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**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:03 AM

Fun with the 454

Pulled the driver's head off last night. Second verse same as the first. Bores look great, have to clean them a bit, oil them down and put plastic over them like I did the passenger's side. Still hoping the bottom end looks like the cylinders do.

Also, I visited my parents over the weekend and picked up the first tool I ever made. Been a decade since I made it with my dad, but he still had it in his garage. It's a transmission support tool. Bolts to the bellhousing and rests against the frame. Works perfect. So now when I pull the 454 out, I can move the car around as I please without having to worry about support the trans. This is very important to me since I have a tiny garage. I will show it in action when I pull the motor.

Here's how she looks now. I'm going to pull the water pump and radiator before I yank out the 454 shortblock.

70 splitbumper came over today and helped me pull the 454. I got two really good action shots of him pulling the motor out...and when I plugged my SD card into the computer's reader...it died. Should have used the friggin USB cable. I went back out to the garage and snapped a couple of pictures.

Here it is on the engine stand before I oiled it down and plastic wrapped it.

Believe it or not, after sitting with 16 quarts of water and 12 quarts of watery 'oil' in the crankcase...the bottom end looks like this:

Looks brand new. Who would have thought. I will probably pull a main cap and a rod cap to see what the bearing look like, but I'm sure they will be fine as it was never run with the water in the crankcase.

Here's a closer look.

The transmission support tool I showed you earlier in action.

And the empty engine bay:

Near future plan is to strip out most of the crap from the engine bay, clean it up and paint it. Swap on the ported heads to the 6.0L and install the camshaft. Then it will be close to the time I will be installing the new motor.

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:05 AM

LQ4 tear down and Christmas comes early

A few weekends ago I organzied my garage (this was brought on by a generous gift of a new craftsman compressor by my father....funny things happen when you ask to borrow the old man's tools, sometimes he just gives me a new one so his doesn't go permanently missing). While I was at it, I wrapped the 454 in plastic and put it in the corner. No one seems to want it, even for $500!

Got the LQ4 on the engine stand and started taking it apart starting with all of the EFI intake junk, the coil packs (to be reused), and valve covers. Here's a pick I like of the rockers after I got the cover removed. Not sure how much I like the gold tint to everything.

Here is a passenger side head after removal (for sale!)

Looks like the rear cylinder wasn't too happy!

Driver's side head (for sale!)

Everything looks peachy.

Passenger's side cylinders

Oh, the carbon! This will be fun to clean.

Driver's side cylinders

Second verse, same as the first.

After much tinkering and thinkering, I came up with a plan. Carb cleaner. I rotated the engine so that one set of cylinders we perpendicular to the ground and filled each cylinder with about 2" of carb cleaner. This server two functions, one to loosen up the carbon and two, to check ring seal(already did a leak-down test and everything looked good). Came back four hours later, still had a considerable ammount of cleaner in the cylinders. Grabbed some shop towels and wiped off the cylinders. Viola...something even a wire brush couldnt remove just wiped right off! I then cleaned the gasket surface with scotchbrite, brake cleaned everything, then oiled down the cylinders and wiped them out a few times while I turned to engine over to complete the cleaning process.

Looks pretty:

Ready for heads now...but only after I finish taking to oil pan off (throwing away for a CTS-V pan) and installing the ARP rod bolts and new camshaft. Probably throw on a new ported oil pump while I'm at it.

Here's the mess as it stands now and all of the brave blue shop towels that gave their lives so that this LQ4 may live.

This is what I found when I woke up this morning:

The parts fairy had visited me in the night!

My ham of a fist agrees, this is good.

Like the kids from a Christmas Story, I tear into the boxes:

Love it, big smile.

What is it that put a big goofy smile on my face?

THIS

SLP, ARP, Fel-Pro, Edelbrock, Trick-flow, Hughes, Summit. The gangs all here.

Oh and a bonus from the fine folks at the Summit Racing warehouse.

**SuperBuickGuy** · June 21, 2011, 11:05 AM

fun stuff, you have 2 days to get it running before winter rains return

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:06 AM

Christmas continues

SWEET!

ARP rod, intake, balancer bolts and head studs

MSD wires

Edelbrock mount adaptors

Surprisingly poor quality in the finish. Lots of burs and sharp edges. I will have to clean them up before I install them.

See.

Hughes LS1 flexplate for TH350/400, 700r4 transmissions.

Billet Double roller timing gears and chain

SLP ported oil pump. Impulse buy, could have just gotten a cheap stocker and ported it myself.

Interesting note on the SLP oil pump, it comes with another pressure relief spring to up the oil pressure if needed and a new cap and o-rings too.

K&N Extreme Flow filter...

Something I should have known better, the K&N comes with the required carb stud and hardware...bought some cheapo Summit stuff too. Oh well.

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:08 AM

Problems in Whoville: Summit suggests wrong bolts

On top, the bolt supplied by Edelbrock for the intake. Below, the bolt recommended by summit, ARP 430-2001. Picked them to bling up the intake a bit....they are all WAY too long. What am I supposed to do with them? Looks like Summit gets a call tomorrow.

Here it is, plane as day on the Summit website, they are recommending you use bolts that won't work...

Did some digging, and low and behold, I need 6mm x 1.0, 50mm long bolts instead of 113mm long. Here are some in 12-point. Someone please double check and tell me if this is the part I really needed in the first place.

ARP 770-1007 ARP Stainless Steel Bolts | Summit Racing

http://www.summitracing.com/parts/ARP-770-1007/

Free Shipping - ARP Stainless Steel Bolts with qualifying orders of $99. Shop Bolts and Screws at Summit Racing.

Also found this AWESOME source of information on misc bolts and parts for GENIII engines.

Error | Keep&Share

http://www.keepandshare.com/doc/view.php?id=837831&da=y

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:11 AM

LQ4 bottom-end and rod bolts replacement

Got the oil pan off today and took a look at the bottom end. As soon as I get myself a torque wrench with the proper range I will install the ARP rod bolts and do a step by step.

I cleaned everything off and then oiled everything down. No discoloration, just general varnish and carbon build up on everything. Previous owner definately didn't change their oil too often. Thank god it looks like they never ran it low.

Now, some ARP rod bolts!

First thing's first, remove the existing rod bolt (only ONE at a time, very important!) using a long handled ratchet and a 11mm socket. After a good push, the torque with break and the bolt will come out in about 4-5 turns.

But, the bolt will not come out all of the way. I used a pair of vise-grips and yanked a few times until the ferrel loosened and the bolts came out with it.

Apply plenty of ARP lube (provided in the kit) to the bolt, especially under the head.

Then torque to 40lb-ft per ARP's instructions using a 10mm socket and your favorite trusty torque wrench.

Note: the instructions in the kit are hidden under the complimentary packet of lube. The instructions say you need to resize the rods, but I discovered these are the same instruction sheets provided in the SBC kits. You do not have to resize rods in GenIII motors when upgrading to ARP bolts.

So rinse, lather, repeat until all of the bolts are done. Then it's a good idea to go around a few more times, loosen each bolt one at a time and re-torque them. The debate rages on if you need to retorque or not, but I think it's a good idea and can't hurt anything.

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:15 AM

SLP ported oil pump and double roller chain and cam install

After working a 10-hour Sunday shift for the Boeing co and having my obligatory valentine's bedroom time with my wife, I escaped to one of my two man-caves. (the other is my office where I'm at right now).

After finding a three-jaw puller and getting the balancer/crankshaft pulley off, I was finally able to get started.

Installed the camshaft (should have gotten a picture of it sitting next to the stock truck cam....what a difference!) and then I installed the SLP double roller timing set. That was a breeze. It's a really nice piece too.

Check out the dot to dot on my install....anyone think I screwed it up? I think I'm right on.

Test fit the ported SLP pump without the shims just to see.

The chain does get REALLY close to the pump, but doesn't quite touch. I can see that in operation it probably would, hence the shims that were included with the pump.

Ran out of time and didn't have any sealant for the shims....so that will probably be that for the week. If I'm feeling up to it, I might even install my ARP headstuds and the ported heads. But that's only if I find a valve spring compressor in time. Might just have to go buy one....

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:17 AM

Timing cover mods

First thing I wanted to say was that after a lot of research I found that this combo, the SLP double roller and SLP ported oil pump DOES NOT need to use the spacers. One side of the pump was REALLY close to the chain, so I gave it a little extra room with the grinder. I decided to make it fit with the shims in place as a how-to.

With the shim in place on the oil pump, this is what happened to the timing cover. Hard riding condition on the left side, minor one on the lower right.

I applied assembly grease to all the areas I suspect might ride or come close to the cover.

The only thing on this side that smashed flat was the area on the strengthening rib directly below the area SLP already clearanced. It even left a grease mark behind from the cover.

Another area that rode was near the pick-up tube boss. You can see the black grease that was left behind.

You can see on the cover the areas that were close to touching and those that hit solid. The solid hits not only left grease behind, but scratched off the coating of oil.

I then ground these areas(note: I did not have the proper tool for this job, a carbide bit would have saved me a LOT of time):

After a very through cleaning (as if rinse, wipe, rinse, wipe, rinse, wipe over and over), I was able to get the cover down without riding anything at all.

Side note: When I decided to run the pump without the shims, the passenger side of the pump was incredibly close to touching and likely would rub on the pump at operating temp and RPM. I snugged the pump in place, put grease on the timing chain and turned the motor over by hand multiple times. After removing the pump I could see a very faint outline where the chain was getting too close, so I clearenced these areas as little as possible for just a bit more room. There were, of course, no issues at all with the cover fitting in the configuration.

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:19 AM

Bottom end buttoned up, shortblock becomes longblock, and a little mock-up

First off I want to say sorry for the lack of pictures in this update. I had a bad day and went to the garage to work it out. I didn't stop to take many pictures. It did however make me mock everything up to give me a little push to keep going.

Got the windage tray and pick-up tube installed. Make sure you lube the o-ring with the same oil you will be running in the engine. It also helps to install the tube, it should slide right in.

Since these are new untested parts, I decided to check the clearance between the oil pan and pick-up. Didn't get any pictures of that, but the result was good.

Curious thing happened when I went to install the oil-pan. One of the holes in the pan didn't have a corresponding hole in the block! I took the pan off to double check to see if it was a misplaced hole, but no....there wasn't a hole in the block anywhere near that spot!

Interesting note: I used a straight edge to align the oil pan to the back of the block, then something struck me. Is that step truely necessary for engines being bolted to TH400/350/700r4's? The bellhousing bolt holes that are on the pan dont have corresponding structure on my 700r4 to attach to. Or am I just being crazy?

Moving on, I got the front cover installed then moved on to the ARP studs. No pictures of that, but I will take some when I take the mock-up apart to finish the heads.

So, I put the dowls in the block, slid the heads onto the studs, got the valve covers and coil packs sitting on top of them. Then I put the Vic Jr. on, put the carb that needs to be rebuilt on top of that and test fit the K&N. I thought it would also be neat to see the headers hanging there, so I added those too. These pictures will serve as inspiration to keep me going these next few months.

I plan on making a custom valley cover to delete the knock sensor holes and will paint it the same color as the block. Debating on if I should spray in gloss black or chevy orange. Also thinking about painting the valve covers to match as well. Need to make that decision soon, but first I have to get a valve spring compressor to finish the heads and put the long block together. Those pictures look good, but theres a ton left to do!

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:20 AM

ORANGE! And a carb exploded.

Been a while since I've updated, but I've had a huge curveball in my life. When the time is right I will tell that story, but for now, on with the show.

Between extended periods of time away from home, I've managed to clean, prep, mask, prime and paint both the engine block and the valve covers. I used a ceramic high temp primer and chevy orange rattle can paint. Turned out nice for the $20 I spent on materials.

Just a bit of overspray to clean off the front cover.

Valve covers primed.

Coated in Chevy Orange a few times.

With the valve covers loose installed.

With the coil packs.

Over a few nights I managed to take apart my carb, clean it and replace every part that is made out of rubber. I deleted the choke mechanicals and plugged the hole for the choke rod. I've cut the choke horn away before on previous builds, but I think I will just leave it for now. Turns out the carb is a 4780-5 800cfm double pumper and not an 850 as I was led to believe. Oh well, still plenty for what I'm doing. While I was at it I found that it had factory jets and a 6.5 power valve. I installed a 5.5 for now and will wait to change out the jets when it's time to tune it.

Pile of parts.

Ended up with this.

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:22 AM

A custom tool and a balancer installed!

I know this is a big jump forward in my install, but between a new baby, my wife almost dying and having to work a ton to make up for lost money...I didn't document anything I've done lately.

I installed the heads on the ARP head studs, installed the valvetrain, and got stuck at installing the harmonic balancer. I didn't have a tool to install it, and none of my local buddies had one. The price to buy one for just a one time use was NOT to my liking. So, I made my own very very simple tool. Cost me $8.45 in materials and $8.99 for a hacksaw (needed one anyway).

Here's the recipe:

1 M16 threaded rod with 2mm thread pitch. Just take your old crank bolt with you.
2" stack of washers
1 large diameter thick fender washer (the washer that comes with the ARP bolt is perfect of course)
1 nut
1 deep socket (mine was 24mm)

This is the first try...it was a bit too short.

Here's the second one I made, a few inches longer. Note the ARP washer on it.

Stack the washers on the ARP washer, toss on the nut and crank away!

Viola! Crankshaft harmonic balancer is installed!

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:23 AM

Intake, motor mounts, valley cover mod and a little planning...

Intake manifold and water pump installed.

Went the cheap route and kept the stock top cover and reused the wiring grommet. I just filled the hole for the wire with ultra black, put a nice bead of more ultra black on the sealing surface and squeezed it down. I should work that way for a while. Hardly noticeable, I think.

Here's the fit check with the Hughes flexplate. Holes line up perfectly with the ATI torque converter for my 700r4.

PROCESS CHECK!

I found the directions for the Edelbrock motor mount adaptor plates to be ambiguous. I THINK this is the direction they are supposed to be installed.

And with the old energy suspension mounts attached.

One of the last big projects: I need to create a bracket to mount my old alternator. I have already added the pulley I need and have a general idea of where it will go.

I think I will use one hole common to the cylinder head, run a tie-rod to another hole...not sure about a third mount. Maybe a plate the takes up three holes on the head and attaches to at least two points on the alternator.

And one thing that needs to be done in the engine bay before the motor goes in, aside from a general cleaning and re-paint. This old power steering box has got to go. I have a manual box I'm swapping in since I want to run only a water pump and alternator.

Still need to adjust (final torque) the valves...maybe tomorrow.

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:25 AM

Making the car warm, the steering harder, and seeing Jesus.

New update. Not very glorious stuff, but interesting none-the-less.

When I was a student in good weather California, my windows started fogging when I tried to de-fog them. The air smelled sweet and dirty. Heater core was leaking! I did what anyone else going to school in a good climate would do. I bypassed the heater core by cutting the heater hose and looping it back into the water pump. Now, years later, is the time to replace this $38 piece of hardware.

It sucked.

This is what it looked like after I yanked the fan/cover assembly, loosened the box inside the passenger footwell and pried the hell to get the old heater core out.

Lots of beautiful rust.

This has got to be a 30+ year old heater core. I think I see Jesus.

Here's the heater cover/fan assembly. Dirty, moldy and a bit of rust.

This foam-rubber gasket is VERY hard to find. Don't lose it. Here it is installed on my new heater core.

Cleaned up the heater box/fan assembly.

Painted and cleaned the inner heater box.

Installing the new heater core is difficult. Especially when I'm trying to take a picture. Can you tell I'm left handed? I seem to be using my left hand in all of my shots.

And installed with the retaining clip in place. Note that the metal the retaining clip is on is a bit bent. I had to fix that later.

Not too happy with the seal job, might go back and re-seal the heater box to the firewall. The excess sealant will be scrapped off and cleaned when I prep the engine bay for paint.

After removing my old power steering box, I test fit and function tested my new manual steering box. Surprisingly easy to turn the steering wheel now!

Another angle. All bolts still loose and no nut holding the pitman arm to the steering box.

Another piece for the scrap pile!

Last thing I have to do before I install the LQ4 is to clean and paint the engine compartment. Getting really close now!

**1970camaroRS** · June 21, 2011, 11:27 AM

A gen 1 alternator on MY gen III motor?

Here's one heck of an update. Not exactly done with this project yet, but the mock-up picture was too good not to share.

Problem: No alternator on my LSx motor.

Have: Alternator from my BBC and the bracket that went with it.

Solution: Adapt my junk to run with the truck pulley, waterpump and tensioner.

Here's a reference picture of the head

Basic location and spacing I had in mind.

After making some measurements (including the difference in the depth of my alternator and the waterpump pulley), I found I needed a 1-1/4" plate and I would have to pick-up a hole on the cylinder head with the spacer plate.

Got this big hunk-o-aluminum from Midwest Steel Supply. It's 1-1/4" thick, 6"x8" T6 aluminum and with shipping was surprisingly cheap. I could have ordered a smaller size, but I wanted extra just in case.

Sorry if these pictures are excessive, but I like them. I layed out the pattern using my existing bracket, made some reference marks for the holes (do not drill these) and marked the inside area where I want the other cylinder head hole to end up.

I managed to find a bandsaw somewhere and cut out the plate. You can hacksaw or jigsaw this, but I wouldn't recommend it.

After clamping up the BBC bracket to the spacer plate to use as a drill guide...

...I used a 'gunbarrel' drill bit and backdrilled the holes.

After measuring out and drilling the third hole, I mocked the spacer and bracket up to the head.

Used some random fasteners and a few drill bits and mocked everything up. I had a long steel spacer tube from another project that I cut down to 1-1/4" to match the spacer and used it on the tie-rod common-to the cylinder head.

Looks like everything lines up perfectly!

Now I need to counter-bore the backside of the outermost hole so I can install that bolt. It interferes with the cylinder head. Then I will de-chrome everything chrome and probably paint the alternator, bracket and spacer an aluminum color so it all looks uniform. And, I need to find a belt...

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Operation Budget LQ4 (version two)

Operation Budget LQ4 (version two)

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