Detroitmuscle
Forum Member
I have been very quiet lately on the car scene as most other things in life take priority but this is an attempt to mix things up a bit and have a little fun and gain some knowledge in the process. As most of you know building a car is an expensive hobby so in the spirit of true budget-minded builds Mike (c0ncEpt) and I have teamed up to try and save at least one of our cars from sitting out this year.
The goal: To get this car up and running this season on a very very tight budget, shake out all the bugs, and possibly get some power numbers as well as track times.
The car: We are using my 98 Trans am as the base, it has some decent suspension pieces, a "built" rear end that may or may not hold (keeping fingers crossed) and very soon to have a trans that should be more than capable of taking anything we will throw at it and then some.
Motor: We recently acquired a junkyard 5.3 LM7 motor with 126K on the clock, complete longblock with accessories. We will be doing very minimal work to this motor the plan is to get some ebay head studs, some LS9 headgaskets, a set of valvesprings, clean it up and beat it to all hell and back.
Transmission: Detroit gearbox fresh built TH400 RMVB trans with trans brake.
Turbo Kit: Huron speed sponsored non-a/c T4 flange kit using a 44mm wastegate and XS 76mm turbo.
Fuel system: Aeromotive A1000 pump, new AN lines for feed and return, regulator, filter ect.
This is a very basic and generic rundown of the setup we will be putting together, of course anything is subject to change at this point and we will be keeping an eye out for any and all good deals but remember this build will be done on the CHEAP until we can afford otherwise. All parts we have so far have been great deals or thing we had lying around. We hope to learn a lot here as there will be a lot of firsts in this build for Mike and myself. We have no set hp or ET goals at this point just looking to have a running car that we can both enjoy and take it from there. Here are a few pics of what we have so far.
Bye bye H/C setup
New motor
The goal: To get this car up and running this season on a very very tight budget, shake out all the bugs, and possibly get some power numbers as well as track times.
The car: We are using my 98 Trans am as the base, it has some decent suspension pieces, a "built" rear end that may or may not hold (keeping fingers crossed) and very soon to have a trans that should be more than capable of taking anything we will throw at it and then some.
Motor: We recently acquired a junkyard 5.3 LM7 motor with 126K on the clock, complete longblock with accessories. We will be doing very minimal work to this motor the plan is to get some ebay head studs, some LS9 headgaskets, a set of valvesprings, clean it up and beat it to all hell and back.
Transmission: Detroit gearbox fresh built TH400 RMVB trans with trans brake.
Turbo Kit: Huron speed sponsored non-a/c T4 flange kit using a 44mm wastegate and XS 76mm turbo.
Fuel system: Aeromotive A1000 pump, new AN lines for feed and return, regulator, filter ect.
This is a very basic and generic rundown of the setup we will be putting together, of course anything is subject to change at this point and we will be keeping an eye out for any and all good deals but remember this build will be done on the CHEAP until we can afford otherwise. All parts we have so far have been great deals or thing we had lying around. We hope to learn a lot here as there will be a lot of firsts in this build for Mike and myself. We have no set hp or ET goals at this point just looking to have a running car that we can both enjoy and take it from there. Here are a few pics of what we have so far.
Bye bye H/C setup
New motor
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