On your wiper motor the three nipples are for your windshield washer hoses, 2 of them go to the nozzles that are usually mounted to your cowl right under the windshield and the third would go to the water reservoir where your windshield washer solution is stored.

Your project reminds me of mine a little bit, as mine turned into one of the well while I'm doing this I might as well do that as I already have this or that taken apart. It sure snow-balled out of control, I think you know what I am talking about. I have mine finished and now I am nit-picking it and trying to find things to upgrade. Good Luck on your project.

 

That's good to know, I guess I'll dig up that reservoir and hook it all back up then. It really has gotten a bit out of control though, I look forward to being finished and having it be cool but I sort of miss the two years I could have been driving it. Hopefully this will all be worth it.

 

Just got back from vacation a day or two ago but I did get a bit done before I left. I had been thinking that instead of cutting out a big hole in the plastic that covers the gauges I would just cut one about an inch across and put some sort of snap ring or grommet on it (the hole is to access the button on the gauge faces), but it took about 2.5 seconds of drilling to realize that this was going to be a bad idea. This plastic is brittle, rigid and does not take well to being drilled through. It does, however, melt easily with a soldering iron. The drilling cracked the front in half but I was able to "weld" it back together with the soldering iron.



With no metal working skills or tools I haven't been able to make a plate like I want for the gauges but I was able to cut some thick plastic and bend a metal rod in a way that should suffice for now. The gauges are actually pretty secure but I'm going to use some more bracing between them and the back plate to make it nice and solid.





That clear plastic disc to the right is from one of the holes I cut / melted out of the front. The edges are kind of thick from the displacement of melted plastic but it can't be seen when in the dash. I don't have a pic yet but I painted the once-clear lens black so it will cover the old ammeter.

I have to go to ATL to look at houses today but I'm thinking that I can get this wrapped up Saturday. Once I quit my job next week I should have plenty of time to knock out a trunk box then fire this thing up.

 

After 6 hours of alternating work above, behind and below the dash I have the gauges (almost) in wired up. All I need to do now is tap into the old illumination 12v wire and mount the gps antennae; everything else appears to be working though I don't know how to check the tach since I can't start the motor. I'd like to check and see if the pull up resistor did the trick or not, if anyone knows how to spoof a tachometer let me know.
I was hoping that these would do the full sweep and then settle down when you start the car the way the electric autometer gauges do, but these just kind of jump a bit then move into place. The cluster isn't bolted in and a couple senders aren't hooked up but you get the idea.

http://youtu.be/3_HWxjj4qP8

As I was posting this I realized that I don't think I ever heard my fuel pump prime, will have to look into that on Friday.

 

I had a giant post typed up but my computer screwed up, I'll just put some bullet points here now until I have another update.

-Ridepro acting funny, sent to Ridetech, should be back by Tues
-Started working on e brakes, like this http://www.chevelles.com/forums/showthread.php?t=215679 , but the loop on the end of the F-body cable will not fit on once everything is together (when set up in a front-pull fashion).
- Gauge lighting is fixed, headlights, brakes, turn and reverse lights work. Everything electrical that I can think of works as well, though I dnt' have the cd player or amps hooked back up.



- Headers are on, accessories are on, I made a new throttle cable bracket and got the throttle body / water pump interference taken care of with one of these http://www.ebay.com/itm/170464613124...84.m1423.l2649



-Wire wheeled, cleaned and ceramic painted the headers. They look pretty good now but I expect this to last all of five minutes once the car is started.

- While I have easy access to the computer and firewall I'm going to go ahead and wire up the stuff to run a 4l80e. I have a harness that came with my LQ9 back when this all started and it has the red/blue connector like what is in the car now, so I'm thinking it should be fairly easy to just pick the plugs I need and just transfer their wires over one by one. When I get the car tuned (should be Thurs or Fri I think) I'm going to have them flash in the 4l80e stuff, and once the car is working the plan is to toss in the 4l80 itself. Still trying to find one in good shape that will accept a slip yoke, as I think that is what I need (as opposed to a bolt on yoke).
This is the trans stuff, right?



-I'm pretty sure buying an idler relocation bracket could have been avoided by just finding a longer bolt for the bottom of the p/s pump bracket and putting some spacers and a pulley on it.

-Not much left to do at this point other than hook up the stereo, finish the ebrake and get the interior back in, and now that I've quit my job I'll have all week to get that stuff done.

 

gauges look killer!

 

Thanks, they turned out really well I'd say, the only thing I don't like about electric gauges (at least the way mine are wired) is that when you have the key in the 'start' position they don't work, since all the power goes to the starter. 99.99999% percent of the time this is not an issue, but when you are trying to prime the oil pump it sort of sucks since the oil pressure sensor doesn't read anything. Too bad you can't prime it with a drill like you can on the ancient sbcs. I think I have an analog oil psi gauge sitting around to slap on there, but if not I'm not I might have to pick up a parts house cheapy.

 

Between trips to and from Atlanta I've had a bit of time to work on things and tomorrow around lunch time it's off to the tuner. There won't be time to dyno it but we should be able to get it running and I'll go back for the dyno later.
There are a few suspension-related issues, but I'm hoping those can be resolved in the morning (I somehow doubt it though). When I hooked it up and was going through the initial setup everything was going okay, but now it's on the fritz. Huge pain in the ***, should have just went with coil overs.

My current fuel line setup seems okay, but after reading several threads about the nylon line used in modern cars I decided to go the yard to see if I could find some of it on the cheap. I found this in a 91 DeVille, one of the few cars I saw that had the plastic stuff running all the way from front to the back and using the simple to remove style of connector. Most cars I saw either had sections of hard line mixed in or used the metal style connectors with the clasps on them (which I do not know how to remove). I paid $8 for all of it, and plan to run it from my fuel filter to the rail once I figure out how to get the fuel pressure sensor in there somewhere.



I don't know what it was made to fit, but this hose #21897 fits the truck pump outlet and has the bend needed to get back across the radiator.



Once the suspension stuff gets worked out everything else should be pretty easy to wrap up.

 

Chuck, let's hope you've got a good engine this time around. Everything looks great. Are you moving to the Atlanta area? If so, where are you guys looking?

 

Yeah the plug in your hand is the main plug for the trans and the one lying on the ground right below it with the brown and green wires is one of the speed sensors plugs, the 80E has two speed sensors where the 60e only has one, here is a link to the wiring differences https://ls1tech.com/forums/conversio...ompatible.html look at post #4 for the goods

Glad to see all of your hard work coming together, It's looking really good man!

 

The engine itself looked really good inside and I'm pretty sure it's legit. Going to be moving about 10 minutes north of 285.


Cool, thanks for the info about the wires, it should be easy enough to work out. For now though, unless something changes over the weekend, it looks like the car is going to be mothballed until next summer. Between the suspension computer not working, pointless parts delays and the fuel pump not working once I had the car flatbedded to the tuner it looks like I'm out of time for now. Had all my parts arrived when I was told they would things might be different, but that is a post for another day. I cannot convey using words suitable for polite conversation how upset I am right now, but today there are other things to worry about.

 

Just updating this with a quick memo, the problem was the piece of garbage fuel pump in the sprectra tank. Replaced it with a walbro, got pressure and tried to start it and it ran for about 2 seconds then died. Now it turns over but doesn't even try to start, guessing no spark or something, fuses look good but I'll dig more into it next July. What's another year in the garage at this point anyway.

 

next july? y so long. this build is definitely 1 i'll be referencing

 

Giving up a glamorous (unfulfilling) career in hospital administration to go to med school. Moving in a few hours and starting class in a coupe weeks.
I was really close to being finished but the fuel pump problem and suspension controller issues / delays really screwed me over at the end. Still hoping I can get the suspension worked out, but I don't know what to expect.

 

Is there any way to check the firing order of a harness? I know what it should be but was just wondering if there were any way to verify that a harness were assembled correctly? Other than tracing wires I guess. Just curious more than anything, as I was talking about it with a friend when discussing issues I've had. Regardless, I think I might pick up one of the holley efi kits and try to install it over christmas break if it isn't too cold. The whole deal with needing a flatbed and a tuner just to start the car has left a bad taste in my mouth. HP tuners or EFI live would be a more educational choice, but I don't have time to actually learn any of that stuff right now.

 

Sounds like your starting issue could be VATS... I've seen more than once the car will start and dies after a few seconds and than just not start at all. I might be locking you out since the VATS has activated.

 

Nice car and progress. I see you are running the belt the same way I will be with the relocated idler pulley. When you get a chance can you post the length or part number of the belt that you used. That will get me in the ball park. Thanks.

 

I'm still using the vats-less computer I was before, and the tuner said he rechecked it but it's possible. It just kind of tuns over but doesn't fire (from what I recall, I'm a few weeks removed from messing with it but I'm heading home for the weekend in a few days and will try and get back up to speed on it).

I'll look for that part number also, I can't count the number of times I've gone to o'reillys and bought a half-dozen belts to play trial-and-error.

 

I realize how unhelpful videos like this can be but I left my camera down in ATL so had to use the phone. This is basically all that happens when I turn it over. Every now and then I'll get a pop, guessing it sort of sounds like it might be firing with the intake valve open? Can't hear it in the vid but I don't know else to describe it, mentioning it in case someone else has had it happen. Just a heads up, the volume of the video itself is really loud.

 

coming together nicely.....looking awesome