JOHNA01374

Thank you. I read your post and see the last update was in Feb. Have you made any more progress on the car? I have delayed my swap until winter as I'm gathering parts and really want to drive the Monte. I picked up a cheap set of lifters and tossed them in to cure the lifter problem. Turns out that three of the lifters were dying. When I pushed down the centers they would not fully expand and felt soft. How it didn't bend a push rod I have no clue. I'm still on the look out for someone running the truck intake and I Like the idea of the additional torque. Even more so since I'm swapping the LS6 cam and losing a little low end.

I've run MT Drag Radials on two different cars over the last few years. I personally don't like the feeling of the tires much below about 15psi. I've never liked the feeling of full on slicks as it feels like the car is wallowing around at 140mph and it's not comfortable to me. For me the sweet spot for that tire has been between 16 and 20 psi depending on the car. On something as heavy as the Monte I'd start at 20psi and see how she hooks and go down from there. I've also never had a major problem getting the tire to hook on the street. You will need to do a healthy burnout when you first get them but after that they stick like glue if the roads even remotely warm. I have to find it but somewhere I have a video a buddy of mine shot on his phone. I foot braked the Cutlass and let it fly. The tires spun about 5 or 6 feet then dead hooked and pulled the left front about 6 inches off the ground. I know it's too late now but for your next set of tires take a look at the Hoosier radials. I made the switch this season and they seem to be a much stickier tire. I'm currently running 22lbs in them and they hook great with just a little rotation. I wouldn't even call it spinning. I'm sold and not going back to the MT's

It's been a while since I did a SBC to BBC swap. The last one I did was pretty straight forward. I had to hunt down some brackets but I used all the stock accessories and the trans bolted right up.

They are just basic home made logs made from sch40 weld bends. I got suckered into making a set of real tube headers on a previous build. After several days of cutting, bending, cussing and welding they made ZERO additional power over the ugly logs and actually took longer to spool the turbos. Logs are just fine on a street car. If I was making 1000+ HP then it might be a different story. If you're going to do turbos keep the ramjet manifold and spend the money on a tunable EFI system like the Holley HP EFI. I've done blow through systems in the past. They seem simple on the surface but you will have just as much invested and most likely not be as happy with the results. They do work but they're not much fun to drive everyday. Not to mention the headache of screwing with the Carb everytime the weather changes or want to turn up or down the boost..

Here's the Cutlass Engine pics. I had just finished it enough to drive it home. Notice the wastegates aren't even hooked up and there is misc wires running all over the place. When I have a few minutes i'll get some current pics. I've cleaned up the bay and coated the headers, downpipes and turbine housings.

Thank you on the compliment. The original owner had the car reprinted a few years back. The paperwork I have says it's 95 dodge viper red. The pic looks a little different as it was snowy and overcast that day. On a summer day it looks a little darker than that. I do have some engine bay pics of the cutlass here somewhere. Ill dig them up and post them. they're from last summer before everything was coated.

If funds are tight I would recommend Duplicolor Silver wheel paint. I used it on the old intake on my Cutlass and it doesn't look painted at all. I was getting crap from a buddy when I told him I was going to paint the intake. A couple of weeks later he was at the house when I installed it and bragged about how right he was and how good the manifold looked unpainted. Should of seen his face when I showed him the paint. Your other option is to have it media blasted then clear coat it. Like someone else said. You have to make sure all the media or sand is out of it before re-installing.

Well Guys it's official. The Monte is going LS powered. Over the winter I made a number of changes to y twin turbo 80 Cutlass to get it ready for summer fun and track duty. The manifolds and down pipes were sent out for coating, I got a few things cleaned up under the hood and the body work is 90% done. I'm gonna shoot it in SEM hot rod black as soon as I have a nice day and she'll be ready to cruise and race. That means the Monte is going under the knife. As some might recall I had a ticking lifter last summer that appeared to go away. Well it showed it's face again and I believe it's collapsed now as I get an occasional backfire through the carb so it time to do something. With Gas prices going up I figured I move forward with a small cube LS motor as my goal for this car is really just to drive and enjoy it as much as I can. I settled on the 5.3 LM7 truck engine. I figured the 6.0 was a bit big and the prices kept me away as well as 100K JY motors are in the $1200-$2000 range. The idea of a 4.8 with a little boost really caught my attention and I almost made it happen but after a little research went with the 5.3. I found the 5.3 complete top to bottom, front to back and only has 55K on the clock for the outrageous sum of $400. I already have a Holley HP EFI computer to run it and have the Holley harness on order. As of right now the plan is to clean up the motor, Install a Z06 cam and springs, An LS6 manifold and put it in the car. I got the stock truck manifolds with it as I'm playing with the idea of doing a single turbo setup but it's not set in stone just yet although I have a nice 72mm Garret sitting on the shelf just looking for a home. Need to talk to people that have done an LS swap in a Monte. I see dozens and dozens of Chevelle swaps on various forums but I'm not sure if the process is the same. I'm wondering about oil pans, front end accessories etc. What needs to be changed, moved etc? Has anyone done a Monte swap with a 5.3 truck engine yet?

In street driving I've gotten a full summer (5000 miles or so) on a set with a few drag strip passes. The problem with the Mickeys is they need to be HOT to work so you really burn them up at the track. As for when to replace them. The wear indicators are there for a reason but I've run well past them several times with no issues and the Cutlass traps in the 135/138 mph range so they are still safe at that point.

Motor has 99K on it. I know it needs a timing chain, cam and lifters. Oil pressure is good but if I'm going to pull the motor it isn't anymore work to put new bearing in the crank and rods. Also plan to do a new oil pump. Just makes sense with everything apart.

Well guys the time has come. Took the car to 3 cruise night on Sat and when leaving the last show I started the car and heard the dreaded Lifter tick.. Already pulled the valve covers and checked the rockers. I'm 99.9% sure one of the lifters is dead or dying as the motor makes the noise when I start it up but it goes away after about 10 mins of idling or driving. I know a cam and lifters is in my future and I've picked out the Comp cams 11-202-3 street cam. I have an Edelbrock Performer intake and a set of 1-3/4 headers waiting to go on. I haven't pulled the motor apart yet but it has always run strong and never used a drop of oil so I'm guessing the rings are still in good shape. I'm thinking of not even pulling the pistons out and just swapping bearing assuming everything looks good etc. Just wanting to talk to anyone that has done a 402 rebuild. Did you bump up the compression or leave it stock at 8.5? anything else done to improve performance? Are you happy with you rebuild. Obviously this is going to be a 100% street car so smooth idle, lots of vacuum and good manners are first on the list. Torque is a close second. I also don't want to spend a fortune as an E-Rod LS conversion is in the future I just can't afford to do it right now.

This is a good thread if an old one. I've talked to a few friends that work at shops or own a shop and most tell me that a basic paint job would run $3000 -$4000 depending on the amount of metal work and the choice of paint. I've been asking about going back to the original Cranberry red but in base clear and want the car to go all the way down to metal. I have gotten one guy that said $6000 but I got the feeling he didn't want the work....

Here is a pic of the engine compartment when I was first putting it together. You can see that there are a number of items still not in place. Ironically I only have a couple of pics scattered around. It's not much to look at yet as it's still stock met brown, tan vinyl top and a black fiber glass hood but it's faster than hell... Notice there is no intercooler... When I first put this together it was going to be a street/show car. I was going to keep everything very mild and only wanted about 500HP. We built the car as you see it without and intercooler as I only planned to run 5-8 psi and I didn't want a huge intercooler blocking the radiator. Well needless to say that simply wasn't enough. After doing a lot of research and talking to a lot of guys I made the decision to switch to E85. Thankfully the only changes I had to make were swapping the injectors for a set of 120's and a simple re-tune. The car now makes a touch over 20 lbs IF the radials hook up. I believe the highest we've recorded was 22 lbs. I have to say I'll never go back to gas on a boosted car. Intake temps in the low 200F range at the end of a pass with 22 lbs of boost... I've considered putting a turbo on the Monte but I swore to the GF that I wouldn't do that to this car. I even have an BW S475 that would be a perfect fit for a 402-454 BBC. I think my plans for the future will be an E-Rod LS3 with a 4L65E trans. I want to keep the Monte a 100% driver with good mileage and reliably.

The twin turbo SBC in my Cutlass made 835hp/896 lb tq on the engine dyno. In the car it made 645 hp and 736 lb tq. Odd that the torque didn't drop off more but the operator said he see's this pretty often. Said the Chassis dyno can apply more load than an engine dyno and if there is one thing turbo cars love it's more load. The Cutlass has a TH400 / 3K converter and a Ford 9 inch with 3.25/1 gears.

A single Mark VIII fan will get the job done and they're about $100 with the necessary relays.