1320 Video Names Its 10 Wildest Swaps from LS Fest
You’d be amazed by how many of these unsuspecting vehicles are running 1,000 HP+ LS-swaps.
There isn’t really any other engine in existence that gets people more excited to swap into their cars more so than an LS. The pros are many and the cons are few. Power, reliability, cost of maintenance, you name it, the LS does it all. As you might imagine, throwing a 400+ HP V8 in a little tin can of a car like a first-generation NA Miata is a pretty wild prospect. However, in the grand scheme of swaps, the Miata has become a relatively common chassis for the swap. If there is a fully-functional swap kit on the market for your car, it’s probably pretty common.
However, the cars featured in this video are far from common (even if one might be a Miata). These are the good folk of Holley’s annual LS Fest, which takes place in Bowling Green, Kentucky, in early September. If you missed this one, fear not, there is the “West Coast” equivalent hosted in Las Vegas, Nevada, in late April. Don’t sleep on that one! However, while we go over the crazy shenanigans that happened at the recent event, we want to check some of the craziest swaps that were present. Thanks to 1320 Video, they made it easy with a list of the 10 most interesting swaps that they saw at the event.
The first featured is BMW E92 M3 drift car that the owner brought all the way from Australia for this event. The car is a full-race car and the it features a wild looking twin-turbo LS featuring dual 76mm turbos making approximately 1350 HP. According to the owner, the only reason they stopped at that power level is because the clutch couldn’t support any more power. Even being a drift car, they ran this BMW at standing half-mile event and went 206 MPH for their best run. Talk about doing everything well.
The second is a rear-mount turbo NC Miata. According to the owner, be built the car to be “still driven on the street” even though its running low 9’s in the 1/4-mile events even when they were letting off to not get kicked out of the event. They state that they usually run 1/8-mile events where the car runs in the high 5’s and the current setup makes around 1000 HP with a 78mm turbo and a 6.2L LS.
That’s just the start of it. If widebody FD RX7s, mid-engine 1960’s Corvair vans, and Jeep Libertys all rocking LSs, check out the full video!