This is phase 1 of the build, once I realized it was exactly what I wanted then I moved on to the rest of the build, being the body work, prolly the toughest task since the body was so rough!

I will be posting some statements and pictures that I had originally stated in the entire writeup that was performed on www.kyhorsepower.com

To give you a little bit of background, I had built an aluminum head 355 for the Monte. It was in there about three years or so and was an earth thrashing engine but didnt run all that great....cam was a little to big but it sure sounded rowdy.....anyway it was a high 12 second car. Now I am doing a LS1 with a six speed.....as of right now, they only mods planned are LS6 cam, Truck Intake, and a tune. It will be true duals through an H pipe and the Cats are staying! Yep I am making this luxury sport luxury again. My goal through the cats is 11.9x's. Not only am I swapping the engine and tranny but I am also doing the complete dash, cluster, steering wheel and radio with the steering wheel controls. Dont know how much trouble I will run into but that is the plan for now. If the dash will not work, I am gonna try to fiberglass a smooth one in of my own design.



BEFORE!!!!




First Test Fit!!

Sorry about the dirt and the quality......she still has a long ways to go! Truck intake, fuel lines, egr.....shew depressing thinking about it.....hope I can stay interested!




May have to Relocate a coil or I wont be changing wires!



Ok guys, long time since an update but I have made some progress. Alot of time has been spent but not much to show! Anyway here are some pictures of my crossmember made up to allow for true duals and the engine mount plates installed to allow me to use all the stock accesories along with the stock motor mounts!










Ok guys,

Been a while since an update but I have made some progress. I finally got the trucke intake on it the way I want. I also avoided having to move my fule lines to the driver side of the car. As most of you know, ls1 powered cars and trucks have fuel lines coming up the drivers side, well my old monte has them on the passenger so I was figuring one running new lines throughout. I got an idea the other night and decided to switch fuel rails from left to right...IT WORKED I now had the fuel lines on the passenger side for easier hookup. The other dilema I had was that I needed some truck pig tails for the injectors since I was going from car engine to truck intake. I said wonder why I couldnt just use the car injectors in the truck intake? Well the car injectors are about 1/2" longer so I now could not bolt my fuel rails up. I made a spacer for each fuel rail and drilled and tapped the spacer to tighten the fual rail to and it worked! I now have car injectors and a truck intake with my fuel lines coming up on the passenger side. I am a happy camper, I also done a port and polish on my truck throttle body before I mounted everything up. The monte now looks as if it has a tunnel ram on it! lol

I also fabbed up the driveshaft for movement around here and such, but it wil need a heavy duty one before it sees the track. I also got my manifolds and plug wires installed along with my coil pack relocation on the passenger side. The power steering hoses are connected but I am still in need of a reservoir and pulley!
I also removed the dash harness and body harness from the 02 camaro so it can now be installed in the 87 monte. It will control everything as if it was a camaro.....lights, dash, radio, cluster, the whole nine yards. Here are a few pictures I snapped before I came in tonight!






Ok, time for another update guys! I finally got some time to work on it the last couple days! I got the console bracket welded in and relocated the e-brake to the center just like a camaro. I got the pedals mounted, along with all their accesories so they will work like factory! Turned out real nice with alot of time and patience. All my brake switches and clutch switches will work like factory. I also got my steering column in along with me steering wheel and all the radio controls on it. It will also work like factory. The first dash test fit is almost complete! Once this is finished, I will be able to install the 2002 bosy harness so everything will work like a factory camaro! Let me know what you guys think!


OUT WITH THE OLD AND IN WITH THE NEW!!














Here are some updated pictures guys! I also took some of the semi-finished product! I have some things still to do but it is all minor stuff. I need to make my pillar panels and put a few trim pieces inside. I also have to fab up a cold air intake that I am waiting on some parts for as we speak! Overall the car is awesome....drives like it was made for it!














CONVERTIBLE LIGHTS I INSTALLED...........THEY MADE IT EASY TO SEE WHEN GETTING IN THE BACK!

 

BODY WORK NOW

Well Folks it has been a long time since an update, just wanted to let you know it is still under construction. I have cut and fitted all the a/c lines, just waiting on the guy to weld them up for me since I have no tig. I have now started on phase 3 of the construction.....BODY WORK and it was awful. The car cleaned up didnt look too bad but boy was it ever rough. This car was beat from one end to the other........Me and dad have put in several hours and still have not yet got half way! I found alot of rust and if any of you know me, you know that I HATE rust. To remove it I just cut the entire area away and welded in new metal. Anyway cant tell much from the pictures but there has been a ton of work go into this thing and I cant wait to get it complete!

NEW TRUNK.....STRIPPED THE TOP








SOME CANCER








well here are some more bodywork pictures....she is coming along......about another good day on it and it should be ready for some jet black shiny stuff! However I will wait till my building is finished before I paint. Let me know your thoughts. I have found alot of rust so I just been cutting all of it out and patching new back in! It has made a little more progress than the pictures show but I have not taken any new pictures.












Well Finally got some pictures posted of the 12 bolt swap. It is a rear out of a 67 chevelle, is has an eaton posi and 4.10 gears. I also converted it to disc brakes from a ls1 car. As you can see I had to weld all the bracketry on it because someone had stuck it in a nova and welded leaf spring purches on it. Anyway here she is in her final appeal.










I also found a little cancer that I had to get rid of....not to many pictures of the bad stuff....lol

 

Well as some of you know, I have been working on a very time consuming build. You can find the thread here!
http://www.kyhorsepower.com/forums1/index....showtopic=41189

The car originally had:

4.3 v6 auto on column
bench seat
manual windows and locks
rear defroster
7.5" ten bolt with 2.29 gears


It now has:

5.7 LS1 and six speed
bucket seats (power of course)
Power Windows and Locks
rear defroster
1967 Chevelle 12 bolt with 4.11 gear and LS1 rear disc
Keyless entry
Remote trunk
Auto headlights
Daytime running lights
battery save
Hotchkins Suspension
CUP HOLDERS!
Steering Wheel Controls
Driver Air bag
Many More others


The car has grand am lock switches to fill the old window crank holes and 95 monte carlo window switches and yes the auto down works! The radio system consist of the factory Camaro Monsoon.

So my goal was to build a TRUE Luxury Sport Monte Carlo, I mean what is sporty about a 4.3 column shift car? Boy the six speed is fun! I also wanted to be able t drive the car anywhere without it being loud an obnoxious....exactly, pure Luxury Sport. If the car was so luxurious, then why did it have manual windows and locks? Boy that would have saved me alot of work! Since the car was supposed to be a sport, why wouldn't it handle? All these questions inspired this build you are about to see. I have spent alot of time and effort on this project so you may want to keep the negative comments to yourself to avoid getting a swift kick in the nuts! lol I'm just joking, all comments are welcome, please tell me your thought I WANT to hear them.

The first picture was when I bought the car, it was a rough unit, beat one end to the other, not a strait piece on the car. We really struggled on the body and it still is not perfect but it will pass for a couple amatures. My father done about 75% of the body work so I owe alot of credit to him! I done the other 25% and the paint work. I have not buffed the car simply because I suck at it but other that that, here she is!!!!!!!















I still Have a few things to tidy up and gets finshed but it is about there! Hope you enjoyed the pictures











Be nice on the photo critiques, I am definately an ameture

 

Very Nice, My car also came with 4.3 and 200 trans. Wow If you lived closer We could run tag team on the cruze scene. Very, Very, Nice.

I think my car would win in race. LOL Just Kiding

 

All the work was performed by myself with some help on the body from my Father! I have since painted and smoothed the truck intake but do not have any nice engine bay pics, it looks much better now. The car has the stock cam in it still and through the cats made 316/327 to the tires. Here is a couple pictures of the truck intake!

 

I think it looks great! The custom interior touches look like they were born there.

 

Here is a picture from the febuary issue of GM High Tech that they shot down to LS Fest in Bowling green

 

Sweet ride man. A buddy of mine has a SS Monte that he built back in 05. His is black too.

 

Very clean install. And that Monte is just flat out awsome. Nice job!

 

Quoting John Travolta, "You're my ******' hero"! Lmfao! That is just bad *** right there, and your attention to detail just takes it over the top. I had a complete WS6 at my disposal and all I took was the damn LS1/4L60E!

 

Nice upgrade.

 

Seen this car at LS Fest in September. GORGEOUS.

 

Nice Clean Job

 

Great job everything looks great, i really like how you put the camaro dash in there, ever think about doing a 2 tone interior so the tops of the door panels are the same color as the camaro dash/ console?

 

Thats the coolest ls Ive ever seen... R u on .montecarloss.com?

 

Tuned out great!

 

Awesome job, nothing amateur-ish about those results that I see!

Was the cowl hood needed to clear the intake? It looks nice, though it's a little out of place with the Luxury Sport theme.

You should put headers on the car. Keep your cats, add an X-pipe, and rock on!

If you want to run 11s, the easy way is just add spray. Otherwise, count on headers, cam, clutch, and driving the ever lovin' **** out of it on drag radials.

Upgrade the front brakes, slap some LS1 C5 brakes on there, you'll want it with your newfound power.

I like the two-tone interior idea to tie the colors together...make the inside look as finished as the outside!

My driving instructor in high school drove one of these, always liked them. I think your car looks great, you guys did a great job and I'll bet it's a joy to drive. Hats off!!

 

Awesome ride, the paint came out great. Do you have a video of it running?

 

no not really, I thought about black carpet but not door panels, black door panels are hard to find in good shape. I built this car with very minimal money and grey is what i had, they were clean and in good shape. In person they dont look out of place at all.

No i sure am not, would like to get on there and post all of this but just hard to find enough time, I work on cars for a living now and it seems that is all i get done....lol

The cowl hood was on it originally which had blown off the car twice but we repaired it. I wasnt sure if it would even clear when I installed the truck intake but it did, cleared well, not sure if a stock one would clear though. I have been tossing around the idea of doing headers with cats just to clean the engine bay up some. I have an h-pipe on it and I love the sound, not looking to change it. It will never see nitrous! Honestly, I believe the car will run a really low 12 as it is, I have not yet installed the ls6 cam. It made 316/327 just tuned and through the cats on a very unforgiven dyno. I have a few cammed vehicles so im not looking to make this one real fast, i have been impressed with it the way it is. I would like to do something with the front brakes, f-body brakes preferrably....just for looks though, the thing stops awesome now. These cars are actually alot lighter than they appear, that is the reason for the better times then what an f body would be. I too have always liked the LS monte carlos, like the SS's to but my true love was the LS because it was different.

I avoided the headers mainly because they make an ls engine so raspy and I didnt want this out of this car hence the LS theme. So I think if I keep the cats, I can retain that clean sound and quiet ride. I did get a set of 243 heads the other day, so I may do those with the ls6 cam later on in the summer. I have yet to track the thing because I was just ready to drive it and not work on it! I still beat the guts outta it but just not with slicks or radials on it....lol

Thank you, I was fairly happy with it to not be buffed but I have since got a new (nicer) gun and am itching to sand her down and clear coat it. It has a single stage PPG acrylic Eurathane on it now.


The best thing about this build is that it was done without buying anything! And that it was done at home. I bought the adjustable uppers, hotchkis sway bars, and the piping for the cold air intake.......the rest was all fabricated by myself. Of course there was money spent, rearend ($100), paint ($500), UCA's ($170), Sway Bars ($350), Cold air Intake parts($95), rear Shocks ($50), Lower Door panels ($??), Rear Speaker Panels ($??), Chrome Bumper Trim ($130), and the only thing I didnt do myself was the vinyl top which was ($340). I am sure there were some other things including the engine and transmission but there was alot of stuff avoided.

Thanks to all of you who have commented, it makes it all worth it when folks see the time and effert that has went into something we can enjoy.

 

You thought about swapping in ABS from that camaro?