just another weaksauce 6.0 LQ9 bimmer

[gmtech13]

I'll use the very first post to list the progress updates that I'm tracking in excel

Goal - LQ9/T56 powered E34 - more straight line sleeper than rally monster

Background history of build, I've pieced together a 2004 Cadillac motor and ls1 Camaro 6 speed manual shift transmission over the last 4 years and came around to purchasing a shell for the mini beast, my only requests in a shell were that it was RWD, roomy under the hood and heavy enough to plant straight line and the occasional corner. what could be better than a car that has an inline 6 and a stout chassis stock?

This build is not expected to be operational untill fall 2010 or later, i will not get very much progress done in the "winter months" as i'm doing everything in a gravel driveway, my "shop" is only big enough for tools and the occasional motorcycle.

Myself you ask? I'm a 26 year old inspiring college student. (hence the 4 years to get all the motor parts together) I work at an auto parts store 30-40 hours a week just to afford my habbits while going to school. I graduated spring 09 from a Community College for automotive and completed and passed all 8 of the automotive light duty ASE tests plus parts cert.(which i hear don't bring much clout on these euro boards) also spring 09 which leads me to be a master certified tech. I'm not trying to come off like a know it all by any means I'm still very humble and much so a rookie at several things. I do enjoy more difficult projects though.

here is a pic of the 600$ shell purchased 5-16-09


here is the motor coming out on 8/9/09

no thats not me that is my buddy Jordon helping in extraction of the broken 2.5 (timing belt failure)


complete extraction

up to this point i have 1200.49$ into the car as it sits in this picture, i'm going to sell off the old motor and components on ebay soon

Please ask as many questions as you like i will try my best to answer anything to the best of my knowledge. Also if you see something funny looking please point it out in this build so I may correct it. I've grown up working on domestics to the USA and not Germany so there are alot of new things i'm encountering as i come along in this build.

-Erik

[Captain Morgan]

nice project, looking forward to seeing it come alive. Hopefully I can get started on mine one of these days as well.

[gmtech13]

your sig pic says you started already... that's false advertising if you haven't...

[Captain Morgan]

your sig pic says you started already... that's false advertising if you haven't...

meh.... just too lazy to make a new sig. technically I have started, the GTO is slowly coming apart and Ive got tons of parts piled up, just nothing worth starting a thread about yet

[BRAAP]

OH yeah!

I can see turning my E36 LSx project into a dedicated track whore and doing an E34 or E39 LSx as the Daily Driver!

Will be keeping an eye on this for sure.

[kenua6]

Nice

[gmtech13]

i just happened to fall into one of these...




should i??????

[BRAAP]

i just happened to fall into one of these...

I hate it when that happens!

...
should i??????

Absolutely not! You are just asking for all kinds of trouble in thinking that way. Here is what you do. Package that up nice and tidy, ship it to me, (PM me for the shipping address), I'll recycle the contents, even compensate you for it, custom LSx head work, cash, etc...

[gmtech13]

I hate it when that happens!



Absolutely not! You are just asking for all kinds of trouble in thinking that way. Here is what you do. Package that up nice and tidy, ship it to me, (PM me for the shipping address), I'll recycle the contents, even compensate you for it, custom LSx head work, cash, etc...

i cant give it to you for my cost cause it would cost me more money to ship it to you than i paid for it

[BRAAP]

i cant give it to you for my cost cause it would cost me more money to ship it to you than i paid for it

I'll cover shipping.


Looking forward to plans and updates...

[gmtech13]

just drove 370 miles round trip to columbia, mo to pickup a fluidampr balancer, 8 rib s/c pully, gto alt bracket and disc bracket and tensioner. other than breaking my 3/4" adapter to get the arp balancer bolt off, today was a cakewalk

5' of pipe for a handle and 1, 3/4" breaker bar and a 1-1/16" socket and 2 guys bouncing on it, will get er done every time lol

[gmtech13]

I'll update you with old pics of the blower i got for free from my neighbor from his old 502 big block EFI boat






this is how she has been sleeping all winter



over the winter i got a new trunk, front bumper, wide grille and matching hood from the junkyard, this one dosent have the holes for the spoiler like the old one had.





i used the old motor for snow traction in the back of my beater s-10 parts hauler, while it was back there all winter it managed to beat the floor to crap and put 3 holes in the bed DOH!!!



I took 9 days vacation to get some progress on the car, i didnt get as much done as i wanted to but progress updates are overdue since it's warm out now

first i put the manual pedal set in and reinstalled the telescoping steering assembly


crappy picture i know



YOURS TURELY!!!



i stared by cleaning up the engine bay by removing the useless stuff like condenser, a/c lines, master cyl, etc.



previous owner jacked up the car by the core support which is actually a cross member :-/ prolly going to replace this piece with tube.....


You guys think i should keep the abs on a track/street car???

next i lugged out the beater LS1 mock up block and started making motor mount block plates and an accessory drive system layout/brackets





yes i know the water pump sticks up to far, that one is a core for case fitment only from a truck, i have a camaro one new in the box which fits perfectly. part number 45002 napa lifetime new water pump. With a napa 38195 belt tensioner for the accessory drive which mounts to the waterpump itself (not pictured yet)

yes i also know the blower does not line up with the tensioner, they are going on their own 8 rib belt separate from the 6 rib accessory drive belt, the blower will be shimmed back from the bracket to alignment for the belt.

i used a 04 tahoe 145 amp alternator, on a 04 gto bracket which is the same as the 99-02 camaro bracket
the power steering pump for a GTO like the factory procharger setup is hard to come by and expensive, so i did some diggin and found a pump for a pump from an 84 Cadillac 4.2L V8 p/n 81-1422 NAPA/A1 cardone and the factory GTO pulley is even harder to find cheaply so i used a 7-3093 NAPA/dorman pulley
and a gates/napa idler pulley 38041

I picked up a 15gallon slim fuel cell from a member on LS1tech and am going to use one of the 2 fuel pumps i got for free from my neighbor when he gave the setup to me from his boat.

I sold the old original wheels, cylinder head, transmission, hood, headlights and scrapped the engine block and rotors which paid for the original price of the car!!!

here is some bimmer carnage!!!!!!!!



i wanted to save the bad piston and one good piston




i researched a starter for the 6.0L and bought a NAPA/Raylock brand new lifetime 4N-5131 since it appeared to have the strongest nosecone and tightest solenoid to block clearance of all the LSX options

i got a honda s2000 engine start button p/n 35881-s2a-911 - because all real race cars don't use keys!!!
as far as wiring goes i hear that the old floppy disk drive connectors fit good, otherwise it will get a molex connector soldered in

i bought all brand new brakes for a 540, i went this route versus the corvette swap cause i want to run 16" wheels since tires are way cheaper and well i plan on going through alot of tires....
part numbers NAPA - 22 02320L, 22 02320R, 2202319L, 2202319R - calipers, 4886526, 86329 - rotors, up-7284x, up7286x - pads, 34411159468 - parking brake shoes
and a 6 line stainless braided hose kit from ebay

i ordered 1/2 header flanges from ebay and won a set of used but in great shape eibach springs

i picked up a used rear seat upper and lower with a white rear bumper (had a crack in it even tho owner proclaimed it was flawless, but it's fixable and mine from the car is not)

i won a 33411131063 (bmw part number) from ebay rear inner wheel hub for the large diff and 540 axle swap, i just need to find one more and a 3.64 LSD rear diff, if anyone has the hookup on that i would greatly appreciate it!!!

i got 540 axles from NAPA/A1 cardone lifetime p/n 95-1127

had to order a piece of 10x1.5 threaded rod class 8.8 from fastenall for the blower bracket through alternator lower support since i couldent find a m10x1.5 165mm long bolt locally

right now i'm waiting on tooling to machine the tensioner adjuster and the curved slot, i bought a 10mm 4 flute endmill to make the needed change since the plasma cutter i have dosent do 3/4 aluminum very well

i know the bracket is a lil rough but i think it looks good for only using a bandsaw, drillpress and die grinder lol i have a limited amount of power tools



back to work for 3 days then a big swap meet on sunday morning and another HUGE swapmeet on the 25th, hoping to get some wheels and tires here or some exhaust parts

got this in at work 3 weeks ago




so this is how she sleeps for now untill the rain passes



i'm thinking about picking up some cragar soft 8's for track wheels since they make 17x8's on 4.5" B/S and 17x9's with 5" B/S for about 60 bux a pop and my buddy who is a machinist can redrill them to 5x120mm

here they are photochopped onto a random google image search car...
what do you guys think??






up to this point i have 3500$ in the car and 5k in the motor/transmission
my rough budget is 10k to get the car driving, i kind of expect to go over this when the cage and buckets go in but thats not part of the origional plan, neither was the supercharger...

[E34play]

Nice to see progress, but pass on the wheels. It's a bmw, not a 5.0!

You can get other wheels in that width that will look good for likely not too much more (even some new).

[gmtech13]

Nice to see progress, but pass on the wheels. It's a bmw, not a 5.0!

You can get other wheels in that width that will look good for likely not too much more (even some new).

links to recommendations?

i'm having a hard time finding something else i like, i'm on the fence about these as far as style, but the price is way right for beat around track wheels

-Erik

[McDani3coupe]

I saw that car for sale when I was looking for my e34. I guess we are both doing e34 ls swaps...your's will be faster though! How far is bellville from the quad cities? and throw some lm reps or some wheels off of the wheels for sale thread on it. Those rims you showed would make good winter rims. And yes If you plan on keeping the car on the street I would keep the abs if you still have room.

[gmtech13]

I saw that car for sale when I was looking for my e34. I guess we are both doing e34 ls swaps...your's will be faster though! How far is bellville from the quad cities? and throw some lm reps or some wheels off of the wheels for sale thread on it. Those rims you showed would make good winter rims. And yes If you plan on keeping the car on the street I would keep the abs if you still have room.

i dont know where that is lol

i should have let you buy it i kind of want a black on black one now

yes those are intended for winter wheels only

i'm debating soft 8's for the track cause they are so cheap, i may snag a set of drag wheels at the next swap meet for the track cause they look so good on 5mall5nail5's car

i wouldent mind a set of vette wheels either

i think the abs will fit ok still but the steering box is right were i want to put my driver side motor mount

i wish you luck with your project, how far along are you?

-erik

[McDani3coupe]

haha, I haven't even really started. I'm just in the planning phase. The Quad cities are on the northwest corner of Illinois right on the iowa border. If you want to paint it black now would be the time to do it while the motors out!

[gmtech13]

on to the progress pics from the weekend!!!







TADA



started to get dark on me so i removed the rear control arm crossmember/mount cause it was right smack on the oil pan



i will cut and modify it once the motor is back out, right now i wanna see if this pan will clear the steering linkage or if i have to go another route

the shifter should come out right were i need it just like v8suprabuilders touring he did

thats all for now as today is my birthday and i've got errands to run and people to see, cant beat a free steak dinner!!!

haha, I haven't even really started. I'm just in the planning phase. The Quad cities are on the northwest corner of Illinois right on the iowa border. If you want to paint it black now would be the time to do it while the motors out!

ah i see, i'm about 20 min from stl

the block and trans thats in there is a beater hollow mock up block so it's just there for fab work

[j30a1]

nice work

[gmtech13]

i dint think i'm gonna clear abs with the planned header design





then i ran into 3 problems while it sits this way

#1


#2


#3


with those 3 problems i decided to move the block forward 1.25" so.....



out came the motor and popped the pan off to notch it

not going to lie it hurt to cut up a 550$ oil pan/pickup tube setup

but i got it on ebay for 155
so out comes the plasma!!!





i think the pan is eating my tube





this is how much i cut out (top) versus whats getting replaced (bottom)



prefit went smooth





welded up!!!



i'm rookie welder and it shows lol





water leak test

LOOK MOM NO LEAKS!!!! First try at welding something that holds fluids




tomorrow is pan cleanup, c-member cutting and linkage testing

i plan on moving the motor up 1/2" forward 1.25" and start making mounts

-Erik

[eightynine535]

looking good

[gmtech13]

put a temporary brace on the cross member so i can cut it out



aint custom till the sawzall comes out!!!



going back in with the new pan

hopefully it will fix my 3 problems!!!

#1 - fixed!!!



#2 fixed!!!





#3............



NOT FIXED!!!!!!!



bmw from the factory decided since they put their motors in crook, they would put the centerlink in crooked too!!!!!!!

looking looking and looking





ABS has got to go!!! i'm planning for long tube headers



Intake clearance

as it sits now

if i keep the motor tilted 1.5* to match the centerlink (i dont want to change the steering geometry cause i plan on tracking the car) it wont hurt anything except for how the shifter comes out of the transmission

i can live with this, 1.5* is not bad at all.

this is how she sits in her final position



if i did it all over again i would notch the pan to match the 1.5* offset for the centerlink

-Erik

i think it looks alot worse in the pictures then it really is

the way the heads are offset front to back gives it the illusion the motor is more crooked then it is

[McDani3coupe]

looking good!

[gmtech13]

looking at more picture i got in my file here at home i think the tank on the pan is welded on crooked from moroso also, looking at the pic of the 2 pieces i cut out to notch the pan the one side of the taper is longer then the other in both pieces.

o well, it's just a track basher

[zubbie]

You should be posting this in the E34 section also. Not many ls/lq conversions. There will be much interest generated.