BUILD THREAD The Mullet Maurader, The Epic of the LS swapped Buick
- Thread starter Northernregal
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Merry Christmas update!
FedEx man showed up early and had the parts to finish the wilwood brakes, I bent a hub seal 😠, so very gingerly I installed the hub seal and finished off the front brakes.
Got back under the rear and bolted down the rear end, for keeps this time. Just need to bolt up the rear sway bar and finish the front sway bar when the correct end links show up.
So I tackled the headers. I'm going to do a more detailed write up in the Holley ls swap thread I started but this will give you the jist of it.
I spent a lot of time doing this.
Clearance for the 1 7/8" headers is there but it's kinda like Tetris. Got to trim the 4L80e ears down, and then again, and just a 1/8th more, no more like 3/16, no wait you didn't get it squared at the bottom, ok I swear just one more 1/8th....
Driver side goes in nice from the bottom minor trimming but remove any oil pressure sensor or fittings above the oil filter to make life easier.
But now, I get to feast on this view....
Looks like win to me. 😀
FedEx man showed up early and had the parts to finish the wilwood brakes, I bent a hub seal 😠, so very gingerly I installed the hub seal and finished off the front brakes.
Got back under the rear and bolted down the rear end, for keeps this time. Just need to bolt up the rear sway bar and finish the front sway bar when the correct end links show up.
So I tackled the headers. I'm going to do a more detailed write up in the Holley ls swap thread I started but this will give you the jist of it.
I spent a lot of time doing this.
Clearance for the 1 7/8" headers is there but it's kinda like Tetris. Got to trim the 4L80e ears down, and then again, and just a 1/8th more, no more like 3/16, no wait you didn't get it squared at the bottom, ok I swear just one more 1/8th....
Driver side goes in nice from the bottom minor trimming but remove any oil pressure sensor or fittings above the oil filter to make life easier.
But now, I get to feast on this view....
Looks like win to me. 😀
So it's a race you want? So be it!
Canadians are quite the motivated people... 😉
Canadians are quite the motivated people... 😉
I was gonna say you and I were thrashing pretty hard this week. I have stupid family stuff tomorrow and boxing Day or else it would be on! 😉😎. I'm on pace to fire up by New year's.
Seriously, right? I'll be out of the garage from now until the 29th... then I have about 9 days left to wrench before I return to work.
I'm off until January 3rd. Then it's gonna be like 15 total days off until April. It needs to be at least running and in body work by New year's. Even if everything isn't perfect I need to be driving by my birthday mid May. The crap tires I got with the car wont burn themselves apart....
Hey you folks gotta stay warm some how?
The polar vortex for central US has been pushed out into early Jan now. No family gatherings this year, I’m working on mine tomorrow “for xmas”. May just get my 5000W heater hooked up and wired though.
But the vortex weakening is still on track overall to be not quite as bad as last year. We'll see though. Stranger things have happened. They kinda saw this coming last year but this year it just happened. Literally and figuratively. And the charts are very similar from last year but there were more temperature pre-spikes than this year.
Weather changes and is usually cyclic. But the "global warming" chanters will blame every little change on global warming. So what if we really only have 2,300 years left on this earth instead of 2,305?
My New Year's resolution is to do my best to save the planet by burning my fossil fuels via internal combustion engines to try and use it all up so the global warming clan doesn't have a collective stroke 500 years from now.
As far as G-body stuff goes, I resolve to officially start the 85 442 frame-off in 2019. I am still finding and appropriating little trinket parts that I don't have, like some GM nuts and bolts, and minor stuff. If I waited until I had everything possible, I'd probably never get started. And you will see the build here. Likely won't be as cool as Hutch's 87 rebuild, but it should be good.
Plus, get motivated to change out the 87 442's power antenna mast and tube assembly. I don't dread the work itself, I'm just skittish about it being a 23K mile car and really don't want to f*ck anything up on it if possible. Not sure how I want to approach it, but it will be a how-to posted here when I do get 'round tuit.
But, I digress. The last picture is just so cool looking with the engine in place and the wildwood brakes on the suspension. Too bad that's going to get covered up. Looks great!!!
Suspension is done, fully bolted in and sway bars are setup, and the UMI front brace is in. Still messing with rear pinion angle a bit as my lower shock mounts on the Quick performance axle are a bit off on the mount angle.
Set the car on the suspension and leveled it from the floor to get the pinion angle set and the angle the shocks mount on is going to destroy the bottom shock mount bushing. Going to have to get some flat iron and fab up some different style mounts for the shocks. They will JUST fit behind the LS1 rear brakes so far. Hoping I don't have to get coilover mounts for the shocks.
Set the car on the suspension and leveled it from the floor to get the pinion angle set and the angle the shocks mount on is going to destroy the bottom shock mount bushing. Going to have to get some flat iron and fab up some different style mounts for the shocks. They will JUST fit behind the LS1 rear brakes so far. Hoping I don't have to get coilover mounts for the shocks.
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