The best is when someone asks for help with a car, you help them then they refuse to acknowledge that they were helped, they insist that it was all their own doing.

I can only imagine the headaches you guys @ the shops have with people and this type of stuff.

The guy that tried to save a couple bucks, he's getting what he deserves, I just hope that there's enough $ coming out of his pocket so the lesson is a painful one that won't be forgotten.

 

Well none of us wishes bad things for anyone, its a tough enough economy as it is. But thats all the more reason to get it done right the first time.

I've spent hundreds of hrs on phones call with people who in the end just wanted a complete parts list for my engines so they could go shopping and stuff it together themselves. Its the game we all have to play to be in business. Spending the least to make the most and last the longest doesnt work well. Most people find this out later down the road. Then someone tells them ..LOL or
An again Shawn at VASpeed with a great quotable line !!

 

I hate to see people have problems don't get me wrong, but a guy that takes up that much of someone's time, only to turn around and try to save a couple hundred bucks then ends up having a problem because he found a guy around the corner and went with him to save 500 bucks on a 8 to 10 thousland dollar project is learning a lesson the hard way, you get what you pay for.

I know I probably could have pieced some parts of the projects I've had over the years together cheaper, but at the end of the day you pay for expertise, knowledge and experience. If none of that was worth anything, think about how much less $ alot of us would be making.

Hell I've learned alot with the current car, things I have done right and some that I have done wrong and had to redo. But, the problem is one goal was met, then I wanted to push it to the next level, meet that goal then want to try to push it some more, the end goal was never really set with the car as to where I wanted it and that's caused alot of the costs.

If it sells and I get a chance to start on a clean canvas, I will put a clear picture of where I want the car first, then start building, that's the lesson I have learned the hard way.

 

Some people never learn, here is a snippet from a conversation two days ago....

<Phil> You've got a pretty bad leak around the front of the oil pan and your oil pressure is alittle low for my taste when the engine is warm

<buddy> How low is the oil pressure

<phil> Well when the engine warm the oil pressure gets down to 28-30psi, idle is still kinda high @ 1100 so once the tuning is done the oil pressure is going to drop more.

<buddy> Well I talked to so-N-so @ LS1tech vendor and he said that the oil pressure is normal for a stroker

<phil> (big sigh) Man, at what point do you stop listening to people who are just trying to tell you what you want to hear? I've been doing this since 1999 and you know my track record. If your not going to listen to what I have to say than stop asking me questions. Look man, I am not trying to come off like an ******* but its really fustrating trying to help someone that just won't listen. I tell you who to get a motor from and what parts to use to make 520-550rwhp and you end up going somewhere else and getting parts that won't make 475 at the tires.

<buddy> your right.

 

Wow, I bet I can fill in the sponsor within 2 tries..or less

I feel your pain Phil...

 

Excellent thread...Unfortunately we live in a WAL-MART Society this day in age.

 

Ok, you only get 2 tries....

 

Nicely done and I hope your <buddy> learned a hard lesson.

 

I can only imagine who is telling the guy that kind of oil pressure is right.

Jesus I wouldn't even start that thing again with that kind of pressure.

What weight oil is in it, out of curiosity?

 

Ooops forgot that line as well

 

when you have an established business, and a great word-of-mouth reputation, a good website becomes less significant. i know they're expensive and a PITA to maintain, and even more costly when you have to pay someone else to maintain them, but i know it's frustrating for other people when they're shopping around and they can't find any info listed on a webiste like pricing or specifics parts/processes/tools used...and then they have to make one of those "phone calls".....whatever that is

 

Why did you *** it out? It is an LS1tech vendor.

 

I've seen this happen a couple of times. It doesn't work out for anyone in the long run. The person who did the work gets a bad rep and the customer suffers.

 

28-29 at 1100RPM is low by my viewpoints without knowing the full story. With it having an oil leak and lower pressure; I would 1st look at who installed the pickup tube/oil pan and recheck that work, oil pans are not hard to seal up... There also seems to be a plethora of pickup tube o-ring issues lately.

To go along with this thread, I myself as a tech would be more worried about inexpensive labor more so than inexpensive parts. With cheap labor comes inexperience usually. It's hard to judge though with specialized performance work, as the customers I hear feedback from either get deals on installs and have problems, or get raped on labor and have problems.

I won't complain too much, a certain percentage of my pay comes from me fixing other "shops" mistakes on the 2nd go around.

 

FWIW - My LS1 had about the same oil pressure from day one when I bought it 10 years. 60K miles and 100+ track runs without a problem. I would be more concerned with the oil pressure at WOT.

 

See sig

 

I wasn't referring to anyone that's posted anything in this thread, it's a totally unrelated topic but I was just trying to make a point, that everyone sees this kind of thing at some level sooner or later.

 

I'll post in here because I have absolutely nothing to hide. That short-block is a TSP short-block sold to a shop in Maryland. We ship hundreds of short-blocks & I can only think of one time that we have ever had a oil pressure problem because of the short-block we built. That engine had a block issue... However I can't even begin to count the number of oil pressure issues related to improper installation.

Lionel's short-block is a TSP shortblock built exactly to our specs. It shipped just like every other TSP shortblock. I have his entire build sheet with complete clearances & specs.

Just because a fresh engine has a oil pressure issues doesn't mean it's the short-block. Almost every damn time someone gets mad & bashes a TSP short-block it ends up being installer error.

I guess this is one of the issues with shipping short-blocks to customers for installation away from TSP. You can buy a million dollar short-block & without proper setup the engine will suffer the exact same problems.....

Nobody with this engine can tell me the clearances for the oil pan, or anything about any of the specs associated with this install. Hell I can't even get a honest answer on what oil was put in it.

I told Lionel with the engine fully warm running a thinner oil at idle 30psi was possible. I was never told anything about the idle being 1100rpm or anything like that. My guess was with a good tune the car was idling somewhere near 800. That being said I immediately requested data concerning the oil pump oring & the pickup tube clearances. The customer has not checked valley cover seals, pickup tube clearance, or the o-ring on the oil pump. In fact the customer confirmed that the oil pump o-ring was not replaced with the new engine.

I really expected more from some of the guys in this thread. There's huge numbers of TSP short-blocks running around on LS1tech with absolutely no problem at all.

It always amazes me the guys that will get in a thread and attempt to discredit a short-block with no other knowledge about the car or installation.

I will make sure this short-block is absolutely perfect just like every other TSP short-block. We will work with the shop that bought the engine & their customer Lionel to make sure whatever issues he's having are fixed quickly!

 

Just talked with Phil about this car. Apparently Phil now has the car & GW motorsports has gone out of business. From what Phil tells me the car is leaking quarts of oil on his floor, has burt wires, leaking brake lines, broken Fast intake from overtightening & a lot more!

Phil is going to go through the car & fix all these issues. My bet is with the quality work Phil does this thing will be on the road in no time!

 

Thanks for calling me on my cell phone today Jason. I never thought that there was an issue with the shortblock. Having installed a couple of your motors I know that they are built correctly from the start. I also know having installed numerous LS1s that there are ALOT of places where you can f**k things up. I am not afraid to say that if I had spec'd the long block there would have been different pieces on the top end but thats another story. I think all the issues that we're seeing were caused from a bad install.

The same shop that installed the motor also cracked a Fast 90mm intake by tightening the bolts too much. Really there is a laundry list of **** that is wrong.