Sikky is good quality and simple but then they are also very expensive. You break a piece and you have to have a custom one made by them. Unless you are good at welding. Not shooting them down, but if you are strapped for cash go with a Daft kit. Hinson is nice, but good god...the prices!!!

Good luck and try not to pull all of your hair out.

 

Thought I would give you a little inspiration lol

 

I have a 90 s13 fast back.

I spent over 5k on my sr20det conversion.
That was with the purchase of the motor, new turbo, rebuilding the block and heads, new intake and headers, etc.

I also spent over 5k in brakes and suspension upgrades. That included, j30 limited slip, swaybars, wheels, tires, 5lug hubs, 300zx brakes, Upper and Lower Control Arms etc.

I ended up spending over 15k which included shipping, labor and taxes. I couldn't do everything my self, which might save you if you DIY.

I am currently building a 5.3L LMQ to put in my 68 truck. I bought the Edelbrock carb conversion kit for $600 and the complete motor for $600. I am taking the carb and trans off the original engine. I bought a few misc part to get it together. This was a very cheap build. I think I have only spent 1,500 so far.

So, i agree your build can go very cheap, or it can get very expensive when you start adding all the "extra" little things that will nickle and dime you.

I can say one thing though. As cheap as this truck build is going, I wish I would have done a LS1 in my s13 rather than the sr20det.

 

the car is very nice but 40 k in parts is ridiculous if u ask me i think i have a bigger part list then you and i am nowhere near half that

 

That price is all parts put in the car which was pretty much everything new.
1000 Brakes
2000 Coilovers
300 Urethane bushings
400 Swaybars
250 Strut tower bar
2000 Leather interior
500 Wiring
150 Dakota digital boxes
2000 Exhaust
1000 Wheel bearings all 4 corners
350 Brake lines, fittings, stainless
600 Fuel system
1000 Cooling system
1000 A/C
3000 Wheels / tires
300 Bedliner (underside of the car)
100 Intake
10,000 Motor
2000 Transmission
300 Driveshaft
600 Rear differential / axles
500 OEM head lights, corner lights, turn signals
2000 Silvia K's body kit
2000 body panels (quarter, fender, hood, roof skin, radiator support)
8000 paint and body work

That's 41,200 right there and I am sure I forgot some stuff. I also paid 9000 for the car with a LS1 and T56 in it but that was pulled and everything was redone due to it not being done correctly the first time. Also note that other than the body work all the other work was done by me and friends so no labor is in those prices.

It really adds up before you know it especially if you do everything to the level that we built this car. I use it as a demo though for our business.

 

Holy crap, 10k for the motor!!!

 

Yeah seems like a lot but I bought a L92, then I needed F-body accessories, spacers to make those accessories work, new water pump, new A/C comp, new wires, plugs, fluids, LS3 intake with injectors and MAP sensor, then $3000 for the MAST wiring harness, ECU, tune, cam, and cam springs. Plus I had some head work done. New head bolts, GTO pan, pickup tube, gasket, and dip stick. Once again its the little stuff that adds up to big dollars. Yes it could have been done cheaper but I was under a time constraint and most all of that was new parts.

It was still cheaper than what MAST sells the motor as a crate engine and I would still have to do the pan and front drive accessories. So I actually came out ahead.

 

You exaggerate or got seriously ripped

Care to explain why your exhaust, fuel and cooling was so expensive?

Ive met several autocross guys that use titanium exhaust systems for around that much. Doubtful you've got that. I have a 100% SS braided fuel system with Russel AN fittings and it set me back $180. Whats so special about a LS1 that you need a $400 pump to run it? Where on earth did you pull that number out for the cooling system? Run the AN-16 for the heater core lines and AN-20 for the radiator?

Seriously, put some real numbers out there

 

Fuel system would be in tank pump, Vette regulator, stainless line, EFI line, Russell fittings, and stainless clamps to mount the fuel line in the car. I don't have an exact tally on it but thats a ballpark figure. I also had to buy new tank straps due to the ones on my car being rusty.

Exhausts system consisted of $800 long tube headers, $600 3" mandrel bent stainless exhaust system for the 240 with a Magnaflow muffler (downpipe back). 4 stainless V-band clamps at $50 a piece. 5 foot section of 3" stainless exhaust tubing, 2 90s and 2 45s to mate up the rear section that I had already purchase. Manifold gaskets, stainless locking header bolts, new hangers, and I paid to have everything tig welded because I don't tig.

Cooling system consisted of Hinson radiator $600 if I remember correctly, 2 SPAL fans at $130 a piece, fan shroud, new overflow cannister, hoses, clamps, and wiring for the fans, 160 thermostat. Also had a fan shroud built and had it tig welded because once again I don't tig. I also have another fan and brackets for the condensor that I have yet to install. Oh and I have over $100 in my heater hoses. I bought pre-bent hoses that would route in the direction I wanted them to and had to use some 90 fittings and some straight fittings to make it work. Yes you can do it cheaper but it wouldn't tuck and be as neat as mine are.

Most people forget about all the small stuff and that's what adds up. My numbers represent all the bits and pieces that I had to have to mount everything and get it installed. All the brake lines in my car are stainless as well even the hard lines. They were installed in the car with specific clamps and thread-serts with stainless hardware. None of the OEM stuff on my car was worth a crap. That is why I said earlier to start with a clean car. Much of the money I spent I did not intend on but when your fuel line is rusty, your brake lines are rusty, the factory mounts are non existant then you have to replace all that. I also had no idea that the damn wheel hubs needed to be replaced and that they were so damn expensive. The 300ZX TT hubs in the rear were the pricey ones.

You can doubt me all you want but I ended up with about $50K in this car and there are still things that need to be done. I know it was that much because I saw the dent in my bank account.

 

I would suggest you never sell this vehicle. You'll never get your money back. But this seems to be one of the cleanest S14's ive ever seen, and thats just from the front of the car lol. In the future i would like to put a ls1/t56 in a S13. Keep my budget around 6k. Let's see how that goes lol.

 

I built it knowing I would never recover my costs. It started out to be a fun car for myself but then it turned into something to showcase what we can do at our shop. We primarily do LS swaps in muscle cars and do some complete restorations as well. We just wanted to do a super clean LS swap that we could take customers for a ride in and to display at the shop. After this year I will probably part the car out and build something else.

 

the list of prices u have there seem excessive but i understand u went with new everything, which could have been easily replicated for alot less but props to you on doing that

 

But it's all worth it in the end, when you have that little piece of glory you can call your own!

 

He paid for the name brands on everything he used. 90% of that stuff wasnt necessary, but more to the fun side or just for something new. Its all fine and dandy for a company showcasing their products but makes little to no sense for a shop especially since they will be soon parting it for pennies on the dollar in returns

The point of costs and budgeting is to know to add a good deal more for the unexpected and the small parts that seriously add up in the end. $3500 is too little, while $50,000 is absurd

To help with my swap, I listed each of the different subsystems and tallied each component in them. Then decided which would be reused, which needed to be swapped to something else and which needed to be fabricated. Costs for each system were predicted along with a course of action. Parts were purchased and modified with guesswork eliminated

An example would be the fuel system. Mine was a 3rd gen so the tank/sender was reusable. I drew this diagram to help make a bill of materials and order exactly what I needed, nothing more. When it was all said and done I had approx $180 in line/fittings, $60 for the pump and $45 for the vette filter. This method is more in depth and takes a good bit of time to do, but the guesswork is removed and costs rationalized. Once the initial cost is laid you can decide which parts MUST be new and which can be wheeled and dealed over to get a used part. In my case, I was able to cut costs by purchasing reusable AN fittings from ebay. Some things cannot be compromised on, such as the filter and pump in this example so they had to be new. Sure I can shell out for a racetronic pump with hotwire kit, or I can buy a new one direct for much less with the function the same and build my own control relay



This kind of thinking is how I pulled off my swap for under $2,000

 

I agree with ^.........if you take the time to carefully plan stuff out ahead of time then you can cut cost down, I am going about the same route as Pocket, and so far my cost for parts has been kept very low! when knowing what you can by used and what you can't!

 

I can believe that price sheet.
i have an excel spread sheet with all my prices for the things big enough to document, not including welding gas wire, cutting blades for grinder, cans of primer, sheet metal, nuts and bolts, brake clean.
I have put in parts over 25k to my car and my dad helped mew with about 4k.
not done yet.

 

My shop primarily builds resto-mods and we do full restorations also. The money spent on my car is about what most builds we do start at and they go up from there. When you think about it, it really isn't much different than doing a 69 Camaro or a Chevelle. When you take a raggedy rusty shell of a car and replace a large chunk of the sheet metal, do quality paint and body work, then install a new interior, LS motor and trans, new lighting, new suspension, new brake lines, fuel lines, new bolts (stainless mostly), new wiring, new wheels tires, and in this case a new OEM body kit from Japan. This stuff adds up quickly.

Could it have been done cheaper? Of course it could, there are many here with nice cars that did. However when you use a vehicle as a business promotional item then you don't build it with used parts and take shortcuts because it is cheaper. This was built with the best parts we could get and with everything new when possible. Essentially it was a restoration of a 240SX. Had the car been a cleaner example from the start it probably would have never evolved into what it was. At some point when you have gone so far you just have to continue.

This motor and trans will more than likely end up in my 65 Chevelle SS next year. We can then either drop a stock LS1 back in the car and sell it as is or part it out where I will be able to get a large portion of the money spent back. You obviously never get 100%, usually more like 50% but when you buy good parts your return on the parts will be better than buying cheap stuff. I also view it this way. If this car gets my shop even one car build then it will more than pay for the loss I will take on it after parting out whatever I don't reuse.

Last thing I want to add is that we were under a really short time constraint so much of the stuff we bought we could not wait to find a good deal. I do search for deals all the time but we did this whole car, paint and body, in 2 months while still working on customer cars by day.

I was not out to brag about what was spent on the car, I was only pointing out how quickly things add up and how all the little things you forget about adds up. As a business we have to keep track of those things so that we make sure we are paid for all the bits and pieces.

I do highly recommend that you get a solid plan in front of you and do the research on all the bits and pieces like what was stated earlier. It will definitely give you a much more solid idea of what the swap will ultimately take.

 

Yea... i have about 4-6k so far into my LT1 swap 300zx. Hell, i have at least 1500 in parts sitting on my floor at any given moment.

Its not even the big **** either... The little **** is what adds up... 4 10$ fittings here... 2 5$ bolts here...**** like that.

 

Yup. My engine was the cheapest part of my swap

 

my motor and trans were free if not i gained on them by parting out the cars lol