will anyone else jump off the ls wagon with me

[HurstOlds]

Plus: It's cool to be able to say "Yeah, it's got a 455 in it!"

That 'coolness' quickly fades when you have to hit up the gas station all the time, speaking from personal experience. At this point, I would prefer better gas mileage over having a 455. The 455 is great and all, but I would like better than 8 mpg, so I could actually drive my car more.

I've been exploring all options for improving gas mileage. Currently the only one that wins is to not drive my car....

The FAST EZ EFI is like $2,000 to install. The Fast XFI is like $3,000. That's just to help get a few more mpg out of the current setup.

What does an LS swap cost? I'm sure it's a little more than $3,000, but you have to look at the extra gains you see in fuel economy. If you are going to have your car for a long time, you'll recoup the money in gas savings alone.

At this point, it costs me like $100 in gas anytime I want to drive anywhere more than just somewhere close. It cost me like $120 or so just to drive to the BOP wars in Byron this year. I don't see gas prices going substantially down any time soon, so what is there to do?

My only other option is to swap in a 4 speed trans, but one that will hold up to a 455 is not cheap. But, it's cheaper than an LS swap, so maybe I'll go that route.

The favorite thing that I like about my car is that it's a sleeper. Because it's an Olds 455, people don't even know it's not stock. Hell, no one really knows anything about Olds engines outside of the Olds community to notice anything. If I raced for money or something like that, the sleeper thing would perfect. At this point I just want to be able to afford to drive my damn car!

 

[307 Regal]

lol i thought this was like a jack-*ss stunt, like jumping off a ls powered wagon into a bush or some thing... :lol: i dont have any ls experiences so ill leave my statement as is...

OMG thats halarious


Sounds like fun though. Who's got the wagon :?:

:lol:

 

[cut123]

lol i thought this was like a jack-*ss stunt, like jumping off a ls powered wagon into a bush or some thing... :lol: i dont have any ls experiences so ill leave my statement as is...

as the OP i feel its my resposibility to build an ls powered wagon and jump off now

 

[DoubleV]

I nominate nullshine for 'blowhard of the year'.

 

[dave1978]

I like carbs and old school stuff, engines of the proper manufacture etc. But I'd rather see people keeping these cars around with other engines than not. My thinking is to compare this to old hot rods from the 30's and 40's they came with flat head 4's straight 6's etc. These engines were crap for performance so people put in small block's or what ever they may like. People don't complain about this as much. Lets face it most of the stuff that came in these G body cars was crap as far as performance goes.I'd rather see an Oldsmobile 350 in a Cutlass ,but I wouldn't put another 260 back in if I had a 350 small block laying around in good running condition. Just my opinion.

 

[G-Body_Vet]

I'm with Hurst Olds on this one. I like my 455 build, but an OD trans is pretty much going to be a must if I want to get half decent gas mileage. I'd like to do the EZ-EFI too, but the Q-jet will have to suffice for now.

I eventually want to do a 5.3 swap just because I haven't done one yet. A low mileage 5.3 is much cheaper than a quality rebuild on anything. Even a 4.8 is light years ahead of anything installed in a g-body and nobody wants them, which translates to dirt cheap!

I'd like to do a nice reliable cruiser with one, something like a 4 door Regal/Century with Buick mags. Clean, classy and functional.

 

[dogsht]

Hurst Olds Bob, Your mileage does not have to be thaT bad. See my post in jump off the ls bandwagon thread. 200-4R, working lockup converter, good compression moderate cam, smaller primarys in your Q-jet. No reason you cannot get at least 15 mpg hwy with your car n motor.

 

[HurstOlds]

Do you have any recommendations where to get a good quality built 200-4R? Its either that, or dedicate the car to mainly racing, which Im not as interested in.....

 

[78MC-BBC]

I'm with Hurst Olds on this one. I like my 455 build, but an OD trans is pretty much going to be a must if I want to get half decent gas mileage. I'd like to do the EZ-EFI too, but the Q-jet will have to suffice for now.

I eventually want to do a 5.3 swap just because I haven't done one yet. A low mileage 5.3 is much cheaper than a quality rebuild on anything. Even a 4.8 is light years ahead of anything installed in a g-body and nobody wants them, which translates to dirt cheap!

I'd like to do a nice reliable cruiser with one, something like a 4 door Regal/Century with Buick mags. Clean, classy and functional.

I agree with you on the low mileage 5.3 being cheaper than a quality rebuilt . There are so many 5.3 and 6.0 complete motors around me for $4-600. Hell i am looking into whats needed to swap out the vortec 5.7 and swap in a 5.3 or 6.0 into my 96 Tahoe, so far the biggest hurdle in that swap is the wire harness

 

[85GPLef41]

Well as much as i would love to have a 455 with some type of fuel injection and nicely built up, it wouldn't allow me to plate it or register it according to the damn smog police around here, Hell they even lowered the emissions standards and made it extremely difficult for stock carbed cars... :| i know a few guys who have parked there rides because of missing smog equipment etc etc. I failed emissions testing TWICE with a crate 350 with around 30k miles,new edelbrock 1405 carb i know it wasn't emissions compliant, when i put on a 1406 from my buddys car it failed the carb visual. The tech said it wasn't an original carb. SO long story short i jumped on the LS swap AFTER racing a newer Caddy cts with v6 and he spanked me!! I knew i was never going to be able keep up with the newer rides with my carbed 350 and still try to remain "compliant".