On the 'mildly' Cheap SS Monte Carlo chasing a 9.0____(anything less than 9.1)

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Goat Herder
Dec 1, 2014
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I want to start out saying that I've always wanted a fast car and never owned one. I build my son's stuff, but I never race it - he does :( lol.

I was thinking of finding a G wagon, but was not able to find a Cutlass Cruiser (car of choice) for over a year. A good friend's ex-girlfriend had an 84 Monte SS that was given/family hand down that she intended to have my friend get going for her. But when their relationship ended, so did the aspirations of the SS. In a round about way she, and her family, gave me the car on the condition that I didn't scrap it (they don't know me that well - I don't junk anything). So despite that I'm not a real Monte lover, I figured it would work and be fun.

It is low mileage car, but it sat in the stones/dirt for almost 15 years and the frame took the brunt of that abuse. So a frame swap was 1st item on the agenda. From there I decided to build a turbo, of course, junkyard LS program on the cheapest possible budget with the goal of 9's, Drag Week and hopefully for less than $7K. I hunted for a Gen 4 (big rod) 5.3, but as unable to find one timely, so I picked up a $225 4.8. And I figured that if I can make 600whp then I should be able to get a stock suspension G into the 9's.

Follow along if you want to see if I can do it, and be advised, I'm not scared to fail, but will have fun doing it :)
 
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Goat Herder
Dec 1, 2014
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Upstate NY
Here are some pics of the car as I got it - of course front clip missing and a bunch disassembled. The young man is a friend of mine and my son's who was very happy to find the original bill of ale.
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Goat Herder
Dec 1, 2014
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Upstate NY
I didn't want to be kicked out of every track that I go to, so I bought a 10 point cage from from S&W (surprisingly cheap) and installed it of course with no knowledge of how the pro's do it. But I thought I could figure it out. Presently, it's in with the exception of the door bars and dash bar. The reason they aren't in yet is I want to get the car running with the dash somewhat functional and still be able to get it wired and driveable. They will be added later. The dash bar will rewire the windshield to removed to get it in, but .... that's the way it goes :).
 

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Goat Herder
Dec 1, 2014
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You done yet? 🤪

Close, but the Corona and social distancing (that my wife feels I need ti adhere to) have slowed down the progress over the last couple of weeks.
 
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Goat Herder
Dec 1, 2014
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Upstate NY
I have to add that Fleming directed me to the hockey puck body mount program. They work surprisingly well. The car that I bought for the frame had a new set of Energy Suspension body mounts - mostly. I was missing the rear 4 and the front two, so I have hockey pucks in those locations. And they worked great - thank Mr 442.

The build consists of the 4.8 and a 4L80 that I had kicking around in the garage, and a Holley Terminator Max X. I have to say that I am a humongous MegaSquirt fan (3 in the driveway), but due to the budget orientation of this build, the Holley is cheaper if you have an electronic transmission. The Terminator Max X was as close to plug-n-play as could be expected - $1150 on ebay. If I had went with a Turbo 400 or Powerglide, then the MS would've definitely been the EMS of choice, but....I'm learning to live, and love, the Holley as much as I like the MegaSquirt.

I chose a genuine Borg S475 for the turbo for the only reasons of that it's cheap and it will easily handle 700+ whp. The knockoff of the S475 and S480's are more than the real deal S475 Borg I found on Amazon ????? Somewhat puzzling, but whatever. I was going to run without an intercooler, but a friend convinced to not try it. I am going to run E85 only, but I'm sure the intercooler will be great for driving. And the Monte front clip is built for an intercooler, despite GM had no idea of what they built in 1984 :)
 

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Goat Herder
Dec 1, 2014
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Here was the initial startup a couple of weeks ago.


The guy in the driver seat is the guy with the former girlfriend/local dyno owner and operator, and of course friend -Tom. He got the Holley running in minutes - it would've taken me hours to get through the manual, but it took him minutes to get it running and idling smoothly (he's a wizard lol.)
 
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Goat Herder
Dec 1, 2014
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Upstate NY
Here's a vid from the following weekend (with me at the helm :):) )


We installed the spare rear -
7 5/8" Torsen wit h S10 2wd axles.


I still have to get a converter and figure out the cheapest possible rear end setup. I believe the rear will be an Exploder 8.8 that we cut down, but the converter might put me over 7K because I haven't found a sub $700 converter option for a 4L80 that will take 700whp (800 crank HP).
 
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Goat Herder
Dec 1, 2014
5,659
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Upstate NY
I had thought that I would or should start a build thread, but after some consideration I figured this section needed some liveliness and I'm not really building anything other than a car that will run 145+ in the 1/4 - at least I hope.

I'll be driving it on the street this weekend and trying t get the transmission tuning figured out.

Wish me luck.
 
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