262's 85 Fiero SE LX9 F23 swap thread lots of pics

[ericjon262]

For the first time in over a year, the car is back indoors. I going to clean in/around the car, and start making preparations for removal of the engine, and installation of a new short block. 2019 will be the year of the Banshee.

[1QUICKHATCH]

Looks good, I will be watching for updates!

[ericjon262]

they'll be coming, slowly, but coming...

[ericjon262]

quick update, contrary to popular belief, and mine as well... the LX9 uses a 24x wheel on the crank, identical to an LS1! hopefully in the next couple of weeks, I will have my MS3X re-calibrated for the 24x wheel and I can ditch the external wheel. I'm also starting to look at ways to simplify my intercooler setup, I have a few ideas floating around, that I'll post up once I can further validate them.

[ericjon262]

a few quick updates:

the programming in the MS3 can be setup to run the LX9 as "wasted COP" the guys on the MS forum are working on making it full sequential COP.

I have a new engine in the garage. my Suburban is currently taking up all of my time, and money... I'm going to drive it to Alaska and back(Washington), you can see that in the link below if interested...

http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/showthread.php?t=766856

I sold the MS3x, I am going to upgrade to an MS3 pro ultimate, and get replace the factory gages with a tablet.

I'm currently planning a new hotside, made of either Schedule 40 mild steel weld els, or Schedule 10 304 SS weld els. price is about the same for both, but the stainless will be way lighter, and look nicer.

[ericjon262]

well, my truck's engine is back in! which means my engine stand is free! I'm planning on throwing the 3500 on the stand and starting teardown soon.

[ericjon262]

not much to report on, but the "new" LX9 is on the engine stand, and I plan to start tear down later this week in parallel with work on The Pig Rig.

[ericjon262]

I started teardown of the new engine today



drained residual oil out and it was still somewhat see through!



another forged crank, I'm 3 for 3 with them so far.



pulled the timing cover and was quite surprised at how clean it is!





then I dropped the pan











it's pristine! practically brand new looking. the bores have hatch marks still, but look pretty glassy, I'm going to run a ball deglazer over them to renew the walls, and probably throw a set of gapless top rings in for shits and giggles. overall, this thing looks awesome, I'm half tempted to just throw it in and run it as is, but that wouldn't be any fun when I have those ported heads and monster cam to go with it.

[ericjon262]

I started teardown of the engine in the car the other day. today, I yanked the heads off, they look ok, but it felt odd, they came off way too easy. the gaskets stuck to the heads, not the block, but both peeled off the heads pretty easy. there was a piece of what appears to be aluminum in hole number 4, but I think it hasn't been there long, I think it may have snuck in through one of the sparkplug holes thats been open in the garage for the past 3 months, there's no signs of damage d/t it.

on the other hand, the water jackets of the heads, and the block are full of corrosion products and bullshit of unknown origin.

the stuff in hole 4:





all the other pictures:

[ericjon262]

got the block back from the machine shop! I taped it off and shot some black paint on, I think it turned out pretty good.



I also got a little something in as well! right now, the majority of my efforts are focused elsewhere, but that should shift next month once I come off leave.

[ericjon262]

Alright! so, I don't have a ton of pics at the moment, but progress is being made, the engine is out, and I just placed a large order with WOT-tech for studs, head gaskets, and other paraphernalia. I also ordered a set of total seal rings, I talked to one of their techs, and he didn't like the gapless rings for what I was doing, mainly because of how thin the top ring is, so I ended up with a standard top, and a napier second.


in other non engine related news, I ripped my intercooler reservoir out, I'm planning on making or buying something smaller, that will mount closer to the heat exchanger. I also plan to mount the pump all the way up there as well. I'll end up building a wood or sheet metal panel to fill the hole where the old tank went.

I also came to the realization that I made a somewhat large mistake with this car fairly recently. when I pulled the intake manifold a few months ago, I noticed the plenum gasket wasn't crushed around one of the ports. I should have thought a bit harder about this and fixed it on the spot and tried running the engine again. in the past when it didn't want to play nice, it would only run if it was super rich, which makes sense if there's a huge air leak into the plenum causing 2 or 3 cylinders to be much leaner than the others, which are now crazy rich and not wanting to fire. this realization has triggered the decision to ditch my custom intake for now. I'm undecided as to whether I'll run a ported stock piece, or make a new custom manifold similar to what was there.

I'm also probably going to go ahead and convert to DBW and digital dash. my throttle cable is about to break, multiple strands are visibly unraveled, and it's harder to package a DBC throttle as neatly as a DBW.

I also need to fix my front trans mount, I put that thing together very poorly, because I was in a rush to get the car together. I'm also going to redo my engine mount so that it bolts to a stock pan, so that when I throw a rod through the pan spinning this engine to 8K, I can replace it with any old engine and not have to grind away bits of the pan.

for now, I plan to throw the car together N/A, but try and carefully plan for adding a turbo after I can drive it again.

[ericjon262]

drunk me ordered the throttle controller the other night, I'd expect it here sometime next week.

in other news, if I want AC again, I'll have to re work my engine mounts



I checked piston to valve clearance,



it was a little tight for my liking, about .060", I would prefer at least .1", so I decided to get a bit sloppy...











while my work was sloppy, I put the effort into making it pretty good, I ended up with 6 almost identical reliefs which should provide plenty of clearance.



I torqued the heads down in 7 passes, starting at 20 ft lbs, and then going up in 10 lb increments up to 80 ft lbs. I then checked torque at 80 ft lbs on each stud 3 times before going to bed. the next morning, I did 2 more passes at 80 ft lbs. no stud movement.

the gen IV 60v6 uses a timing chain tensioner instead of a damper, it bolts onto the earlier engines, so I decided to install one, along with a cryo treated timing set from WOT-Tech. the wire pin is to keep the tension shoe off of the chain during install, it was removed after this picture.





then I installed the timing cover and commenced measuring pushrods. all of the exhaust pushrods measured in between 6.06" and 6.08" at zero lash, and the intakes all measured between 5.63" and 5.64" at zero lash, unfortunately, I can't find a lifter preload spec anywhere... I have seen a few sources that say LS V8's are .040-.050, and others that say .060-.080", and 3800's like .030(I assume the difference is block and head material) but nothing for a 60v6, which has smaller lifters, shorter pushrods, canted valves.and mixed materials for the heads/block.

[Will'sFiero]

Maybe the lack of traffic at this site is partially driven by the fact that it never sends topic reply notifications.

Looking good! Kill it!

[niceguy]

I agree, I just happened to browse the forum for the first time in awhile.....I wish I had time to try my hand at welding, I'd lke to do something cool for the LZ9 3.9L. Getting head gaskets replaced and anything else needed while torn down and I have a spare 3.9VVT that I want to mess with this winter.
Enjoying your pics and updates, wish you were closer to Memphis, TN so you could do my engine work lol

[bszopi]

Good looking build. And I will look into the topic reply issue.