5.3L Vortec Hood Clearance

[Rgpmalibu]

After scouring the internet and many sleepless nights, I got the answer to the question, "will my stock hood close over my alternator and throttle body?" I used all of the Holley LS swap stuff in my '78 Malibu, and that alternator looked really high. I got my wife to help me put on the hood tonight, and it went down easy and closed just fine. It looked like there was about 1.5 to 2 inches of clearance under there. I was thinking I was going to have to buy the Dirty Dingo alternator and power steering relocation bracket, or a cowl hood - either option would be about $350, because with the DD bracket, you have to buy a new power steering pump. Now that the hood is down, I'm wondering how to spend the $350 I just saved. I have some fuzzy dice for the rearview already. Actually two sets - I have a lot of comedian friends. I need gauges. Anybody use the Speedhut gauges?

 

[motorheadmike]

The engine mounts used make all of the difference with fitment of the stock truck accessories.

I have SpeedHut gauges in my wagon and working OEM gauges in my MCSS... link to the build threads are in my signature.

 

[81cutlass]

I used a stock truck pan on my swap in my grand prix at first with home made mounts and had to go to the smaller case alternator and cut the support on the hood for it to clear. I then swapped to a Holley pan and have like a 1.5" gap between the pan and steering parts now so I could lower it more. The pan thickness under the #1/2 cylinders to the ball joints on the tie rods at full lock is what controls overall engine height.

If you want factory style gages in the stock dash you can use a 98 camaro coolant temp sensor and a 99-03 tahoe oil pressure sensor and they will work with all the ralley gages like out of a mcss.

Then you can use that extra $350 on a posi or something else drivetrain related

 

[Rgpmalibu]

I used a stock truck pan on my swap in my grand prix at first with home made mounts and had to go to the smaller case alternator and cut the support on the hood for it to clear. I then swapped to a Holley pan and have like a 1.5" gap between the pan and steering parts now so I could lower it more. The pan thickness under the #1/2 cylinders to the ball joints on the tie rods at full lock is what controls overall engine height.

If you want factory style gages in the stock dash you can use a 98 camaro coolant temp sensor and a 99-03 tahoe oil pressure sensor and they will work with all the ralley gages like out of a mcss.

Then you can use that extra $350 on a posi or something else drivetrain related

I got the posi already when I got the quick performance Ford 9". The trouble I'm having finding gauges is that I have the old sweep style speedo, and places like Dakota don't make inserts for that style.
I tell you, I'm really impressed with Holley 's engineering on these swap parts. I'm no engineer, welder, or fabricator. This stuff made the swap as painless as possible (I intentionally didn't say "easy"!). There were some pains, but I learned some stuff in the odd case that I would want to do it again. With, say, a 2nd gen Camaro....

 

[gearheaddrew]

What do those sweep style gauges look like?

 

[Rgpmalibu]

What do those sweep style gauges look like?

They're the stock gauges that came with the car. Speedo and gas gauge only. I have the gas gauge working, but ththe speedo works off the old cable drive, which I cut out. Thinking of going with a gps speedo with a tachometer, oil pressure, and temperature.

 

[gearheaddrew]

They're the stock gauges that came with the car. Speedo and gas gauge only. I have the gas gauge working, but ththe speedo works off the old cable drive, which I cut out. Thinking of going with a gps speedo with a tachometer, oil pressure, and temperature.

Ah 10-4. Mine is a 78 Classic has the cluster like the Monte so I went with Dakota Digital cluster and their cruise module for my DBW setup.