build journal - '13 2ss/1le [COTW 8/15/16]

[h018871]

Hammdo had some spare 1LE shocks and struts available, I picked up a set and put them on the car while the cradle was out. I did the shocks in the rear at the same time.
Thx Don!

[h018871]

Quite a few of the LS7 blogs indicate that the rear of the heads can get hot and cause issues with the rear cylinders. The solution is to remove the plugs at the rear and connect the ports to the existing front steam line. The plugs come out fairly easily when the head is off, just punch and hammer from the head surface side. There is easy access to the bottom of the rivet/plug. Well, the heads were on the motor and I didn't want to remove them.
SO......I took and old steam pipe end and drilled it out to act as a guide, then used an easy out to grab on the rivet and pull it out. It went very well, coated the drill with grease to catch the shavings and done!
GM "some time back" made a one piece steam pipe for all four corners, it is # 16 in the drawing, I think it may be PN 12602544, but not sure at all.
I used the front steam pipe from the LS3 and pn 12605716 for the rear. The outlet goes straight up and required minimal bending to get around the intake manifold.
4 new o-rings # 12602541 and ready to go.

[h018871]

The MSD LS7 intake put into a 5th gen SS requires a few adjustments.

1st, the LS3 Manifold Absolute Pressure (MAP) sensor will not fit in the hole in the manifold. Yes, you can drill out the hole and recut the taper for the o-ring, but the hold down is on the wrong side. That too can be cut off, but I was not comfortable hacking on a sensor. So got the LS7 MAP and pigtail. MAP 12644569, pigtail 88987997 (ACDelco PT1799).

2nd, my case specifically: the oil pressure sensor at the back of the valley cover was "clocked wrong", such that the release catch was right against the manifold. The threads are straight cut with the seal coming from a crush washer. I removed the crush washer and replaced it with a thicker crush washer. This re clocked the sensor so the latch was towards the firewall. SWEET!

3rd: The tension pulley and throttle body were trying to occupy the same space. I had a 102mm throttle body, so I put on the OEM LS3 TB.........still interference. Remember the different accessory drives for wet and dry sump? The difference comes from the thicker LS7 dry sump oil pump, that pushes all the pulleys forward (further away from the motor). This meant that the, LS3 tension pulley is now closer to the motor and interferes with the TB. Sometimes the TB can be flipped over, but not in this case.
The solution was to swap the larger dia SS LS3 pulley (~4") for a smaller dia C6 LS3 pulley (~2.7"), it is also slightly thinner. Gates pulley # 38008, takes Gates #K060790 belt on an electric PS car.

[krazzyk01]

Originally Posted by h018871

I removed the engine out the bottom, dropping the front sub-frame. This gave me the opportunity to take care of some maintenance/clean up items in the engine compartment. Cleaned up some of the wiring wrap, put in new firewall insulation and do a perminant repair to a short in the main power cable that runs between the jump post and the engine compartment fuse box. It was causing intermittent steering failures, only when in hard left turns at speed.........not the best time for the steering to go out!

Insulator part #s
92195864 Insulator, left, outer, upper
92230866 Insulator, right, outer, lower

Positive Cable, Front 6.2 liter 22925607
This was MUCH easier to replace with the engine out of the cradle

Hey! Long time...

Can you elaborate on where this was? I've got some possible issues during high speed turns as well. Not sure it the same thing or not but that looks like something worth checking out anyway.

Thanks

[h018871]

Originally Posted by krazzyk01

Hey! Long time...

Can you elaborate on where this was? I've got some possible issues during high speed turns as well. Not sure it the same thing or not but that looks like something worth checking out anyway.

Thanks

Hey there krazzy!
When going into a hard left turn while at speed the steering wheel would jump ~45-60 degrees to the left and get very hard to turn. A bit unnerving.........
Also the radio would reboot and one or both windows went into relearn for indexing. Definitely a power problem.
The short location was under the oil pan, the wire runs inside of a black metal tray.
This is a pretty poor drawing, item # 2 is the wire. It runs from the jump post to the starter, alternator and the under hood fuse box.

BTW I'm headed up to Cresson next weekend with PCA, it should be fun. We need to get on track together soon

[hammdo]

Originally Posted by h018871

Hammdo had some spare 1LE shocks and struts available, I picked up a set and put them on the car while the cradle was out. I did the shocks in the rear at the same time.
Thx Don!

Save a brother some $ ;o)

-Don

[h018871]

Not really a shock........ He's the man

I'm surprised that I didn't do this before. I was at MSR Cresson last weekend. After putting the camber plates back to "street" (-1.0 degrees) and driving to the hotel the car was parked with the wheel at full lock right. this was to take up as few spaces as possible in the parking lot.
The caster is at 8 degrees, the tires now follow an arc that really helps turn in and more importantly greatly reduces inside edge wear on the tire to the inside of a turn. Additionally, the outside edge tire wear has been reduced. Maybe not very clear from my explanation............some pictures to help

[hammdo]

Geoff, how about a pic of your camber plate settings — do you mark them or, do you have the alignment shop tell you what marks to set at?

Also, do you leave toe alone?

Like the Conties wear...

-Don

[h018871]

I’ll get some pics later
I pull the struts all the way out for the street alignment setting. The plates are marked, each hash is 0.16 degrees IIRC (verified). I’ll verify that
I built a spread sheet that I use when prepping for track days. One of the things on it deals with the plates. Enter current and desired camber and it spits out the number of hashes to move.
I get a lot of wheel travel because I’m using OE springs. This keeps my camber fairly small, I usually run between-2.0 & -2.5 at the track
I do not make toe adjustments. Increasing negative camber causes the toe adjustment to move from toe in to toe out. This helps turn in also
Street toe is 0.5 degrees in

[hammdo]

I’ll need to see what my marks are (Pedders).

I run 0° toe on mine (street) so the toe out is not so bad.

I’m heavy in the front as it is ;o)

Thanks!

-Don

[h018871]

As you can see from all of the marks, the the track camber setting is not always the same, and it varies side to side. The outside tire (right is CCW, left if CW) usually gets more neg camber.....
The hash marks have a 2mm spacing. There is roughly 0.08 degrees/mm, so that means ~ 0.16 degrees/hash, I corrected the previous post. During track prep I mark the target hash with a sharpie to make adjustments once I get to the track quicker and easier. The silver sharpie doesn't come off with 'tub o towels' like black and green do.......so I ignore the silver dot, although it is the easiest to see!

[hammdo]

Nice, FYI, I have the Moreno plates if you ever want them (bearing on the drivers side is gone but, can be replaced). Next time you’re up, let me know...

Pedders is ~.5 ° per tick mark (they let me know). I’ll have my shop test mark them next time I’m in.

-Don

[h018871]

I'll take you up on your offer, thank you.

I'll be up at Cresson this weekend, swing on by and grab some BBQ!

[hammdo]

Hum... since my plans are busted...

Saturday or Sunday?

-Don