nycblazer

how much did you pay for this bell housing and where ive been looking for one for my t56 viper spec tranny. and if possible the part number for it thanks alot.
and yes do take your time building it because you know what the say.
the best things come to those who wait. lol like the heinz commercial.

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

I actually bought it from another member on here, I'd posted a "bellhousing wanted" ad in the classified section here, & he responded to me. I THINK that I paid $300, or $350 for it, I'd have to dig up the receipt to know for sure - regardless, it was a LOT cheaper than buying it new. The part number is 8710-10, I was glad that I thought to ask that, as you're the 2nd or 3rd person to ask me that...

<Grmph> Well, it seems that I'm not getting much of a choice in that lately - our washing machine crapped out today, & that's taken most of the day that was supposed to go to the car...

Ah well, one day...

nimrod.sixty9

iTrader: (5)

Not downing my L03, I actually like it. And I see countless trucks that have the same engine, LOL. I get complements all the time on how good it sounds (no CAT with flowmaster 40 series).

I just think its killer that you chose to do this in a 3rd Gen. Your one of the few really keeping them truly alive. Hope you get more time. Good luck.

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

Had to post this pic -



It's my latest "score" from the local classifieds. I got it from a retired fella who was moving into a smaller place - he told me that he used it once, & planned on using it again (he's an old Mopar guy ) but never got around to it. (I'd been trying to work something out so that I could share one w/ a local F-bud, but with both of us working on winter projects, I could see that being a real hassle - so getting my own saves a lot of grief.)

I picked it up For $100 (incl. the load-leveler at the bottom of the pic), the one other nice find like that that I've gotten recently is a 3hp 10" Skil miter saw - looks like it's a good 30-40 yrs old, with a heavy metal table. Paid $25 for that (works great), & got it so that I could build my own exhaust...

Other than that, I've been finishing up a minor little "sub-project" related to the engine swap (should be able to have pics of that up soon), & cleaning some of the used parts I've gotten - exciting stuff. But even though it doesn't look like anything's happening here, I'm getting some of the "small stupid stuff" taken care of so that I can (hopefully!) make some real progress here soon...

Thanks for the interest guys.

van454

iTrader: (1)

I don't think I've posted about my car on here, but I'm on thirdgen.org and a few others, and I'm a bit of a post ***** (when it comes to posting pics anyway) lol, so you may have seen it on there. Here's a pic anyway

As for questions, I'm not too sure where to start atm, I guess when I get an engine and trans I will see what questions I need to ask. I'm glad to have someone to ask though, so thanks, like I said, info is hard to get on these cars here.

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

NICE looking car man!

subtlez28

iTrader: (15)

That is a sharp car. Only way it could look better is if it was maroon, and a hard-top!

Right TK!?

But then I'm kinda partial to maroon and hardtops.

van454

iTrader: (1)

Thanks guys, I like the T-top, but the metalic maroon that these came in is very nice, I'd really like black though. White was my second choice, but there aren't enough of thses cars over here for me to be too picky aout things like color.

Sorry for the hijack lol

firechicken76

iTrader: (14)

ls1 here too!

88 gta conversion done to an 84 trans am, ive got the wheels for it, just have to have the tires swapped. i went with a 4th gen wing. motor is an 02 ls1/t56

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

Heh - my thread's becoming a "gallery" of thirdgen Pontiac swaps!!

OK, I figure it's time for an update, so here's some of what I've been working on.

FIRST, I've always had a problem with traction with this car - I could kind of understand that with the Tuned-Port 350, but even after I swapped the TPI intake for a StealthRam (& theoretically lost about 40 lb/ft down low), I'd still boil the tires off the line - even at my altitude!!

Obviously, this state of affairs couldn't be allowed to continue (ESPECIALLY with the new, more-powerful engine!), so I made a call to UMI for a pair of their LCA relocation brackets:



All I can say to anyone who's considering them is - "Buy them!" They fit absolutely PERFECTLY (I mean within a millimeter!), they're considerably more solid than the factory mounting location, & if even half of what I've read is true, then my traction issues are going to be severely reduced.

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

Ah hell, since I'm wondering, I might as well post & ask -

Here is the other part of what I've been working on:



No sense adding a bunch of power, & not addressing the "whoa" side of the equation, right?? This is the "Track Pro" kit from Baer brakes - it steps me up from the stock 10.5" or so to 13" rotors, but still fits under my gold GTA rims (yes, I've already checked/confirmed).

I'm thinking of painting the calipers, but so far, the only high-temp reds that I've found are all within a whisker of Ferrari red (which I think would look wrong with the deeper "Flame Red metallic" of the body). The other thought I've had is to leave them "as is" - but they were really kind of dingy when I got 'em, I had to hit the calipers with a 3M abrasive pad on my drill to bring out the "sort of" shine that you see above.

What do you guys think - Bright red with gold logo, or leave 'em "as is"??? (As a reminder, HERE is what my car looks like...)

(There's also a place in town that custom-mixes auto paint, but I don't yet know if they can do that with high-temp paint, like what's needed for brake calipers...)

Thanks guys.

subtlez28

iTrader: (15)

Doesn't VHT make caliper paint in different colors?

I would go black. Stealth is the way to go.

I wish the original owner of my Z28 hadn't painted mine blue...
Though it does match the 3M painters tape I use to number my car at races.

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

Yep, they sure do - it's just that I don't think that anyone makes a "deep" red, all of the high-temp paint that I've been able to find has been (more or less) that same bright color...

Nice...

I would consider black (& actually, that probably wouldn't be too bad), but given the "mesh" pattern of the wheels I have, the calipers are going to be reasonably well hidden anyway, so it's going to be fairly subtle unless you're going down the highway beside me & happen to look that way.

I just had it stuck in my head (when I bought the brakes) that I'd be able to carry the paint scheme over to the calipers as well. Not a big deal I guess, the car's going to drive the same either way...

Thanks Shawn, I'm going to be thinking about black now...

van454

iTrader: (1)

Nice, I think they would look good black too. I'm adding C5 brakes to mine and I'm going red, but my wheels are way more open the stock wheels. How is the swap itself coming along?

iansane

Have you thought about just having the calipers powdercoated?

Disassemble the calipers, 'coat them and rebuild them while you're at it.

I'd do as close as you can get to the flame red metallic and then do black logo. Gold logo could work as well.

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

Thanks guys, I might spray-paint one of 'em black & hold it behind a wheel to see what it looks like...

As far as the swap goes, well, it's going pretty slowly at the moment - I've been wanting to paint under the hood before I start re-assembling everything, & the paint that I had made-to-match came out looking pretty crappy (it really doesn't look that "cherry red" in person) - but I'm guessing that a large part of that was because I paid a little extra to have it put into rattle-cans. (And, given the way that JohnnyBravo's and Ghettocruiser's projects turned out, I can't exactly "drop the ball" in that department now, can I?) So lately I've been sanding & scuffing in preparation for doing it all over again.

I've had local guys that have said that they'd help do things, incl. one with an HVLP gun, but it seems that the schedules never worked out (or something...) so I've said "screw it" & now I'm just planning on buying or renting my own tool(s) whenever I need something. (My wife's hinted that she's gotten me a half-decent HVLP setup for Christmas, probably so I don't buy some cheap piece of crap off of craigslist!)

That's going to have to be pretty rare for the foreseeable future though, since I got confirmation yesterday that my job's been sent over to India, & ends on the day after Christmas (THANKS IBM...) I still have a number of things I can do to make progress on the swap, but I'll need to take the time to find another job also.

I'll try & keep this thread updated.

subtlez28

iTrader: (15)

Sorry to hear about the job TK!

But those Indian call centers have always been super helpful for me...

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

The sad thing is that it's not just call-center work any more... I've been doing back-end support for travel-related servers, not just "helpdesk" work - and the *really* sad thing is that they don't even have the basic technical skills needed to do the flippin' job!! (So the next time you have trouble with reservations -especially renting a car- then you might have some idea of what's going on...) Given that, you might think that I'd be glad to hear of this kind of crap, but I'm just disgusted.

Anyway, enough of that! I might've gotten a little carried away with the car yesterday - instead of just a quick little "rattle-can refresh" under the hood (which, to be honest, was the original plan), I said screw it & removed a good bit of the stock stuff that was still under there, & sanded virtually all of the previous paint coat off. In addition, I grabbed my angle grinder (that still has the cutting disk in it) & ground away any little hint of anything that resembled a sharp or rough edge that could cut your hand. I even smoothed down some of the high "bumps" that appeared to have been created from the spot-weld process (not TOO much though)...

Once done with that, I hit all of the spots that were ground down with primer - so you can imagine how "beautiful" the underhood area is now...

Happy Thanksgiving, all.

More soon (I hope)...

01badz28

iTrader: (5)

Ha ha - I've got one of the derailed engines also (its replacing my blown LS1) and there was a very large chunk of plastic from the oil tube in the passenger side cylinder head.

V8Rumble

iTrader: (9)

In the coolant passage, or what?? (I do NOT want to have to take this sucker apart at all, if there's any way around it...) Was it something that was obvious, or something that you discovered because you were tearing it down anyway?

And what do you mean by "oil tube"??? Thanks.