3rd Gen Camaro Project Car
 

Recommendation on an engine/trans combo.

Purchasing the 3rd gen from a junkyard. Great condition for a rolling chassis. Looking for recommendations for the combo on engine trans right now. Still gotta get into it and rip apart the whole thing.

Anyways, was looking into a 454 carb engine.

Or an LS1 fully built with a th400 tranny.

LS1 built with a single turbo, use methonal injection instead of an intercooler, and a power glide. :)
use a factory computer, no need to go after market, the stocker can control it all perfectly. :)

What do you wanna do with the car? Drag race? Drive it everyday? Both? Budget?

If I was yoiu I would go w/ a ( daily driver) sbc 406/ hi rise Holly/ double pumper 800/ 600/587 COMP CAM, Forged Bottom end w/ forged pistons/ I rods/ clevite bearings/ all roller motor/ MSD with the bad ****/// 4000 sat nite special converter with turbo 400 tranny. 9" and a SS drive shaft. Question is do you have the money?

Nick

i agree with the 406, but for a daily driver that cam is pretty big. my first 406 build was stock crank, eagle rods, trw's 11-1, dart iron eagles, solid 540/558 lift cam, victor jr, 750 d/p. with a th350 trans, 8 inch converter, 3800-4200, and 4:10's on a 28" tire. best pass all motor was 11.40 at 116, (then hurt the motor, purchased wrong rings so it went consistent 11.80's at 112) 10.75 at 124 on a 175 shot. your best bet is to find a guy that will do your machine work or a good speed shop and ask thier opinion. if you want to go this way i'll give some shops that will set you up with whatever you need.

Well, if the money allows go with the LS1 the TQ. and light weight is a good recipe to get a car moving..

an LS1 weighs approx 150lbs less that a gen1 SBC, they also0 have 6bolt mains that make them extremely durable. there are guys twisting the stock bottom end well past 7k rpm with out failure.

dollar-per-HP just isnt there for an LS1 swap in my opinion... Sure if you got the cash and wanna build something "cool" it'd be great but practically you'd be better off and spend a ton of less money on a standard SBC. You'd make more power, cost less, and be just as reliable or even more reliable... The only thing you couldnt say is "I have an LS1"

Like I said if he has the money I would do it but not for the novelty. The fact that with minimal head work and now the fact that you can carburate them they are superior to the gen1 in all phases.....

i wouldn't even bother changing it to a carb. they are 315+ hp out of the box, and there are head and cam packages everywhere that will easily put 450+ to the wheels on a stock bottom end. some of the combo are even pushing close to 500 to the wheels and they are all pump gas.
all you need is someone like foff667 to tune it in and it is ready to drive everywhere.

The only reason I am saying to carb it is that it is cheaper and less electronics...But I agree..

there is some runor that a few national touring series are going to start allowing carb'ed versions of the Gen3 motors compete. nothing high profile yet, but it is a start.

good carb setup with a plate system and a set of foggers tapped into the manifold... pat musi style. ;)

We (me and z28c4maro82z) are possibly Blowing this engine down the road, but first we're just determining which engine/tranny/intake setup. Now my uncle also reccomended Carb instead of Fuel Injection as per more power, less electronics. Now I don't know which way to run with it. I go a lot on his word as he's built and tracked a bunch of Chevelles, an Older Vette, and basically any car he's ever owned, lol. I also am trying to build a very nice 3rd gen with low 12's/11's in mind w/o spending every dollar I'll ever make in the next 10 years. I like the idea of Carb'd LS1, but I'm also looking for the other suggestions that are cost effective and power houses. We understand it's going to take a long time to get this car tracked, so we want to do it right and do it damn good. Keep up the feedback, I'm lovin it (no McDonald's pun intended)

It depends what he wants out of it. If he want's a reliable low 12 second/high 11 second car that can be driven anywhere you really can't beat a LS1. You don't even have to go nuts on the motor. Buy the drivetrain from Contemp. Corvettes in Bristol, slap a cam in there and be done with it. Obviously you need a trans and rear to hold the power but you'd be building it the same for a "SBC".

LSx>>>>>than a carbed motor in terms of reliablity and streetability when you trying to do a fast street car. The reason I say carb because making a fast FI'ed SBC isn't exactly cheap either. Plus depending how fast he wants to go he's probably going to either A) Get a set of A/M heads or B) Really work over a set of stock or GM heads.

Just my opinion. There are plenty of ways to do it and maybe I'm biased but in terms of power, reliablity and ease of modding you really can't beat the LS platform motors.

honestly to go a carb on an LS1 is a complete waste of the potential of the engine. carb's have not been proven to make more power on any motor, much less an LS1 where hardly anyone has done the conversion.
if you want a carb, stick to a gen1 sbc. if you want a 11/10second motor you can easily drive anywhere on pump gas, get an LS1.

Why couldnt you build a 11-10 second pump gas drive everyday motor with a SBC? I could drive my car every single day and it runs mid 11's when horribly out of tune. Gets like 13mpg with my 3.92's, TH350, and a 3500 stall and only cost me about $2500 to build completely. I'm not saying an LS1 is a bad thing to do but it'd be so much easier and cheaper to build something that'll just bolt right in. You could easily end up spending $8,000+ on a modded LS1 swap... Theres so many easier and cheaper ways to build a bad reliable daily driver type car.

Dude, it doesn't take $8K to do a LS1 swap. The drivetrain can be had for less than $3500.

I'm not saying you can't build a good street SBC. Of course you can...but everyone is screaming carb carb carb...no thanks...I've driven 400+ hp carbed motors for days at a time...you can keep them. I guess it's personal preference but if I had a certain amount of $$ and could swing a LSx motor I'd do it over a SBC any day of the week.

BTW, just curious, what's the specs on your motor? Sounds like a runner :)

We were kicking the idea of a carb around, but it does seem more user friendly with the Fuel injection. We have plenty of time to decide though, but at least we have a chasis to start with. While we're at it...the car's going to need new front 1/4's and maybe a passenger side door...anybody know someplace cheap (checking Junkyards, but just wondering if anyone knows someplace better). According to the junkyard, the car was driven there and still runs. When we tried it, the battery seemed dead but we won't be tearing it all down til next weekend prolly (pickup car Mon/Wed, next day off is Sun) to see what's good and what's not.

Basics, I think we're going to need...
Engine (LS1 or SBC or something else)
Trans (prolly Auto with High Stall)
Driveshaft (Steel most likely)
Rear (something to hold the beast)
Ignition (MSD prolly)
Heads/Cam (last on list)
Exhaust (has stocker v6 exhaust atm)
Electronics (diff ECU? or not necessary?)

Body stuff:
Front Pass/Driver 1/4 panels
Front bumper
Passenger Side Door

keep it simple. to hell with fuel injection. if want cheap easy results just buy a carb. you guys can argue reliability all you want, chances are this is a budget build and carbs are plenty reliable. it will be cheaper and easier to buy a used 750 bolt it on and call it a day. i bought mine for 75 bucks, no wires, chips, this or that bull ****, 4 nuts, throttle linkage, done. maybe a air cleaner if you want too. so add a wing nut and stud to that list.

If you just want something cheap and easy then I would say go with a 355, 383 or a 406 because like slow z said it will bolt right in and be reliable with a carb.....take mine for instance 355 iron eagle heads 750 carb with a little more tuning it will be a 11 sec. motor car then comes the spray;)....all of it for under $3,000 and I can drive it anywhere...

3.8 turbo v6... forget a small black v8. If you want something different from everyone else, a turbo v6 will sure achieve that. Basically do a 86-87 grand national setup. With an upgraded turbo, bigger intercooler, injectors and header back exhaust, you will see remarkable 1/4 mile times with stock engine internals. If i was to build another 3rd gen, thats exactly what i would do. I know people may say v8 is better and it may be but with equal performace possible and the novelty of a turbo and the motor swap, this would have my vote.

Been there done that have the T-shirt. It's an easy swap as far as getting everything in there but it's not cheap. I had a bad experience with my swap(the guy ended up selling me a blown TTA motor). Parts aren't getting any cheaper unfortunately. However nothing beats the brute force of that low end torque. The only real problem is these motors are like women. Very finickey and they have mood swings lol

Totally my dream for an early (70-73) 2nd gen Firebird.

Where is the original poster of this thread? :)

Edit: corrected for stupidity. :)

z28c4maro82z and I bought it. Picking it up tomorrow morning most likely , before I go to work. He just came back from driving to Ohio from NJ for his 2000 SS hood (got a good deal on it and drove to save shipping charges).