Thanks man. I found some more info on their website that says they're open MOST Friday nights for TnT, so I guess I need to call and see what's up. I'm really anxious to see what it runs too so I can swap the cam and do a before and after comparison.

Thanks man!

I've been working a little bit here and there on small projects over the last couple weeks, but mostly I've just been driving and enjoying the car while getting some "seat time" before hitting the track. I've gotten a few things done that I didn't take pictures of.......mostly just things like installing my windshield and rear window trim and also finally wiring my dash (gauge) lights.

I also continued working on my kick panels. They are old and chalky, but will do for now. These basically got cleaned really well and dyed black. Then I also made a thin sheet metal block off plate for the AC fresh air vent on the passenger side since it won't be necessary without the AC functioning. I "glued" the block off plate to the rear of the kick panel with some left over butyl ribbon.





In order to install the drivers side kick panel, I had to remove the parking brake assembly. Since everything except the pedal arm was left in bare metal from the factory, mine had developed a good coat of surface rust. So while it was out of the car, I wire brushed it clean and primed and painted it semi-gloss black.



In preparation for the track, I wanted to install a longer and stronger set of front wheel studs to provide better lug nut engagement for safety and to save me from being hassled by the tech guys at the track. The last thing I need to do is have bolt in valve stems installed in my front wheels, but more on that another day. Here's a shot of the factory rotor with the original short wheel studs.



These Moroso 3 inch studs will make me feel much safer.





And there should be no questions or measurements required by the tech crew.

 

Something else that’s been bothering me lately as I’ve been driving the car has been driving on the street with my 5-point harness for a seat belt. Primarily because it’s not the most comfortable way to drive around for long periods, but also because racing harnesses aren’t technically DOT legal so Johnny Law can cite you for not wearing a seat belt if he’s having a bad day. So, while thinking about this, it occurred to me that I could simply leave the shoulder and crotch belts in full time and just swap in/out the driver’s side lap belts when it’s time to go to the track. It’s really just two bolts and you’re done. But, the position of the cage’s rocker bars prevented the retractable lap belt mechanisms from bolting in as originally designed. This is because the rocker bars keep the retractors from sitting as low as they normally would. This means the steel “strap” that bolts to the inside of the rocker just wasn’t long enough with the rocker bar in the way. But, this was nothing the cut off wheel and welder couldn’t fix. Here’s a shot of one of the retractor mechanisms in stock form.

I basically needed to cut the bottom section off and extend it by about an inch.



Not the best welds but better after some grinding…….

And after some paint, this is how it bolts back in……..


Then I simply bolted the factory shoulder belts back to the roof like stock and repeated it all on the driver’s side. I’m now cruising in style with stock seat belts and can easily swap in the harness for the track.

 

Your skills never cease to amaze me! Great work on the seat belts and kick panels. You have me wanting to pull the E-brake out of mine as it is the only rusty part visible in the interior. I may have to find me a set of 73 seat belts. I was going to use the racing lap belts as they are wider than stock but I think I may just do that in the rear and use the three points up front. Its good to hear you are heading to the track soon. I agree with you on the before and after runs. This way you have a baseline and can progress from there. Same as using a dyno but a heck of alot more exciting, cheaper too. Great work!!!

 

Thanks T! I think I'm finally at the point on this car where I can stop the "all day thrashing" on it and just start tinkering on it while I enjoy driving it instead. All of the jobs I posted above were done over a fairly long period of time, working as I had a few hours in the garage here and there. This has given me more time to spend with my family on the weekend. In fact, we went camping all last weekend and I only worked on the car a few hours Sunday afternoon once we got back home and put everything away. So my progress won't come as fast and furious as it has in the past, but rest assured I'll be enjoying the car a lot more. Even if I still don't make it to the track until the 22nd of this month, it's good to know that maybe they do have test n tune sessions more frequently than their schedule would indicate.

I think the before and after cam swap will be pretty interesting. Right now I'm running a very much "cathedral port friendly" cam. In fact, it was spec'd by Tony Mamo for use on a 346 with AFR 205 heads. The cam I'll be swapping in isn't much larger at all intake duration-wise (only 3 degrees more on the intake), but the valve events and in/ex split should be much more "L92 head friendly". The really cool thing is that, even though the duration is increasing slightly, my Dynamic Compression Ratio (DCR) will also slightly increase. This isn't typical with an increase in duration but in this case is due to the fact that the new cam will close the intake valve 1.5 degrees earlier than my current cam. I think keeping the DCR up will be critical on this set up considering the weight of the car and that the static compession ratio is only 9.67:1 on this LY6.

 

Here’s an update on my latest interior progress. I had tore into my door panels about a month ago and have been working on them here and there ever since. But yesterday I finally got them finished up. But since I was working a little here and a little there, pictures of a lot of the steps weren’t taken.

One of the first things I did was to clean and dye the lower plastic pieces, along with the window crank trim pieces and the rubber arm rest inserts. The lower panel pictured is for the passenger side. It must have taken the most abuse from the sun because it was very chalky and has several places where the outer grain of the plastic has flaked away leaving craters. But after some dye, it looks a little better. Even though SEM interior dye products seem to be among the best available, I still don’t trust it’s durability on plastic pieces like this that will likely get a lot of “contact”. I guess time will tell but this is all I have until the aftermarket decides to start repopping the lower panels for my car.



This one is for the driver’s side and is in much better shape.



In order to clean the uppers panels really well before dying them, I needed to peel the vinyl and foam padding off of the almost 40 year old cardboard and plastic backing. I did this so I wouldn’t end up soaking and destroying the cardboard while scrubbing the vinyl with hot water and SEM soap. Plus, peeling the vinyl off of the cardboard also gave me the opportunity to knock some big dents out of the metal wood grain inserts from the back side of the panels. That stuff is really thin and very prone to dents it seems.
Here’s one of the uppers after being peeled off, cleaned, and with the wood grain inserts masked off.



And here is one of the cardboard/plastic backing pieces. I took this opportunity to reinforce most of the cardboard openings with heavy black duct tape since many of them were getting weak and tearing out at the edges.



This is the same vinyl as above after being dyed and the wood grain unmasked.



Next I used the same 3M spray adhesive I used on my headliner to reattach the vinyl to the backing pieces. My next challenge was finding a good way attach the new inner window sweeps to the tops of the panels. I accomplished this with 1/8 inch diameter, ½ grip aluminum rivets. The rivets were placed in the channel formed by the widow sweep so they won’t be easily seen. Below is a shot of both upper panels after being reassembled. I was using my hood to fender gap to hold the panel upright while I drilled the needed holes and riveted on the widow sweep. The pic below that shows where the rivets were placed I only needed four rivets per panel.





Then I was able to fully reassemble and install the panel back onto the doors. I still need to pick up some new screws that go along the tops of the lower panels, but for now they’re secured well enough with all the other hardware that they shouldn’t go anywhere. I also added roll bar padding to my door bars. This was really less about my comfort and safety and more about protecting the panels when the door bars swing out.







I hope no one around here minds too much about how far this thread has moved away from the LS swap details and more into the restoration realm lately. But hopefully my next update will include track results!

 

Interior looks great! Way to restore the original panels and do it yourself. You saved alot of money and have great results. I got your PM and I will keep my eyes open for the rear.

 

keep at what you are doing ! this thread is a treasure chest of information !

its almost a step by step guide to rebuilding a second gen like it should have been

 

Thanks man. I'm very happy with the vinyl upper halves but I'm sure I'll eventually replace the plastic lower halves once I run across a nice original black set or when someone eventually starts reproducing them. These things get way too much accidental contact (scuffs/scrapes) when getting in and out of the vehicle and my experience with the SEM products so far is that it WILL scratch off if you're not careful. I've followed their cleaning, prep, and application directions to a "T", using all of their recomended products for each step and it still doesn't seem to negate that fact that paint just doesn't like to stick to plastic; at least not "permanently".

Thank you very much. I'm glad the thread can be informative on all sorts of levels. I just sometimes step back and ask myself if this is the "proper" forum for some of my info and updates since it is "LS1tech" and not "2nd Gen Tech".....LOL. But as auto enthusiasts, I guess we all draw what we want from each thread on here. I know I gather all kinds of techniques and inspiration from several threads on here. It's funny though.....I get more positive feedback on all aspects of this build on this forum than I do on the 2nd Gen specific forum where I have been posting the exact same information and pics. I guess over there the audience may be more geared towards purer restorations with less emphasis on performance.......so the roll cage, aftermarket gauges, and LS powerplant may be off-putting to some. Thanks again for the feedback.

 

This swap is bitchin' keep going @ it!

 

Gary,
Wow Gary. You let US all down. Your workmenship need ALOT of improvment.

LOL. I figured you might get tired of hearing me (including everyone else who views your kickazz thread) tell you how great of a job you're doing. You have invested ALOT of time and effort into your build and it is paying off BigTime! Well done.


I just wish I had your skill and devotion. Keep it up dude.

 

Thanks bonecrrusher! I keep chipping away a little at a time.

LOL....thanks Jim. I'm an attention *****, so it never gets old..... No seriously, I always appreaciate the feedback from all. It keeps me motivated to know that folks are actually following along and checking in looking for updates. As for my "skill".....I'd more consider it "consistent luck" since a good amount of this I'm doing for the first time and figuring it out as I go. And for my devotion.......well, my wife would call that an obsessive sickness. Stay tuned for track results hopefully this weekend. I'll post whatever happens; good or bad. But if it's bad.......be prepared for the Density Altitude and track prep excuses .

 

Today is the day! It's looking like the DA in Tucson will be between 4500 and 5000 this evening..... Oh well....it is what it is. It will still be good to finally get this thing down the track. Will hopefully have vids and timeslips posted tomorrow.

 

Nice!

 

Alright guys, the track results are in. I was able to get three passes in last night and probably could have gotten two or so more if I wanted to stay late. But, I was satisfied after three passes that I had set a pretty decent baseline for the car and that it wasn’t going to get much faster. So here are the details of each run. I had some pretty poor air to deal with but it’s par for the course this time of year in Tucson. All runs were made through the full exhaust (to include tailpipes) and the air cleaner removed. The race weight of the car after the third and final pass (with a ¼ tank of fuel remaining) was 3486, so all passes were made at or above that weight. The fuel was 87 octane from Shell (gotta love low compression motors at altitude for cheap racing). The DA for each pass is listed below. Winds were all but nonexistent and the coolant temps were consistently near 165 for each pass. Rear tire pressures were kept between 12 and 12.5 psi. All launches were off the transbrake at 3400RPM. Shifts were made at 6900-7000.

First pass (ever):
DA: 5018ft
60’: 1.74
1/8: 7.62
MPH: 91.51
1/4: 11.94
MPH: 113.29

Here’s the video. The first pass was against my buddy’s Magnacharged Trail Blazer SS. He tree’d me pretty bad but I made up the .3 difference by the 330’ mark. He ran a 12.75 @ 106.23. Pretty impressive SUV!

http://youtu.be/jaJ25K3ETdc

The second pass of the night was my best. The DA had dropped a little and I did a better burn out that resulted in a slightly better 60’ and ET. MPH was also up just slightly, presumably due to the slightly better air.

Second pass:
DA: 4762ft
60’: 1.71
1/8: 7.55
MPH: 92.17
1/4: 11.85
MPH: 113.80

This pass was made against a Vortech supercharged 4.6 Mustang. The stang ran 14.8 @ 98.

http://youtu.be/V5ZFh69W0dU

The air continued to improve as it got later, which resulted in my best MPH on the final pass. But, the 60’ fell back off to 1.74 again, which put me back in the 11.90’s.

Third pass:
DA: 4564ft
60’: 1.74
1/8: 7.62
MPH: 91.94
1/4: 11.92
MPH: 113.84

This pass I was lined up against a later model 2nd gen. He ran an impressive 8.30 @ 164.93!

http://youtu.be/cqTn7LgIVCg

Some of the things I want to try in the future will be my new cam, an HVH spacer, possibly a higher launch RPM, and I also want to try uncapping the headers. All in all I can't be too dissappointed considering the harsh DA, but I still thing my 60' time leave a lot to be desired. Here's a shot of the car loaded back on the trailer to head home.

 

Congrats dude! That poor Ford guy. 14s with a SC LOL

 

great news and congratulations on the milestone !

but isn't 113mph kinda low for high 11's ?? i was thinking matbe in the high teens or low 20's.
and why the crappy gas!?? why not premium and bump the timing a bunch of degrees?

 

Thanks Jim! I'm not certain, but looking back, that car may have been a V6. I didn't even look for GT badges. I heard it whistling next to me in the lanes, then after the pass I walked over and glanced under his hood to see what brand of blower he was running. I saw it was a Vortech, snapped a really bad underhood pic and walked away. Maybe if I posted it someone more familiar with the Stangs could tell us? Either way, his 60' was only 2.44, so I'm pretty sure he blew the tires off......V6 or not.

 

Thanks man!

I'm not sure. I don't have a good frame of reference for what a typical 5000 stall automatic car would MPH at that ET, but I didn't feel it was too far off. I'm used to my M6 Trans Am which would MPH around 116 at this ET, so I figured 3 MPH less was about right?

I've done a lot of reading and learning from a few other members who have tried a lot of different timing points at the track with carb'd LY6's. There seems to be around a 5 or 6 degree range in which adding more timing doesn't improve things at all. So, I set mine within that range (at 34 degrees). I've never seen a car benefit from running higher octain fuel unless additional timing could also be added along with it (as you suggested). But if the additional timing isn't going to make the car faster, why add it? Plus......how much fun is it to say I'm running 11's in 5000ft air on 87 octain fuel......

 

Great runs Gary! Your car looked great out there! I bet you are stoked, I know I would be. Did we see some daylight under the fronts on take off? It wont be too long this thing will be knocking on the 10's. A little NOS and a bigger cam and your there. Congratulations!!!

 

Looks like some good runs! The front end really seemed to be picking up on the launch. Running 11's on cheapo 87 pump gas and being able to enjoy your camaro is sweet as hell! Love this build!