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LS/T56/240z Project Mentor Wanted


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Yeah, cheese-I read your posts while searching for a solution. Seemed like all your problems went away by upgrading to a bigger master cyl. Somehow, mnoel has only a 3/4" clutch master and has no trouble. I had the car on jackstands looking for leaks and went ahead and shifted it into gear and the rear wheels started spinning even with the clutch depressed. So, I just kept lengthening my clutch adjustment rod (darn near all the way out) until the rear tires no longer spun with the clutch depressed. For all I know the clutch may be full of cobwebs! So, I'll go thru all that stuff again before I try to get back out on the road. I figure I'll be finding surprises for a while everytime I drive it. My absolute deadline for having car at the racetrack is May 5th for 2-days of SCCA autocrossing in Little Rock just before my best friend's son goes off to West Point. Perhaps, I will run into the legendary Terry Oxendale (Blue Oval Z) there. I still have to do my R200 LSD swap, alignment and exhaust, probably in that order.

 

Anybody can call me with questions (256-366-4685) when they do their swap. I was so bad about double purchasing parts-it would be a joy to help somebody thru this swap, although it seems there are so many different ways to skin a cat.

 

Does this forum ever host national or regional get-togethers? I'd love to be able to thank so many of you personally.

Edited by RebekahsZ
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Brake dragging fixed. Clutch adjusted-well, sort of. I still don't like it, but it neither slips nor fails to release like it did yesterday. Drove it to parts store tonight to return excess trans fluid. Gonna try to limp it 3 miles to work in the morning. No hood, no mufflers, no horn, no wipers, no heater-should be fun. Do you still get one call from jail?

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Congrats Keith! Everything I'm reading is amazing news! I can't believe you got it to fire after 2 clicks on the starter! Honestly, actually I can believe it because of how amazingly thorough you've been during the entire build process. Here's hoping you get all the cobwebs knocked out in a hurry, as racing season is upon us! I finally got my much less ambitious 10.1:1 comp E88+flattop F54 rebuilt and dialed in, just in time for the first Atlanta region event next weekend. It runs like an absolute demon compared to the 200+k mile tired old 8.5:1 comp L28 that was in there, but I'm sure absolutely half the absurd power that you're producing now. I genuinely can't wait to hear about how that setup performs for you. I'll be following this thread closely -- depending on the time I may try to make it out for one of your region events just so I can see her in action!

 

PS -- Watch what you ask for, as you may just get it... my long-term plans include your exact swap in my car, so don't be shocked in a year from now when your phone starts ringing off the hook. :-)

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Major setback with fuel leak at fuel tank access panel that I had welded in. The welding must have warped the panel because the o-ring doesn't seal and gas was pouring everywhere. Tank is out. Bought nitrile rubber gasket material today, will have all the paint blasted off access cover lid tomorrow and will try to re-seal tank and have car running by the end of next weekend. Took a break this weekend for grandmother's funeral in Ohio. Just emailed Burns stainless for estimate on 2-into one merge collector. Will call Rocklanddriveline.com for Z31 CV axle boot kits tomorrow. Waiting for JMortensen Z31 to 280z stub axle companion flanges to be finished. Minor setback with drifting handbrake. I think it is because I used a different master cylinder push rod with a larger "nubby" on the end that is keeping the piston from returning to the full off position, so fluid pressure never vents back to reservoir. Gotta dig around and find the proper pushrod in my pile of parts that I didn't think I need anymore.

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Fuel tank no longer leaks, but now I seem to have a clogged fuel filter. I'm betting it is the sealer that I tried so hard to research and select. Probably didn't even need it with the thicker o-ring. Feeling pretty lousy. Will play at trouble shooting, looking at fuel filters etc, but I'm probably dropping the tank AGAIN next weekend to clean it all out and try it again.

 

Drifting brake seems to be fixed, so it wasn't a wasted weekend.

 

Met a couple of 240sx hybrid guys-they were a big help, and it was great to have kindred spirits in the shop.

 

Posting pictures of solution to drifting brake issue. The silver push-rod is the rod that was made for the Willwood master cyl. The gold one is the push rod that has the proper length and thread pitch for the e-brake handle clevis. As you can see, the contact "bump" on the end of the rod is totally different. I used a dremel tool and several different hand files to make them look essentially the same. Now my ebrake master cylinder works as it should.

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Edited by RebekahsZ
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Needed a break to cool off from frustation with fuel tank. So, I got on the internet and ordered $1300 worth of parts from Summitt, Jegs, Speedway and Raptor. Parts include: Raptor LS-style shift light, 6-speed shifter knob, (2) Corvette FPRs, MSD electronics insulators, stick-on weights for rear drag rims, Longaker Digital camber gauge, Holley plastic big-block style coil covers (looks like both the Edelbrock coil covers and Billet Specialties coil covers are only compatible with LS1 coils), 1" tilton clutch master cylinder (on back order), hydraulic pressure gauge (to help me adjust clutch), dummie 4" velocity stacks, QTP oval electric exhaust cutouts, Burns stainless 2-1 merge collector, Rockforddriveline Z31 CV boot kits.

 

Picked up a fuel tank syphon kit (tired of drinking 93-octane) to start RE-draining fuel tank in order to drop it, clean off any sealer, replace fuel filters and try it again.

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Yeah, cheese-I read your posts while searching for a solution. Seemed like all your problems went away by upgrading to a bigger master cyl. Somehow, mnoel has only a 3/4" clutch master and has no trouble. I had the car on jackstands looking for leaks and went ahead and shifted it into gear and the rear wheels started spinning even with the clutch depressed. So, I just kept lengthening my clutch adjustment rod (darn near all the way out) until the rear tires no longer spun with the clutch depressed. For all I know the clutch may be full of cobwebs! So, I'll go thru all that stuff again before I try to get back out on the road. I figure I'll be finding surprises for a while everytime I drive it. My absolute deadline for having car at the racetrack is May 5th for 2-days of SCCA autocrossing in Little Rock just before my best friend's son goes off to West Point. Perhaps, I will run into the legendary Terry Oxendale (Blue Oval Z) there. I still have to do my R200 LSD swap, alignment and exhaust, probably in that order.

 

Anybody can call me with questions (256-366-4685) when they do their swap. I was so bad about double purchasing parts-it would be a joy to help somebody thru this swap, although it seems there are so many different ways to skin a cat.

 

Does this forum ever host national or regional get-togethers? I'd love to be able to thank so many of you personally.

 

I'm right in the middle of my swap and I may have to take you up on your offer to call. Thanks for posting so much in your build thread. It's helped a lot.

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Worked most of the day re-cleaning out the fuel tank. Made the mistake of cleaning my o-ring with brake cleaner, which made it nice and clean, but it then swelled up an became spongey. Gotta wait 'till Monday to get to O-ring shop and get a new one, but I'll be all ready to go, so another weekend burned without accomplishing much. It was sand plugging my fuel screen that sidelined the car and has me all held up. It is taking a while to get all the sand out of the fuel tank that was cut apart and sandblasted. My pre-filter before the fuel pump was totally full of sand. I'd have believed that sand would stay on the bottom of the tank, but it made its way into the filter. I may have to clean that screen again, but I can do that with the tank in the car. I went ahead and installed a new Corvette FPR while I had it apart. Do not clean nitrile o-rings with anything but fuel. Do not use Aviation Type 3 sealer around fuel. Do not sandblast your fuel tanks. Do not fail to install a screen-type fuel filter before your fuel pump. Do as I say, not as I do.

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Since I can't go drive car around yet, I piddled with some bling for the motor. Installed Holley brand coil covers. I looked at Billet Specialties (the sweetest) and Edelbrock brands, but found that they require LS1 style coils. As best as I could tell, the Holleys were the only ones that fit LS2 coils and didn't require a ton of work moving the coils around. All was really easy, except for the passenger side. For LS2, the kit recommends installing the cover over the top of the fill port in the valve cover. To do that you have to remove the plastic oil fill tube. After no replies on a little thread I started, I went to LS1tech.com and found out that there is NO good way to remove the oil fill plug on a LS motor. Basically you have to destroy it to some extent. Remove the valve cover (so easy due to awesome GM engineering), cut a notch in the fill tube so that you can release the little spring-y clippy doohickie and out it comes. You have to remove the valve cover to keep plastic chips from getting into valvetrain. Inspect valvetrain-these motors are so AWESOME!! Put the old fill tube cap directly onto the valve cover. Reinstall valve cover, torque to 106 inch-lb and snap on coil cover. You have to spend a little time finessing coil and injector wiring and injector rotation, but that only took a second. I did no trimming. It is that easy. Will likely have to do some trimming when I wire 2-step rev limiter, that wiring is kind of bulky. Hope to decorate coil covers in future with some finned aluminum plating-may destroy some Edelbrock valve covers to get the Edelbrock symbol and fins off of some small block valve covers.

 

Found that my driver side rear tire rubs a bit. I looked at the fender edge and I can see a sharp spot where quarter panel was repaired. Will try grinding that off tomorrow. Don't want to chew up my new tires. Had been thinking of ordering some 15X8 RBRs for my autocross tires. Looks like I will be sticking to 15X7s.

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I think I used the same pre-filter you are using. I had nothing but fuel starvation problems. I removed the filter and it has been fine for 500 miles. I think that the element is too small, lacking enough area. My filter came with a 40 micron screen.

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Hmmmmm (sad face). Thanks. I'll toss that around if I continue to have trouble. I'm glad I had it this time, I wonder how the pump would have tolerated that much sand? With the welded metal Corvetter FPR, there is no way to know how much crappe is in it... Could you send me a link or picture or something of the filter you switched to?

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Hmmmmm (sad face). Thanks. I'll toss that around if I continue to have trouble. I'm glad I had it this time, I wonder how the pump would have tolerated that much sand? With the welded metal Corvetter FPR, there is no way to know how much crappe is in it... Could you send me a link or picture or something of the filter you switched to?

I haven't purchased on yet. I have 500 miles without any pre-filter. I believe I read that the pump will handle up to 100 microns.

I would think any filter, in that range, with sufficient capacity would be ok. This is the filter I was using http://www.summitracing.com/parts/SUM-230101/

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Having battled a dirty fuel tank for about 20 years, I like it that the filter filters well. I'm not going to eliminate it. I'll keep cleaning it for a while and if the problem persists, I'll go to a filter with a larger screen or perhaps something with a large surface area fluted filter screen or paper element, but equally as fine filtration. A larger screen would allow more sand to build up inside the filter housing before car stops running, but would still keep the sand out of the pump, regulator, lines, rail, injectors, cylinders, bearings, etc. So far, everything downstream of the screen seems to be clean. At least I can go to one place to clean it up as opposed to having to pull and clean all the injectors, one by one.

Edited by RebekahsZ
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Tank back in; car running well. Rear disc brakes dragging (still)-see Brakes forum for request for help. Gotta hook up tach, shift light and speedo this week. Drove it moderately hard tonight on test drives X3. I think I hit the rev limiter twice, hopefully it isn't still fuel starvation. Don't have a clue as to what rpm the LS2 is limited too, anybody? If anybody has a suggestion for a fuel pressure valve in the cockpit that is compatible with LS2, I'd sure appreciate it. Maybe it was the rev limiter. Don't have a tach and this thing really sounds different than the old L24-things (like rpms) happen a LOT faster. Gave car it's 6-month car wash.

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I'm pretty sure the stock limiter is at 6600. My tuner raised it to 6800. I hit it a lot when I first started getting on it. It comes on really fast. First run at the track I hit it in first, second and third. It is also very abrupt. Scared me at first. Now I never hit it. Getting your tach hooked up should help.

Keep having fun,

Mike

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