R.I) Black 84-Z

 

i have a 2-peice real seal 350 engine... works nicely w/ my tbi. I Other than the fuel pump and flex plate issue, i think it will work fine. The tbi cams have low lift and duration so they suck but a roller lifter engine can use more excentric cam than a flat tappet can.

 

Well, so far the new engine is in. I'm going to start hooking everything up to it in the morning. So far no serious complications, and if everything goes well it'll be running tomorrow night.

 

I hope every think goes right.Like to see pictures of the engine change.As you know I went with old 2 peice seal 350.Mulehead from R.I

 

Ok, got everything hooked up last night and it fired up on the first try. It was running pretty rough, but I'd been working on my car for 5 days and I wanted to go home so after some minor tuning I went ahead and drove it home (I did the swap in my dad's garage). This morning I came back and tried tuning it, but my timing light was broken, it was still running roughly, and I needed to get to work so I went ahead and took it to the City Garage to have them time it real quick. The guy timed it and told me it was only running on 5 cylinders, and that I had a big vacuum leak at the intake manifold.

I guess the moral to this story is just get a new intake manifold for the different bolt pattern, because I made the holes so that it fit just fine but it's definitely leaking. So now I've gotta find a different intake manifold and take the top of the engine apart. I'm considering taking my 5 cylinders over to a junkyard I just found out about and finding one for an '87 LG4.

 

May not be so bad as I thought. The intake manifold gasket set I bought was for the L05 on a Caprice, and for some reason didn't come with the front and back gaskets, which is where the leak is. In my ignorance I thought that since they didn't include them in the set that I could just fill it in with RTV, but that's not the case. Maybe '87+ intake manifolds don't need those gaskets? Well, in any case I'm going to add those gaskets and see what happens.

 

You don't need those gaskets. RTV is the way the factory has been doing it, and the way many of us were doing it before they did. Perhaps you didn't use enough, or it wasn't applied evenly enough. The '87 LG4 manifold would make the bolt line-up easier, but wouldn't be a factor on those end gaskets/RTV. And, those end gaskets aren't sealing vacuum, only oil. If you have a vacuum leak, it's something else.

I assume you got the flexplate in time...

 

Yep, came at noon on friday. Shipping reimbursement should go out tomorrow.

You're right about the gaskets and that not being my problem. Has anyone ever successfully drilled the holes in a pre-87 intake manifold and had everything work? By the way, ARP's stainless steel intake manifold bolts are a lot shorter than the originals, and I wouldn't recommend them to anybody. I think that may be part of my problem.

 

i did it the other way around. I drilled out the holes on my old 87 and up tbi intake and had it work for a little while. Replaced it with an edelbrock performer, though. I dont know why i didnt do it instead of drilling first. The performer was only 120 something from pep boys. I dont know if any of the local auto stores carry the 87 and up ones. I only saw pre 87 style. Anyrate, the bolts shouldnt make a differece unless they are really pushing the alighnment of the intake off. If the bolts went it relitivly freely and you didnt have to force anything, then id look elsewhere for the vacuum leak. What gasket manufacturer did you use? I used the felpro ones and they seem to work great. Even threw in rtv and instructions.

 

I always use Fel-Pro gaskets. Last night I pulled the intake manifold off, cleaned all the surfaces, cleaned the bolt holes out with a tap, cleaned the bolts off with a die, and got some new bolts that were slightly longer for the holes that had brackets. I measured all of the lengths of the bolts to make sure they were going in right with enough thread in the head. Then I put all the gaskets on, sealing with RTV, stuck the manifold on and torqued the bolts to 30 ft.lbs. in sequence. I then started it up and it sounded a little better but still not good.

I think my next step will be to pull the headers back and replace all of the spark plugs, make sure they're tight, and put the stock coil back in. Looks like I'll be doing that tonight.

 

Update: Last night and this morning I gathered some info. I pulled off each plug wire and each one made a difference, indicating that at least some spark is getting to each cylinder. I hooked up a fuel pressure gauge and for the first few minutes in idle it started at 6.5 psi and slowly dropped to 5 psi and held steady. When I put it in gear, the pressure bounced between 4 and 5 psi. I hooked up a multimeter to the fuel pump and put it where I could see it from the driver's seat, and I watched both the multimeter and pressure gauge, and the multimeter held steady, so that rules out an electrical problem. This morning I hooked up a vacuum gauge to the base of the carburetor, and in idle it read a steady 20.5 inches of whatever, which I believe to be normal, but when I put it in gear it bounced between 14 and 18 inches of whatever, which I think indicates bad carburetor adjustment, which isn't too surprising.
Also, under normal highway driving (45 mph) it stayed at 220 degrees with a 180 degree stat and about 50/50 coolant.

I haven't changed the spark plugs and the ones in there are gapped to .045. I also changed the distributor cap and I'm thinking about putting different wires on there. Also it sounds like it might possibly be missing a cylinder. Anyone have any suggestions?

 

i had a similar problem that was caused when i used my bosch plugs out of my old motor. Like an idiot i never cleaned them and they where all coked up. I just gapped them. I had a few weak cyl. untill they eventually cleared up and all the cyl. came to life.

As for the heat problem, new engines will make a tremendous ammount of heat because of the close clearences. Your supposed to do an initial 30 min. run around 2000-2500 rpms to break in the cam and start the engine off in its break in. GMGoodwrench has a good startup procedure posted on their site. Has pretty good tips on how to drive it for the first 500 mi.

 

So far I've been doing everything according to SDPC's break-in procedure. After 17 minutes the temp got up to 240 and I shut it down. It might be normal, but I thought I'd mention it in case it was being contributed to by something else. Still working on the plugs, three down, five to go. I just fired and up and thought it sounded a little better, but I could just be imagining things.

 

it will get real hot b/c of the low clearences. I had the same problem . Scared the crap out of me. It would just heat up at break neck speed. Now that its almost broken in (i dont drive it much) it runs much cooler.

 

Got it running just fine. The valves were not adjusted correctly. Check this thread for details on that process:
https://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/sho...hreadid=121674

It is running cooler now, I haven't seen it over 200 degrees. I believe my intake manifold works just fine, but after looking at the old gaskets it appears that it may be warped. I'll worry about that later. As soon as my phone line gets connected and I can get my computer back on the internet, I'll post a list of parts that I needed for the swap and about how much they cost. Thanks for everyone's help.

 

huh... im very surprised that the lash was adjusted incorrectly from the factory... Maybe they had one of the trainees assembling your engine Glad to hear you got it running good.

 

Still no phone line. While breaking it in, I haven't gone over 60 mph, 2000 RPM, or 30% throttle. Under those conditions on both highway and street, I got 21 mpg on 87 octane fuel. Only 158 miles to go until it's broken in

 

I managed to pull the list off of my computer so I could get it on the net. Some of these parts you can get used for cheaper. Here's the list of parts:

'86+ 153-tooth flywheel $70
SB/BB Chevy Melonized Distributor Gear $25
Knock Sensor $35
Oil pressure switch for '93 Caprice $8
Oil pressure switch connector $23
Electronic Spark Control Module $65
Electric Fuel Pump $60-$80
Painless Wiring Fuel Pump Relay $27
3/4" fine threaded bolt to plug oil level sensor hole $2
EDIT: I forgot the engine $1580

I went with the Holley Red electric fuel pump and it works pretty well, but it makes a very annoying loud whine and it was $80. I also used Earl's -6 Perform-O-Flex hose and it seems a little too small, so I'm probably going to change it to -8 or -10. I also plan on adding a Mallory 3-port pressure regulator so I can hook the return line back up and take some strain off of the fuel pump.

This engine had a place for my bell-shaped oil pressure sender by the distributor, so I made use of that. There does exist an oil pressure switch that will go into the hole above the oil filter that works with a gauge and the fuel pump, but it's $50. I believe '92 305 TPI camaros had it.

If anyone has any questions about my swap, feel free to ask. I should be taking my car to the track on 8/23 to get some quarter mile times, and I'll post them up here.

 

Went to the track tonight, for some reason my car was idling weird but it seemed to race ok (probably my intake manifold acting up).

R/T..........0.814
60'..........2.577
330'........6.860
1/8.........10.407
MPH........68.90
1000......13.499
1/4.........16.110
MPH........84.61

Certainly not spectacular, but a full second and 5 mph faster than my old engine. Once I fix all of the problems on my car (EGR, intake manifold), it'll probably be down in the 15's. I also found that the CC rods worked much better than the CK rods. EDIT: I forgot to mention I was running 93 octane fuel and 1/2 tank of gas.

 

Is that with the ZZ ECM and chip?? I think with a little tuning u will be in the 15's, good luck with it.

 

Nope, stock computer and chip. I'm still waiting for Scoggin-Dickey to find the ZZ4 chip at another dealer. I ordered the chip and computer two weeks ago and they told me that neither them nor GM has it in stock. If everything goes well, I'll have a new intake manifold and the computer & chip by October, and I'll take it back down to the track.

 

Moroso makes a kit for adding a return line for your electric pump.

http://www.jegs.com/cgi-bin/ncommerc...77&prmenbr=361

It seems a little easier and safer than plumbing a new one into the tank itself.

Thought maybe that'd help.

AJ

 

Thanks for the info. It looks like that kit only allows for a return line to be used in a car that never had one. On my car, there already is a return line. The problem is not that I don't have one, but that I don't really have a place to hook it up to (by the engine) since I had to get rid of the mechanical pump. I think a fix for my situation would be to use parts from the ZZ4 conversion kit. It uses a fuel pressure regulator (Holley 12-803 I think) and a special return fitting to allow for a return line to be connected (If anyone knows who manufactured that fitting, please post! GM wants $50 for it.).

 

Here are my new 1/4 times after installing the new intake (Performer 3706) and without spinning the tires:

60'........2.215
330'......6.303
1/8........9.764@69.55
1000.....12.764
1/4.......15.327@88.50

Much better than the last run!