martsink

I had a little downtime waiting on parts, so I made these RS style door cards. You can see more pics of the process on the blog.

martsink

I'm feeling a little sick today, so I'm staying home. I will check for you tomorrow.

extanker

good move getting rid of that first ls motor...i had no faith in it. iirc crank pulley bolt is a one use only .i trust the new and improved ls came with starter,alt and intake and wiring harness/coils

martsink

Had no idea about the bolt. The engine didn't come with anything, but I have to replace all the components with the ones from F body Camaro anyways. I alreay have an LS1 intake and porsche alternator, but I'll have to get the harness and throttle body. I haven't done my research, but I think I can use the coils that came with the engine.

halo777

Very cool project!

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extanker

i wish you luck but imho you are making so many costly mistakes that are going to require money/time/more money to fix. are you going to use GM engine management eg FI/spark timing ? will the po alt work with the same number of grooves in the drive belt....i cant fathom it lining up without fabrication and that type of work aint in no how to work on an ls motor 101 book.will this car be driven on the street or have to pass any state MV inspection ?

martsink

I don' think theres much costly mistakes here to make. Can't be any more costly than buying a new Porsche engine anyways... The whole point of this for me is to learn. I guess the more mistakes I make, the faster I'll learn. I also rely on more knowledgeable guys like yourself to point me in the right direction if I'm doing something wrong.
I'm going to use an LS1 stand-alone harness and ECU with a proper tune to run the enginge. I will also have a Porsche ECU for the instrument cluster, so I will tap a Porsche water temperature sensor in the passenger head, and run both oil pressure sensors on a remote line. The only thing I may have trouble with is the tach. On the new GM engines you can just tap into the crank position sensor and its pretty much plug and play, however, my engine is older so it uses a 24T reluctor wheel. I will have to change the output signal to match.

As for the alternator, I havent really looked into it at all because it doesnt matter at the point where I am in the build. All I know is that there is room for it, and thats all that matters. Sure, I may have to buy a GM alternator to match the harmonic balancer pulley, but thats like 50 bucks.... Making an adaptor plate for it doesn't bother me either.

Yes this car will be driven on the street and track , so I will have to pass Ontario safety.

xschop

The reason why I ask about CV PCD is because if you have to move engine aftwards to clear firewall, a 930 CV upgrade allows for more axle angle.

martsink

Good to know . I believe I should be fine with the stock setup, but I will double check. I haven't read anything about this from people who completed the swap.

clearwaterms

is the car you are starting with a base or an S? Have you looked at the renegade conversions?

martsink

Hey, its an S. I'm actually getting the kit from them. Should be here within a couple weeks hopefully. The problem with Renegade is lack of instructions, I'm left to do 90% of the research on my own. It doesn't help that I'm using a pre 2006 5.3L engine.

xschop

Did Renegade suggest the Fbody accessories? And more importantly will any modification to the firewall be necessary with their kit?

martsink

To be honest Renegade were not much help with part selection. They just said they only do conversions on crate motors and there are 100s of ways to build the car. They dont offer much instructions "because every build is different", which doesn't make too much sense to me. I get most of my information from people on forums. I'm not trying to knock Renegade because they do pick up the phone when you have questions, and Steve there is a great guy, but I wish there was a more detailed conversion guide for the price.

clearwaterms

did you look into a crate motor? I am curious a few months from now when you are all finished if the crate motor that just drops in wouldn't have been the better solution.

martsink

A crate motor is just a matter of convenience if you have a lot of money to blow. You can get the motor, harness, and ECU all in one package. At the end of the day you still have to go through all the crap of finding the parts to go with the kit (eg finding the type of engine and transmission mounts, finding the proper oil pan for good ground clearance, fabricating a custom intake,etc). I think a lof of these items should just be part of the kit, or at least part of instructions, but Renegade doesnt tell you any of this unless you call and ask.

As for my truck motor, its not that much trouble. Its just my frist time tearing apart an engine, so there are many things that I don't know and have to research. To me this is not a big deal, and I actually quite like it. I may make some mistakes along the way, but I will learn from them. The engine cost me under $1000 USD and I will have to spend another $800 or so to retrofit it with LS1 parts. An LS3 crate engine with the harnes and ECU costs about $8000. And you still have to swap out the oil pan and harmonic balancer to make it fit.