That stuff is just there to prevent air from getting between the pins and causing oxidation that could inhibit a proper electrical connection between the pins. Coat them all lightly with dielectric grease and you'll be all set.

 

Thanks for the info.

 

Well, we decided it is time to regroup our plan of attack. We've reached the point where we don't know what to do next. I guess we'll just start cleaning everything. We might just run the Caprice one more time and then start taking the LT1 out. That might be a problem as I'm starting to run out of jack stands My side driveway is starting to look like a ******* junkyard, all I need is a pit bull on a chain.

 

UPS just made a visit. I got the front accessary set up from a 94 Corvette and it was 2 days early! Good seller, just a little high on his prices, but I got what we needed, except for the heat exchanger for the power steering. Maybe I'll be able to use the Caprice heat exchanger. We'll see.



Here's a question, Is the 95 LT! external or internally balanced? My 92 LT1 was external.

 

All factory 1 piece rear main seal smallblocks will be external balance, lt1s included.

 

I was affraid of that as I have to buy a flywheel as this LT1 had a flex plate for the auto tranny. I'll worry about balancing later.

 

Nice project.

 

No, your '92 LT1 was internally balanced. It had a weight on the flexplate (if auto)/flywheel (if manual) that took the place of a counterweight that was built into the crank external to the rear main seal on the old 2-piece rear main seal cranks. Having that weight does not make it "external balance". The damper is neutral balance, which means the engine is internal balance. Period. End of story.

If you get a flywheel for an internally balanced, 1-piece rear main seal crank, it'll be the correct piece. And, it'll be weighted to replace that "external" counterweight that your '83 had on the end of the crank. Your '83 flywheel won't work because it is for a 2-piece rear main seal and has a different bolt pattern (so you won't mix up parts for 1-piece vs. 2-piece RMS cranks). Get a flywheel for '86-'92 f-body V8 5-speed application, and it'll be the right part for this job.

 

You are the only one five7kid, I have seen refer to a 1 piece rms engine as a internal balance engine. Whatever the reasons or correctness of politically correct way toword it, the flywheels will not innterchange, so there's no fear of using the wrong balance flywheel. A 1 piece RMS flywheel for a T5 Fbody is all you need to worry about finding. I have never heard anything other than 400s and 1 piece rms motors being external balance.

 

Okay guys, here's the real final word on this. I talked with the project manager of the C-4 Corvettes, he sent me an instruction bulletin from GM that explains how to balance the LT1 and LT4 engines which are all externally balanced, at least in the Corvettes. So from 92 to 96 all Corvettes had 4 bolt mains and externally balanced engines. Now I can only assume that the 2 bolt main LT1 engines are also externally balanced, and all LT1 had 1 piece rear main seals. The 2 bolt LT1s ran from 92 to 97. On externally balanced engines, the front damper is also used to aid in balancing. You drive these little pins you get from a GM dealer into the appropriate holes to get your balance. Believe it or not, when the engine feels smooth it is balanced, no fooling that's what the bulletin says.

Did I just answer my own question?

 

Update: The seller is sending me the heat exchanger for the power steering. Great guy.

 

Today, I went through both the wiring sections of the Camaro and the 95 Caprice's service manuals. The main connector that goes through the firewall of the Camaro (c-100) really doesn't use that many of the pins. This merge of harnesses might just be a challenge. Back to the books for me.

 

Yes it will be a 1 piece rear main seal. And you would think their would be a bit more of a method to balancing? I'd probably talk to a local engine builder/ racing team that might be able to assist you in balancing a little bit better. No doubt that the engine will feel smooth when balanced correctly, but there is other factors that play into it that could make you believe its not balanced correctly when it really is, which would make you throw some more pins in but that would then throw it out of balance.

 

An engine having a 1 piece rear main seal doesn't really relate to being internally/externally balanced. You can have a 1 piece rms internally or externally balanced. I have no knowlegde of LT1 so im not sure how those are balanced but if you are building an engine (1 or 2 piece rms) you can have it either internally balanced via the counter weights on the crankshaft, or externally balanced through the flexplate and harmonic balancer/dampener. In my case scat called their rotating assembly "Internally/externally balanced" which means it was balanced via the crank counter weights and they sent a flexplate to match and I'll use a neutral balance dampener.

I may have just mis-understood what you said but the type of rear main seal doesnt neccesarily relate to the balancing.

 

If you are balancing anything, it'll have to go to the machine shop. They'll know what to do

 

Let's don't equate the RMS to balancing. Here is the story on the externally balanced LT1. When Chevrolet designed the LT1, they really didn't think about balancing until the LT1s started to come back to the dealers with rough vibrations. That's when they came out with the bulletin on externally balancing the LT1. They drilled holes on the rim of the fly wheels and dampers to accept weights in the form of pins. There is a defined placement of the pins. And if that didn't work, they had another arrangement of pins. He gave me 5 different arrangements and what RPMs to check for smoothness. When I changed my flywheel on my 92 Vette, the first arrangement smoothed out the engine in all RPM ranges. Some LT1s needed pins in the damper. Now if you rebuild your LT1 and have it internally balanced you just use neutral balanced flywheels, clutches and dampers. Mr. Killebrew, C4 project manager, seemed to know what he was talking about and even has a school you can attend to learn as much about your C4 Vette as you want. Nice discussion, lets keep it up.

 

When we refresh the bottom end, we plan on internally balancing the LT1 as this LT1 had a flex plate and a new flywheel will be needed and I don't have to worry about a dual mass flywheel like I did in my Vette.

 

I'm sorry, it sounded like there wasnt much of a method besides just adding in a couple of pns, i didnt realize they gave you certain patterns.

 

I wish I could scan and post this bulletin. It might help out a few LT1 guys. It's a PITA to do because if you have to proceed on to other patterns you have to remove some of the pins then button it up again to try it out. I was lucky with the first pattern.

 

Didn't they associate the patterns with specific rotating assemblies? It seems to me like GM's power train engineers would would have identified the resonant frequencies of the various rotating assemblies that needed to be altered, and provided a fix...

Either way, it looks like you've got a great build on your hands. Looking forward to the results.

 

I bet that when they first start up the engines, they really don't check for small vibrations and then when the customer gets it they report the problem.

Today I was planning on doing some cleaning of the engine bay, but it's too darn cold. What global warming?

 

Tell me about it... I went out and kicked the boiler on about an hour ago. It's supposed to get up to 67*F today though. Although, we had substantial snowfall two days ago.

Oh well, it made me feel better about not having my car done yet, as I couldn't drive it now anyway.

 

SNOW! Isn't that one of those 4 letter words?

 

We have had rain for the last 4 days and we haven't had a chance to do any work on our project. I hope to receive the heat exchanger for the power steering today. I've been reading about the wiring on both the Camaro and the Caprice. Is there a tool that makes it easy to pull pins out of the major plugs? Can you buy new pins? Here's a question: the term dielectric, does it conduct electricity or not? Does it just seal out moisture?

 

It DOES conduct electricity, and I don't know exactly what those connectors look like but I do know you can buy pins and connectors from places like allied electric (they might only sell to businesses actually), you'll most likely need a crimped to go along with it

 

Doing a little cleaning and priming.

 

Got the Caprice up on the lift. The exhaust will be a problem as it is rusted. Looks like a saws all for this job. I'm hoping I can take the engine out without removing the tranny. Once I get the exhaust out of the way, I hope I can get to all of the bell housing bolts.



I spotted a small oil leak (normal for a small block Chevy) near the oil filter adapter. This one has a oil cooler. I can't wait to get it out.

 

You should be able to buy a tool to de-pin your connector. I made one out of a piece of welding rod (0.070") and a plastic handle from something. You basically just pushed it into the hole and the terminal released.

 

I'll try that. Thanks

 

Take a look at this picture. See the crack in the frame area where the steering gear box connects to the frame. Has anyone else seen this problem? If so how did you fix and reinforce that area? We found this while cleaning the engine bay.

 

You mentioned refreshing the bottom end of the LT1 and balancing...I'm not sure which parts you're planning to re-use but the crank snout is different for the B-body/F-body/Y-body cars. Make sure you match that crank snout to the accessories you plan on running to keep the belt aligned. Here's a pic of the one I took off my Caprice and the first (wrong one) replacement I had ordered:

 

Thanks. The accessary set up I bought came with the damper and snout. They were a little rusty, but they should work just fine. BTW, the damper is also different from the Caprice. It will be a Corvette accessary set up all the way.

 

I would seek out somebody local and trusted to give a good analysis of the frame, and direct you to either fix, or replace that section. Some Factory irocs came with a steering brace that bolts onto the swaybar mounts to prevent this from happening. Few and spohn make a aftermarket pieces that's fairly cheap since the used ones can be hard to come by. Deffinately going to need it fixed properly, and I would recommend any steering brace that you can find.

 

Some where on this forum, a guy had a picture of a 4th gen fuel tank and he said it fit in our 3rd gen body, except for a little modifying on the fuel neck. My 83 Camaro was a carb 305 and no fuel pump in the tank. What are my options to installing a fuel pump for my LT1? Do I need to replace my fuel tank (which is no real problem)? Can I just install an in tank fuel pump? If so which one? I like the idea of a plastic tank (no rusting). I need some help here. Thanks guys

 

The fourthgen tanks are a bolt in fit to a thirdgen, the filler neck does need to be shortened though. The fuel level sender needs to be changed to a 0-90 ohm sender like thirdgens came with. Will also hae to decide how you want to integrate the sending unit wiring to your car. I know here are pumps like the walbro 255 that will drop into your tank if you can get your hands on a EFI thirdgen sending unit too. As always, I would imagine there are also inline pumps that will do the job too.

 

Would like to add, that previous post on 4th gen tanks was in reference to the plastic 99-02 style, I don't know anything about the 98-back steel tanks.

 

Thank you for the year groups that have plastic tanks. I didn't know what years had them. That will help in locating one.

Question # ? I have so many. What is a good primer for base coat paints? What is the preferred filler for engine bay work?

 

I just used basic rattle can primer from Ace. Make sure theres absolutly no grease or residue in the bay. That will ruin a base coat real quick.

I used Simple Green, worked really good.

 

We've been using purple power and (I didn't say this) a little fuel to cut the undercoat type substance on the frames. Yes, we had a fire extinguisher right there. We're going to use purple power one more time and then wash it all down with Dawn before we prime. We are planning some smoothing out of the engine bay with some filler. Sun, Mon and Tue we take the LT1 out of the Caprice. Weather looks good so wish us luck.

 

Today the weather Gods were good to us. We put the Caprice up on the Kwik lift and removed the engine. Not as easy as I thought. Getting those bell housing bolts out were tough. The exhaust came out really easy as I had sprayed all the bolts with penetrating oil. The accessaries were also not as easy as I hoped. That A/C compressor and power steering pump kicked my butt. But we got them out. Now I have a pile of brackets, braces and parts I don't need, but I'm not throwing anything away just yet. The last problem was getting the engine off the motor mounts, they were rusted pretty bad. I wish I had a "Happy Hooker" engine lift. That would have made pulling the engine much easier. The plug wires must be the original set as they were nasty. To answer one of my questions, yes you can remove the engine from a Caprice without removing the tranny. The K-member was welded in place so the motor had to come out the top. Tomorrow, I get to clean up my driveway. It's a mess. We took lots of pictures along the way and I should have some of them up tomorrow. Now if I could just sell this clean Caprice body.

 

Here's a shot of the casting showing 5.7. Thanks for having me check this before we started.



Got it out:



It looks tired, but she'll get a nice bath and fixin's. Now we'll clean everything up.

 

Well, it's starting to look like an LT1.

 

Nice work, subscribed.

 

We made a trip to Harbor Freight and bought a Ball Joint remover. Now we can remove the ball joints and clean up the control arms. We wanted to buy some die grinder bits, but this store didn't have any. We want to port match the intake to the head. I watched a very informative show on Speed Channel on how to blue print an engine. Port matching was detailed and I think it is doable. You just need the right tools. Anybody know where to buy die grinding bits?

 

Please, all you welder guys, what's a good welder to buy for the kind of work we would do on our cars, like exhaust, frame work, etc.? I looked at a Lincoln. It was a mig type with gas and ran about $600. It was also 110volts and said it could weld up to 1/4" We have been wanting to buy and learn the finer techniques of welding for a long time and now is the time. Thanks guys for any help on this.

 

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The project is on the back burner for now as my younger son is getting married and my energies are going in helping with that. I'll be back in July.

 

Okay we're back and the wedding is history. Now back to work. We talked to our engine builder and made a plan for the motor. While we have it out and wanted to replace the rings, bearings, etc, for just a few more bucks why not bore and stroke it. So, we'll go with a 383 package. But this won't happen until sometime in Aug as he is building several engines for the dirt track guys.

Here is what we did today: removed the engine harness from the Caprice. Looks in good shape and we're sure that much of this harness will be reduced.



Here are some close ups:









My plan is to clean both the Camaro harness and the Caprice harness and then hit the books on these harnesses. If it gets out of hand, I'll pass it on to a good harness builder here on the forum.

 

We also tore down the engine, removed the heads, opti (which didn't look too bad, but will be replaced) and the water pump assembly(we're going with a Meziere HD electric water pump). More later.

 

After studying both Helms manuals, It looks like a wire by wire trace and match process. Thank goodness the color of wiring is almost identical.