Would the driver manifold fit if you cut it off at the flange? Those manifolds are steel,not cast iron so you can cut them and weld on a v band mount then bend your pipe that attaches to it out of the way. Seems like i have seen that done on some other g bodies. And the non a/c is very rare i think. The only malibu i hav e ever seen with that box was a meter reader car for an electric company and was stripped! I dont even think it had carpet.Hope you figure something out with the exhaust. I just bought a set of those for my 81 malibu project.

 

Yes cast steel welds nicely and is not as crack prone

 

Since it doesn't have AC, I don't know how much creature comfort you are looking for. TRZ makes a nice manual rack and pinion conversion for G-bodys that will get that ginormous steering box and knuckle out of the way.

 

The drivers side manifold actually does fit! I was wrong. Once I squared up the motor and got everything where it should be there was more than enough room to fit both manifolds on so have no fear, you should be fine on your Malibu!!

I think I'm going to stick with the power steering for now. My wife wants to drive this thing when it is done and I know she would hate a manual rack. Thanks for the advice though.



Good news and bad news to report in this update! Lets start with the bad.

Once I squared the motor and got it sitting where it should with the motor mount perches in place the motor sat a bit to high for the stock hood so the truck intake manifold had to go! I got a smokin' deal on an LS1 intake manifold so that will be taking the place of the factory truck monstrosity.

The really bad news though was that I have early model 5.3 heads that have a notch cast into them that will only work with a certain style head gasket, and most definitely NOT work with the LS9 style gasket. I felt sick when I learned this as I had already assembled the heads and torqued down the one time use torque to yield head bolts and the heads were coming off again for sure. After much thought I decided I really wanted to use the LS9 head gaskets so I bought another set of heads that don't have the notch cast into them. I also bought a set of re-usable head bolts so if I have to pull the heads again I won't be shit canning another set of head bolts. This was supposed to be a budget build! Oh well.

The motor should be back together with the new heads and intake and going back in for good this week which is good because it has been in and out of the car at least ten times and I am sick of seeing it hanging on the hoist.

Now onto the good news.

I have managed to get a lot more work done and man am I getting close hearing this thing bark! The truck oil pan does not hang too low once the motor is set up on the mounts! It is still below the crossmember but only by about an inch and half. So I am going to risk it and run this pan, if it gets smashed to shit and the car comes home on a wrecker then so be it. But if something comes up high enough to hit this pan then things have probably gone wrong anyway!

So let's get on to some pics.



I finally was able to do the assembly on the cannon plug, this was a big day for me. Here is a picture in the middle of the assembly for the engine harness. You can see all the wires that have had the female pins crimped onto them and are inserted in the back of the circular connector. In the left of the pic is a pin that is waiting to be crimped onto a wire.

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Here are the two plugs all assembled. Female on the left and male on the right.

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And here is the finished harness finally! At the top the circular connector is mating the two halves together, the engine harness is on the left and the passenger compartment harness is on the right.

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And finally installed on the firewall!

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Here is the MegaSquirt mounted up on the sheet metal panel I made for it.

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Safely tucked under the drivers seat. You can see the wiring harness coming down to meet it on the left. The seat has full travel front to back with no interference of the computer or harness. I obviously still need to bring the power and ground feeds to terminal strip.

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An action shot! Yours truly welding in the drivers side motor mount perch.

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The finished product. Both perches are welded in and look great. These are a pretty neat motor mount.

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And finally a shot showing what some elbow grease and a rattle can of satin black can do. It looks pretty decent in there to me. Cannon plug connector can be seen at the top of the firewall.

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More to come this week. I gotta keep up with the work while we don't have any snow on the ground.

 

What are the details on those motor mounts? Also, haven't seen what you are doing about accessories yet, because I can only assume the truck ones won't work as is with the big crossmember.

 

Awesome progress! Look's great!

 

now here would be the real joe dirt build Rambler wagon thats a rare car people would remember it! haha
http://cleveland.craigslist.org/cto/3449845993.html

 

FWIW.....

A jeep steer shaft will reduce the clutter, do away with the lump @ the column, and the rag joint and cover. It has 2 u-joints in it.
I'm doing a conversion in my 86 T Type, using a "one off" combo of Vette parts, etc. It makes for a lot more room at the steer gear, removes the tite bends to get under the p/s pump....

The pic of the older engine is our first attempt at turbocharging....

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Coming along nicely!! Keep up the great work!!

Thought I would even add a quick bit of visual stimulation to keep the build going...(And I'm sure your's will sound 10X better than mine!)


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And ditto to the Jeep steering shaft..

 

wtf is that!

 

looks like a school project

 

The best part is the real TiAL wastegate, lol. Like taking a shit, and putting a cherry on top. Your fab skills have MUCH improved, so don't take that the wrong way.

 

The motor mounts came with the engine when I bought it. But if you go here you can see all the different types they have: http://www.dirtydingo.com/store/index.php I am running the street rod version but they have a ton of different configurations. Not cheap but they are awesome.

I'm not sure how mine could sound any better than yours! Your car is HOT! Thanks for the inspiration!



More progress today but the pics don't look like a whole lot. But each little bit is getting me closer.

This weeks parts haul. On the left are two new sets of head bolt kits. Then a new set of heads to work with the LS9 gaskets, and on the right an LS1 intake, and at the top a set of ignition coils from an 05 truck. They have built in heat sinks and are supposed to be superior to the coils I have now. I wouldn't have bought a new set but 4 of the eight coils I bought with the motor were broken. So that was a good excuse to upgrade to these!

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There is something familiar about this. Swapping valve springs from the "old" heads to the "new" heads.

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A shot of the motor put back together with the "new" heads and looking pretty decent. It cleaned up pretty good I think. Should look pretty nice under the hood with all accessories bolted back on!

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How's that for a rusty old nasty gas tank? Thankfully it is sound and nice and clean on the inside. Skeezy old sending unit can be seen on the left. I tried to get a new one locally but it wasn't happening so I am going to re-use this poor old thing!

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The sending unit after I adapted it to take the braided stainless line for the fuel system. It almost seems like a crime to put those sexy AN fittings onto that old POS doesn't it?

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More to come, maybe even a little more tomorrow if things go well. We are having a Christmas party here at our house but I am hoping to sneak some car work in before that happens.

 

looking good man... I sand blasted my tank and covered in bedliner.

 

What are you going to use for a fuel pump?

 

Good progress has been made!


The fuel system is almost done! The tank is back in, and the feed and return lines are run. I put 12V to the pump and ran some fuel into a bottle. Damn does this thing move some fuel! It's a monster.

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The turbo oil return is mounted in the pan. It comes in on the drivers side just forward of the crossmember.

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Using the old flexplate as a template I drilled a new set of holes in the 5.3 flexplate so I can bolt it up to the factory torque converter. It lines up perfectly.

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The stock truck fuel rails were just too damn ugly to go on this pretty motor so I ended buying a set of billet fuel rails along with a new external regulator. The rails look hot! They are designed for an LS1 which used a much taller injector than the truck injectors so I had to flip the mounting tabs and then space them up with some nylon spacers I got at Lowe's. I also painted the intake with the same metal flake textured paint I used on the valve covers. It came out great.

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Hanging from the crane one last time before she gets lowered into her new home.

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All bolted in and looking good! Wiring harness is in, coil packs are on, I'm getting so close now I can taste it.

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As usual, more to come!

And finally, Merry Christmas to all!! #ad

 

Following your build too.

 

Sweet haha! I figured there would be some cross posters on this build!

 

Now that you have the motor in, how far below the cross member is the oil pan hanging??

 

The pan only hangs about 2 inches below the crossmember now so I am willing to risk it.


Bigger news though. She is alive! MS2 Controlling both fuel and spark on an LSx with nothing but the 24 tooth reluctor wheel for an ignition reference!

I won't be updating again until mid April. Uncle Sam has seen fit to send me to a tech school for a couple months and I am leaving shortly. But I did at least getting her running. It is obviously running pig rich in the video and it is so loud with open manifolds and in the garage that it just blows the mics away on both cameras. But it IS running at this point. I am pretty pleased.

Keep an eye out this spring for more of this thing!

Enjoy the vid and turn it up!

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