great work what youre doing mate, certainly has given me alot to think about (drive line wise) for my car, good stuff mate Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Did some more work on the VL the other night. Fitted up the T400 onto the LS block. Clearance around the tunnel needed a few hits with the hammer - but not much at all. Bell housing clearance: Put all the accessories on the front to check clearances. As mentioned before, the accessories look a bit dirty but I will look into cleaning these up or replacing them later. For now - good for fitting and checking. Drivers Side Clearance with the high pressure p/s line in place. Standard 6cyl Throttle Cable on the LS1. Might have to get an LS1 Throttle cable, or have this one shortened. Clearance for the alternator near the rail. Some issues with the starter motor, am trying to scope out at the moment. Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

top build thread buddy once my wagon is finished ill hopefully start my next project which will be an ls1 wagon gonna keep an eye on this thread as inspiration..

ok, so it turns out that even with a T400 I need a starter conversion kit. One will be ordered tomorrow. In the mean time, a few photo's I forgot to put up before. The car was a manual. Now with the Auto Brake Pedal setup in it - back to only 2 pedals! Also picked up these 3 gauges already in a Calais Sunglasses holder. Oil Temp (for gearbox), Oil Pressure, and Fuel Pressure. It may be blue, but i'll put them all into my Tan one so it matches the interior. Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Ok, Updates.... Starter Conversion Kit finally turned up. No pics yet, haven't opened it. The only bit that came was the spacer plate. Rang them up to see where the starter motor was... "Oh, they're on back order.. will be a few weeks until we get them in". Not impressed. Because the exhaust place was waiting on the starter to be able to do the headers - pulled the pin on doing the exhaust right at the moment. Picked the VL up and will work on it for the next few weeks and get everything sorted correctly before going back for the exhaust. Means I will miss PowerPlay - but such as life with cars like this. Also - picked up the last of my fittings I needed for the fuel system. Finally! Mock fitted it all up to see what it goes together like. And then placed in the boot near where it will go. 3 x Bulkhead fittings will go through the boot floor for the lines to push onto under the car. Stainless Steel Hardline still to come and be bent up to connect the boot side all together. Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

nice work..i bought a vl with a 5ltre converison allready done.. i was going to stroke it till i started a new job. One of the guys asked my why i was going to spend all that money on a 355 stroker? he said go ls1.. so after some thought and pricing and more home work.. decided to go threw with it.. but since its blue plated im going to put a brand new ls3 in.. only prob is do i keep the t700 or go t400? a ball park figure on the conversion would help a bit too..

T700 will not last with the LS3. T400 built properly will. I have purposely left out prices in this thread for a few reasons. - Remove the "You could have done it cheaper this way" responses. - My finances really arn't what this thread is about, but I am limited in my means and do have to make compromises. - Some things I am getting are awesome prices. I prefer to not get the questions "Where did you get it done that cheap, and can you get it that cheap for me" - Some things I am sure i've paid more than what other people can get the same for. Prefer not to get into shitstorm fights over what i've paid. A ball park on the entire conversion for me: ~$20k. Maybe, just maybe - I might post up the breakdown costing once it's all done. I will think about it though. Don't underestimate the cost of all the "little" bits, and "upgrades" you do along the way. Sure you *could* get away with the cheaper bit, but do you really want to do all this work to not add the extra little bit and make it better since you're already there doing it? If I wanted a bare, stock LS1 - I probably could have gotten away with it for 1/2 the price. p.s. your blue plate means nothing if you change the engine. You will need to get it engineered again.

Amen in regards to price. All the little things add up or parts that you forgot when working out prices. Thats why im doing mine nice and slow so I get it right first shot.

i understand the $$ value on a job like this.. i know its not cheap and like you im doing it on a budget too..im in no rush as the motor in mine is still okay for the momment.. the ball park figure is all i was after.. we all have mates in certian areas we can get things at good prices so didnt need a break down..you have answered most of my initals thoughts brake booster gearbox etc.. cheers man..

Well.. I decided to make the Exhaust maker a bit happier and made the decision to remove the fuel tank so each of the twin 3" can come out either side of the car instead of trying to squeeze them both down the passenger side. As such. A fuel cell was sourced. Found it on eBay, brand new 20 Gal (75 L) - was going for a good price - and to boot was just around the corner. Auction had 1 hour left on it, so put in a bid and 2 hours later..... Don't have photo's, but also made progress on the coils and gauges today. Gauges were fitted into my beige coloured sunglasses holder instead of the blue one (p.s. Blue Sunglasses holder for sale. Tabs are broken, and has some holes drilled at the back, but still in good condition otherwise - $25 - pm me if interested) Decided to mount the coils up in the bever panel space above the firewall (where the windscreen wiper motor lives). To be able to mount them up there, i'll have to make new brackets to mount them closer together than stock LS1. So the grinder came out and cut up the standard brackets so there was something to weld, but still have the coils bolted to the car. Will try and get some photo's of that next time i'm down working on the car. Any other suggestions regarding mounting the coils is welcome. Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Best was to make up a bracket for mounting the coils is this way. Bit of round bar with a hole drilled up the guts of it then parted off into spacers for the coils and a piece of all thread holding it all together plus some right angled brackets on the ends. You can mount them to any flat suface then Btw your pumps will most likely be noisy as hell mounted to the surge tank with solid fittings. My mate his his that way in the LS1 WB and it sounded like 400 vuvuzelas were behind it Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

lol... I expect the pumps will be a bit noisy. Hopefully the rubber between the pumps and the brackets will stop it being "headache" material. Interesting Idea about the Coils. Might have a look into doing something similar.

if that alternator becomes a drama there is a bloke in the states who sells a relocation kit its $450 + post and sits in front of the drivers side head, all cnc'd brackets and new alt for that price too

My pumps where solid mounted to my surge tank and they weren't that bad

Quote: Originally Posted by InsaneVL [View Post] T700 will not last with the LS3. T400 built properly will. I have purposely left out prices in this thread for a few reasons. - Remove the "You could have done it cheaper this way" responses. - My finances really arn't what this thread is about, but I am limited in my means and do have to make compromises. - Some things I am getting are awesome prices. I prefer to not get the questions "Where did you get it done that cheap, and can you get it that cheap for me" - Some things I am sure i've paid more than what other people can get the same for. Prefer not to get into shitstorm fights over what i've paid. A ball park on the entire conversion for me: ~$20k. Maybe, just maybe - I might post up the breakdown costing once it's all done. I will think about it though. Don't underestimate the cost of all the "little" bits, and "upgrades" you do along the way. Sure you *could* get away with the cheaper bit, but do you really want to do all this work to not add the extra little bit and make it better since you're already there doing it? If I wanted a bare, stock LS1 - I probably could have gotten away with it for 1/2 the price. p.s. your blue plate means nothing if you change the engine. You will need to get it engineered again. hey mark l could have done it cheaper hahaha (strirring the pot hehehe)

lol... I'm sure you could have Pigsy Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Quote: Originally Posted by InsaneVL [View Post] lol... I'm sure you could have Pigsy your no fun mark you dont bite hehe that auto pedal look familiar seen it around for like 8 yrs its done quite a few skids Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Hahaha.. and it's about to do alot more Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Small update. Been sorting out a few things with the car. Unfortunately hit a snag with needing the actual Motor and Gearbox in the car to continue on with anything. So really waiting on the engine to be done. On the subject of the engine - the heads have now returned from being flowed. Just waiting on the bottom end to be put together so we can then work out how much to deck the head to gain as much compression while keeping lift to just under 600. Once the heads get decked, the valve clearance will be double checked and the largest cam we can get in there will be ordered with the least LSA for a cranky lumpy sound and great performance. So, While i'm still waiting on the engine to be done, I sent the car away to have some panel work done. (Idle hands means the budget gets another blow... argh.. I need this engine done!) A few years back I done a Battery-to-Boot conversion. When ripping up the battery tray, I made a mess of the panel underneath as some dick spot welded it about a 1000 times. So the idea is to just get the front inner guards fixed up and repainted. As the engine will be a nice focus point in the engine bay - need to make sure that there isnt any fucked panels making things ugly in there. Hopefully down the track i'll pull the motor again and redo the lot, but for now its just a quick tidy up of these 2 front inner guards. To do this - Dummy block/engine and Gearbox was removed. These won't be back - next time and engine is in the car, will be the real one. Also removed the standard fuel tank to make sure there will be room for both 3" exhausts to exit each side. Panel before pics: Drivers Side where the battery tray was. Passenger side (Hole will be going to 4" for intake piping to go through) Engine bay at the moment. Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Quick update (no pics this time though) Engine is finally coming together. Bottom end is almost done. The heads will be mocked up and the final cam specs chosen and ordered shortly. VL is expected back next week with the engine bay tidy up (nothing major, just the front inner guard panels)