bowtienut

iTrader: (1)

On a tight budget, you don't need any costly aftermarket suspension components if you're a little bit savvy with cutting and welding. You can reinforce your LCA's by slabbing on some thin steel plate to each side. You can also weld on your own mounts to the existing ones on the axle housing to adjust your LCA angle and Instant Center if desired. Replace the worn out factory bushings with stiffer ones such as from Energy Suspension, or your favorite eBay source. Good condition stock rear shocks or some Monroe HD replacements will work fine for your foreseeable power levels and goal 60's. Up front, just leave your (hopefully) worn out shocks. Ditch the front anti-roll bar completely. Get a stiffer one for the rear, such as from a junkyard WS6 car, and bias it to preload the right rear tire.
These items will get you good enough 60's to put an F-body well into the 11's with mild power levels.

For the engine/heads, go with the thinnest head gasket. Mr Gasket/Victor Reinz make .026" replacements for the iron-head LT1's. Even better, if your block and head decks are nice n flat, get .015" 1094 Felpro SBC gaskets, use your old LT1 gaskets as templates to add necessary LT1 cooling holes, and seal around them before installation. The Hotcam needs all the compression you'll be able to get, and the tighter quench is a win-win.
Degree the Hotcam to a 106 ICL rather then the "drop-in" 109 ICL. Offset bushings in your cam gear are the cheapest way to do this.

BradyD

Thanks for the advice. I really like the idea of stiffening up all the stock parts and replacing stock rubber. I think we're going to stick with the swaybar in the front because we have to autocoss the car as well. It's sort of a balancing act...have to get a suspension that will be 'ok' with both drag racing and autocross.

We're also trying to find solid advice on a torque converter...the internet is full of contradictions. Some say don't bother with anything less than 3,000...some say 2500 is ideal for drivability...who knows. There are some nice looking 2500 stall ones at summit racing for $300ish, so we may go with that. Apparently S10 and Blazers had a 2400 stall torque converter that we may also try to score for dirt cheap.

Regarding gaskets, we unfortunately already picked up the summit gasket set: http://www.summitracing.com/parts/sum-g2602

EDIT: Annnnd I just realized that summit kit won't work with aluminum headed LT1s. Wonderful

bowtienut

iTrader: (1)

OOps...forgot about the autocrossing. Yeah you want junkyard WS6 bars all around then. And ideally a set of adjustables up front like the QA-1R's where compression stays relatively constant and the **** mostly affect rebound. But....on a budget, Monroe HD's as a good compromise.

Unfortunate about the HG's....stock quench sucks

On TC's : If you're sticking with a 12", then don't waste your money on anymore than the GM S-10 TC. No....don't go with those $300'ish TC's from places like Summit.
Best all around will be a used 9.5" unit. For an efficient/tight brand like Yank, SS3600. On a "looser" cheaper brand like Edge, 3200 at most. Even a 2800 stall 9.5" will be better than any 12". Converters like these will not hamper AutoX performance; for most drivers, they'll be quicker than with a manual trans or stock TC. Always in the powerband! Heat will not be a factor for AutoX events. I AutoX and roadrace with a 4200 8" TC and am more than just competitive

BradyD

Thanks for the advice. I think we'll probably end up going with an S10 converter for this year, unless we can score a deal on a good used converter.

When you say stock quench, what does that mean? Stock CR due to HG thickness? Will a thinner gasket really make that big a difference?

bowtienut

iTrader: (1)

Yes, clearance between head and piston at TDC. Ideally in the low .03x's. Gives more mixture motion/turbulence at ignition point. Requires less advance to make best power and results in more power. Even though it slightly increases CR, detonation resistance is better because of the faster burn / lower spark lead requirement. Stock is about .025 + .038 = .063".
Some don't consider it a huge difference, but it's free

StealthFormula

iTrader: (35)

Just to point out, the WS6's do indeed have larger front sways (32mm vs. 30mm) but they share the same 19mm rear bar as the other models ie Z28, Formula etc.

bowtienut, you always have some great tips and tricks. Mind sharing how one can bias the rear sway bar preload to the right rear? Would like to give it a try.

bufmatmuslepants

iTrader: (3)

Another point for the WS6 bars, only up to and including 99 did SS or WS6 cars have the 32mm front bar. After that the ws6 and SS package had the same 30mm bar. The up to 99 ws6 and ss cars also had higher rate front springs so grab those too. The 3rd gen formula (only a couple years but definately the 1990) had a 23mm rear sway bar, and that is a great super cheap drag bar, I got mine for $30 at a pick n pull. Word of caution: a 23mm rear bar and a 32mm front bar makes the car wicked tail happy because the rear bar is way too big for a 32mm front bar (I am dealing with this now on a square tire setup). The formulas had a 36mm front bar to offset this but the 3rd gen front bar won't work on a 4th gen. You either need an offset tire size, aka fat in the rear and skinny up front to bring it back better, or you need to swap back in a 1LE 21mm rear bar (only stripper 1LE cars got the 21mm bar, very rare) with the 32 front to get even again. The 19 is a touch soft for the 32 front making it push a little in corners, but its much more controllable. The 30/19 or 32/21 is balanced, or you need a 35 or 36 front for a 23 rear bar and BMR/UMI/others offer this for a few hundred, not worth it on a budget build. Again playing with tires, say you do 295s on the rear and 275s up front will help if your rear bar is a bit big, but I wanted a square setup to rotate tires so I have 295/18s on all 4 corners with a 32/23 now and it is tail happy.

Your best bet is getting a 32mm front bar and a 23mm rear bar and some new sway bar end links (no rust, easy to remove) and swap for each event. For drag, remove the front bar and put on the 23 rear, for autocross do the 32/19 setup. A 32/19 setup with Bilstein HD shocks is amazing compared to stock. You can score non adjustable tubular poly ended rear LCAs for very cheap used, but the poly offers no flex and it only magnifies the tail happiness of a 32/23 setup, so I would either try to find some cheap rod ended LCAs, one or both ends, or leave the rear LCAs alone, or weld a plate to them like bowtienut said. Also you need to make sure your ball joints, tie rod ends, and front bushings are in good shape, or replace them. I did the ws6 front springs and sway bar, moog tie rod ends, bushings, ball joints, new sway bar end links and bilstein HD shocks at the same time and it was AMAZING how much better the car handled.

Another ghetto, but helpful way to keep the car flat on launch is taking a child's football, deflate it, cram it in the passenger rear spring, then inflate it, and its a cheap drag bag. Denmah has done this a lot and swears by it. I seriously doubt you will have any need for a drag bag or bigger rear bar than 23 with your budget setup, unless you do get the 3600 stall and your track has horrible prep.

TIRES. Spend money on TIRES. You can't go fast on shitty tires. GTO spares as fronts and ET streets or ET drags or ET drag radials on salad shooters for the rear, 26" x 10.5. Autocross get brand new soft compound tires and put them on cheap 17s or 18s on a square setup if you can so you can rotate them. The cheapest 18s are corvette wagon wheels, I scored 4 18" wagon wheels for $100, they are 18x9.5 and I fit 295/35 eagle f1 super car tires on them fine. 17s offer cheaper tires, so any cheap set of 17s will be cheaper to replace tires.

The absolute CHEAPEST way to go fast is WEIGHT REDUCTION. Get rid of all creature comforts, no dash, crash supports, radio, HVAC, carpet, seats, door panels, head liner, interior panels, and get a plastic bucket racing seat. Get a hole saw bit and Swiss cheese your k member and other pieces of metal that look over engineered (there's a guy in the drag section who put a new meaning to Swiss cheese, find his thread, it's a red car with a stock ls1 bottom end). Beaflag vonrathsburg or something also had a huge thread on his weight reduction of a 93 he was doing. Project Tin Can Shooting For 10s had a ton too. The front frame rails, cowl area, and spare tire area are good spots to start.

bowtienut

iTrader: (1)

OK, I'll buy that. We ended up with a 32/21 combo on my son's Camaro, and I was thinking they were both old WS6 bars. thanks for clearing that up for the OP.
Rear sway preload: Just increase the effective length of the spacer of one of the endlinks (right side I think; been a long time since I did this to a 4th Gen) by stacking washers in there. Or use a longer spacer if you have other old sway bar bits lying around. May need to get a longer all-thread, but you usually don't need to shim it that much if using a stiff AR bar to start with.
It goes without saying that you DON'T want to leave this mod in place for the autocrossing! I was thinking drag-only when I suggested that.

BradyD

So the head gasket included in the summit kit doesn't work for an LT1. I'm going to go ahead and order thinner ones. Will these work?

http://www.summitracing.com/parts/MRG-5716G/

The bore seems to be bigger than the lt1 stock bore.

bowtienut

iTrader: (1)

Yes, that one's good. It's the iron head (B-body) gasket.
4.100" is standard for a 4.000-4.060 bore

BradyD

Excellent. Ordered.

Another question...if our timing chain isn't ok to reuse, what would be the cheapest option that would be OK to use with a Comp 503 (got one brand new off craigslist for $150)?

Bufmat - thanks for all those tips. Very helpful! We have a set of C4 Vette wheels we plan to use with the 10.5" rears...should be able to fit a huge tire on that. Great tips on sway bars and shocks.

Thanks!

Also, we have scored two complete motors for the car for $400. We're going to be using a 120,000 mile 9C1 cop car motor. Transplanting aluminum heads onto it for weight savings purposes.

rechtien

Interested in selling the hotcam to recoup some money?

BradyD

Unfortunately the cam we got in the package motor deal isn't a hot cam, just a stock LT1 cam, which is why we're going with the Comp 503. The guy thought it was a hot cam.

BALLSS

I am a fan of "budget" racing.

With what parts have fallen into place and a lightened car, with the right tune for the combo, low 12's should be in order

as mentioned boxing the LCR's is good and cheap.

for running the front bar for auto x....you can always just unbolt the links for the 1/4 mi...unless event hot laps between auto x & 1/4 mi

BradyD

Back again! We're putting our engine in tomorrow.

We have a comp 503 with these TFS springs installed on the stock aluminum heads:

http://www.trickflow.com/parts/tfs-16314-16

I have a good lead on Crane Gold 1.6 RRs, but the comp cam is .510 + 0.03 for the RRs brings total lift to .540. Is that too close to the limit of the springs? .550"

StealthFormula

iTrader: (35)

Sweet, the car is gonna haul *** between that cam and all the weight reduction you're doing. I use to run that cam with a Yank SS3600 and it was a bitchin combo. We're going back like 10 years here but when I was a newb, I cammed the car and left in the stock converter for awhile which was dumb. Anyways, with the stock converter the car ran 12's at 110mph with just the cam and headers and that was at absolute full weight. You're gonna be good to go...

BradyD

Thanks! Anybody have any input on whether .540 lift on a spring rates for .550 is running too close? This dictates whether or not I'm going to buy the 1.6 RRs.

bowtienut

iTrader: (1)

If you set those springs up to their recommended install height of 1.78" (or even shim them to slightly less), you'll have plenty of margin to the coil bind height of 1.18". In fact, I'd rather run springs to within .020" of their coil bind (ONLY IF YOU MEASURE!) than leave that conservative .050" margin that they assume. It makes for less damaging valvetrain harmonics. Yes, definitely go with the 1.6 rockers.

BradyD

Unfortunately I couldn't come to a budget-friendly agreement on the rockers with the guy, but I did buy the CC503 cam, TFS Pushrods, and a timing chain off of him. So right now we're just going to use the stock rockers. Maybe another killer deal on some will come down the road.


We started putting the engine together this weekend. We didn't get as far as we'd wanted...the balancer and hub assembly fought us for hours to get off. We were eventually victorious. Here's how the engine stands now:


http://imgur.com/cS8kFFT


Hopefully this weekend we'll get it buttoned up. As a side note, will a stock rocker arm take a 3/8" diameter pushrod?

bowtienut

iTrader: (1)

I still have these:
http://www.impalassforum.com/vBullet....php?t=1249281
Most important to run 1.6's on the intakes.
I know I have a few extras but not all 16.