Hey everyone! How goes it?! Thought I'd drop in with an update of the LS1 conversion in the trusty Ironman VX of mine. Today was a GREAT day and well... as the title says... not so great day...
I recently raised the tranny up into place... last weekend to be exact. I found I was missing my torque convertor bolts and so I had to quit without having things completely into place. I purchased some new bolts earlier this week and finally got a chance to play in the garage today.
To bolt the torque convertor to the flex plate is very similar to the original Isuzu motor... you have to do it from a small gap at the front of the bell-housing. In order to do this with the LS1 in the already tight VX engine bay, it was required that I first raise the coupled motor and tranny partially out of the bay... not an easy task. I also had to pull the starter which was another intersting chore. All I have to say is God help me if I ever have to change the starter in this beast... its gonna require I either pull the motor or drop the front differential housing... I think I'll opt for a SAS at that point! lol
With the torque convertor bolted to the flex plate, the starter back home, and everything ready to go in, I had to lower the combo back into its place... again... NOT an easy task! At this point, I have the motor suspended by a chain at the front of the motor and supported under the tranny pan. In order to slip the thing in, I had to climb under the VX, then climb on top of it... lowering the tranny, raising the motor... wiggling it around, side to side, front to back... raise the tranny, lower the motor... wiggle, push and tug... back and forth I went, about 100 times... would have been nice to have had a helper! lol
Anyway, the motor and tranny are in... you wanna talk about a nice, snug fit... and one that looks OUTSTANDING! I will post a few pictures later tonight... my digital camera batteries were dead so I'm charging them now.
Now, for what I think is going to be GREAT news... there was always a question as to whether or not the front prop shaft would clear the bulky 4L60E tranmission oil pan... from the looks of things, I think its gonna be fine. I think it'll be sooo fine that its gonna look like it was MEANT to be that way!
Now for the not so good news!I went to intall the transfer case... which I must say was much easier than the tranny! lol I could actually slide under the VX, roll the T-case onto my chest from the ground, and lift it into place. As you probably know, I have had an adaptor plate manufactured by Novak Conversions out of Utah... from talking with Eric, we thought we had a winner... well, turns out that even with the shorter output shaft installed in my tranny, it is still too long! It bottoms out in the T-case input shaft before the adaptor plate mates with the tranny... I was certain I had prefit it in the driveway.
I'm guessing that I might be able to tediously, carefully cut about 1/2" of the output shaft off and make things work. The fun part will be to do the cutting, and then de-bur the splines with a small file to make it easy to slip the shafts together. I would like to chat with a tranny person though before doing this. I however have never been one to think things out, I am impatient as hell, and since the tranny shops are closed for the weekend, and I'm sure Eric at Novak Conversions is not in the shop, I'll probably just do it... worry about the consequences later! Isn't that what got me in this position in the first place?! To swap or not to swap motors?! lol
I was having too much fun while in the garage and so I couldn't help but do another test fit while daydreaming... in the beginning I knew it would be a tight fit to get my radiator in place without hitting the water pump pulley (the LS1 water pump pully is rediculously HUGE)... would you believe that the stock radiator and fan shroud fit into place perfectly?! Heck, there is even room for an electric fan or two! Oh, and from my research, the magic formula to figure the acceptable radiator surface area is basically the number of cubic inches of the motor it will cool PLUS 50... so my motor of 346 Cubic Inches plus 50 square inches equals 396... anyone know the size of the VX radiator? In case you don't, I'll tell ya... 24" wide by 17" tall... and if my handy dandy windows calculator is correct, that is 408" square inches... which means I can fit enough radiator into the stock location... and by the way, this figure is with a simple two-row core radiator... any additional cores starts to lose effectiveness as you get heat soak by the time the air reaches the third and fourth row of the core.
Anyway... anyone here have input on cutting my output shaft about 1/2"? I'm know the shaft is made of some hardened tool steel or something... so I'm sure it won't be easy. Cleaning up any burs on the splins will have to be done manually by file which could be time consuming. In order to do some a modification at a machine shop at this point is going to be every bit as hard and much more expensive... I'd have to pull the tranny back out, take things apart and take the shaft to a machine shop to be cut and cleaned up... then I have to do it all over again. Anyone here with advice?
Welp, sorry for the length of the thread... just wanted to leave some good info on the update. Also as I mentioned, I'll post some pictures later tonight. I'll chat with y'all later!
TTYL!
Coach... I mean Randy (I often forget who I really am)
Undergoing LS1 Conversion as we speak!
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