Totally unoriginal LQ1 build thread

[draven]

I'm compiling about everything that's already been done to the DOHC that I've learned over the years watching others, so as the LQ1 begins to move into the twilight of its existence, (good riddance eh?) I figured I'd give it one of its last huzaaahhs! and probably even turbo it... oh yeah... that's original...

96 DOHC

Short block assembly is about to commence on the block from the builder and as well as a reworked heads.
Work done so far:
ARP rod bolts
.30 overbore
hot tanked
Hypereureticiceuretic pistons (never could spell it much less say it right in public)
block casting removed to help oil drain back.
tri metal clevite rod and main bearings
balanced rotating assembly
SBC cam bearings for IMS
polished crank
5 angle head job
clevite valves
blah blah blah...

The machinist doing the work asked me if there was anything additional to be done to the block before assembly and I wondered if the LQ1 would take to the additional oil holes drilled in the upper main cap bearings along with a machined groove to assist in rod journal oiling. All this recommended in the 60deg V6 performance manual..

Anyone have a pic of the main cap journals? I cannot remember if there already is a .125 groove there or not...

[The Dark Side of Will]

There are (were?) 270/360 degree grooved main bearings available. Use is highly recommended.
http://realfierotech.com/phpBB/viewtopi ... 781#p19781

King Bearing is still in business, but their website has changed since that thread was written, making the links dead.

Don't know what your budget is, but I'd look into 6" SBC rods and custom cut forged pistons if you are really looking to make power.

[Shaun41178(2)]

I think the 3.1 crank already has the lead in grooves, and if I am not mistaken the block is cast with the grooves in the main bearing locations as well. I suppose you could always crossdrill the crank mains like in the performance manual

6" rods and forged pistons are totally unnecessary to make 400 whp with a boosted setup so I will disagree with Will on this one.. Many people have done it on stock bottom ends.

[Aaron]

What if his goal is 500? Or more?

400whp DOHC turboes aren't terribly uncommon.

[draven]

this build is for a fun and reliable daily driver and only occasional race car. Yes, the custom cut pistons and sbc rods would have been nice insurance but I'm not going to push more than 400-500max on the LQ1. That's been done many times before..MattHawkins, FerrariFan, etc....nothing new there.. Nobody that I'm aware of has made more than them and this build is "unoriginal", not to find out the next weakest link in the lq1. Many high hp Lq1s that have failed have done so at the crank or rod bearing surface through over spinning or detonation. It's either oil starvation or rod bolt deformation ... that's my best guess.. and I'm attempting to combat both of them... I won't be spinning this much beyond 7000 at all.. thinking 7200 fuel/spark cut..

I wanted king bearings too and even thought the builders at Ball Engine swear by trimetal bearings, perferably king bearings at that, ( and only if you keep your super oil clean), King only has the bimetal for the Lq1/60deg. Now, given the lack of a 180deg oil valley in the mahle/clevite bearings I may try and make up for it having him drill and chamfer the extra holes in the bearings.

Shaun I do vaguely remember there being a groove in the casting for the main journals but only took pics of the bearing surfaces during the tear down.. does anyone have a pic of their LQ1 main journals without bearings installed. I'll be calling the builder tomorrow regardless...

As far as turbo's go, are the holsten VGT's worth their price. I've also seen an attachment that the 2JZ guys use that essentially blocks off one vane of a twin scroll housing and opens it up at a preset boost level for a poor man's VGT.

[draven]

Oh.. this is going along with a 70-80% tear down of procarnut's 86 fiero. It was pretty from afar but faaar from pretty up close. Some things were done very well but others were done with the extreme "fiero" way... This is going on an 88 rear kframe swap, a complete interior makeover, 96 standard corvette seats, leather, a non-stock fiero dash, all new door hardware. blah blah blah... we'll see right? The car already has C5 brakes on it. ECU will probably be a haltech E11v2. Probably back to the stock hptuner, darth fiero setup it came with and then on to the haltech.

Currently the interior is torn out. I've fiberglass reinforced the headliner and firewall and reupholstered them in marine pleather. shift boot, emergency brake, visors and map pockets are getting reupholstered by a professional. I can sew up a wound (I'm one of those survival course junkies) but sewing ain't my thing... Driver side door torn completely down to the metal with all new key locks, regulators, and power lock motors going in.. this thing is an f'ing pile of texas dust behind every damn panel too... I have to have the shop vac ready whenever a panel comes off... no shit..

oh well enoug of my griping.. get to the pics right?

As she stood after the dust ball motor came out..


Had to obtain a new firewall cover after having to tear out a firewall MDF speaker box for legroom... found a fella on craigslist who was "giving" away Formula parts as he was building a lambo kit.. made out like a bandit with center console, dash, fender wells (duh formulas wells don't fit a GT), gauges, gauge pods, shifter boot.. all for free.. nice man..

If the fiberboard ever breaks just glass in some of those metal rods used to hold insulation up in ceiling trusses..


The floor plugs were re-sealed up with resin and had cracked and let more dust and dirt in..
Recut some plugs out of sheet metal, pressed them to a near similar shape and sealed with SEM Seam Sealer... Awesome stuff..


Careful kids, don't undercut the passenger deck lid hinge without a proper front engine mount.


She sure looks like a 15K mile motor in the cam carriers...unfortunately there was 11/16ths of caked dirt in the valley between the heads under the LIM.


and for a couple of fun pics.. and a reminder that we do indeed drive mid 80s ghetto sleds..
This is what my wife sent me to go drive on my birthday...




I only had 6 laps in the gray/black 430 and 6 laps in the yellow AWD Gallardo. Barely enough time to get into a groove after an 8 year hiatus from SCCA and Panoz racing schoool.. I have a new appreciation of paddle shifters now... and hands down... I'd take the ferrari over the lambo any day..

[The Dark Side of Will]

GM dealers still have those plugs... I think.

Have you looked at The Fiero Store's repro headliners? They're in ABS plastic instead of the crappy tissue board that GM used.

http://www.fierostore.com/Product/Detai ... &d=264&p=1

They also have a replacement firewall cover:
http://www.fierostore.com/Product/Detai ... &d=259&p=1

Not affiliated... I just think these are really cool products.
There are also matching door panels.
I don't like the speaker locations in any of these interior pieces, though. I'd be happier with plain panels.

[Aaron]

That's been done many times before..MattHawkins, FerrariFan, etc....nothing new there.. Nobody that I'm aware of has made more than them and this build is "unoriginal", not to find out the next weakest link in the lq1. Many high hp Lq1s that have failed have done so at the crank or rod bearing surface through over spinning or detonation. It's either oil starvation or rod bolt deformation ... that's my best guess.. and I'm attempting to combat both of them... I won't be spinning this much beyond 7000 at all.. thinking 7200 fuel/spark cut..

Thanks dick, you know mine's up there too!

I blew up my Lumina Z34 in high school, spun a bearing at 125,000 miles. Pretty confident in saying it was due to bottom end oil starvation. I'm glad to hear you removed the casting flash on your drain back ports, Series8217 did that on his. I did not on mine, however I added 1.5 quarts oil capacity via a deeper oil pan.

I think the factory rev limit is 7150 or 7200, thats what I run mine too.

[draven]

7150 limiter for the 284 equipped LQ1s.

the mahle/clevite trimetals do have additional holes for oiling, just not the extra "oiling vane" like the King bearings.

Will have to repaint the block once I get it back... back to the factory black or go with a faux aluminum engine enamel?

[crzyone]

Black radiates heat better. Not sure you want it radiated in the engine bay though.

[The Dark Side of Will]

Don't go faux aluminum on an iron block.

[draven]

While performing a complete tear down of my doors, hinges, pins, power locks, window motor, glass, dew wipes, etc..etc... I noticed my door latch was more or less shot. I took it apart to rebuild but one of the pivot rivets that hold the two pieces together siezed and the collar collapsed in my press. Checked out OE for any OE latch replacments and came up with nada.

However a really short look on the interwebs landed this..



1989-1998 Chevy Silverado GMC Sierra & GM Driver Left Door Latch Assembly OEM - GM# 16631627

Almost a spot on equivalent to ours with two minor differences, the hole for the door adjar switch is not there.. no issue.. but the door lock and unlock arm is a little dissimilar.

Here I 've removed the door lock arm from the original for comparison and you can see that the left side of the new arm doen't have the door rod tab with holes..


so the plan is to remove the new rod arm and replace it with the old arm and re rivet, however...

The aluminum rivet holding the arm to the latch chassis looks to be a solid shoulder rivet like this:


Does anyone have a location or site to get solid shoulder rivets such as this? I was going to use a stainless binding post, or even a shimmed blind rivet, before drilling out the rivet and noticing the shoulder portion creating two diameters, one in the latch chassis and the other in the lock arm.

The best I've come up so far is this:
http://www.spaenaur.com/pdf/sectionE/E7.pdf

and this

1/4" Headlight Retainer Rivet #2916T - GM# 15022087 here http://www.autobodysupplies.com/rivets.htm

or custom build / order your own rivets here: http://www.rivetsinstock.com/rivet-builder.html

anybody got any other ideas?

[draven]

While finishing up the stripping down of my pre88 cradle I took the opportunity, at several member's request, to illustrate the C5 rear parking brake that the PO had implemented.

Here's the backside of the setup:


here's the front of the setup


Drum brake and acuator removed and flipped


Corvette back plate removed and flipped


Here it is lined up against an 88 knuckle/upright:


The mild steel circular backing plate is only 1/8" - 3/16" thick and the welded on ears bring the caliper mounting depth up close to 1/4" or so.. The pre 88 knuckles have their caliper mounting flanges cut/ground off to make room for the actuator movement so all braking stress was applied to the hub bolts as the backing plate was sandwiched between the hub and knuckle. (as a side note: the axle to hub area had another 1/4" spacer to bring the axle more inboard of the wheel nut cap as the offset of the wheels were so low the axle stuck out side of the wheel)

As you can see above, the 88 knuckle will necessitate removal of its entire caliper mounting tab to make room for the actuator and the bolt heads attaching the acutator/drum to the backing plate.

The original corvette hub bolt spacing, as evidenced on the thin plate between the actuator and caliper plate and thusly clearanced for the fiero hub spacing, looks suspiciously the same size as the achieva knuckles..

I'm thinking I might go with the achieva hubs, recut a mounting plate out of 1/4" 7075 aluminum. this would reduce weight, maintain proper strength, and give proper spacing for the achieva hub to axle requirement (so I've read). More research to come..

However, is it "safe" to utilize the hub bolts as the mounting point for calipers as done in this example? gentlemen, please chime in...

[The Dark Side of Will]

Yeah, using the hub mounting bolts is fine.

That looks fairly simple. I've had a pair of C5 rear knuckles on the shelf forever and was working up to taking them apart to see how the parking brake could be adapted.

At some point, GM seems to have standardized or come close to standardizing the mounting circle where the hub bolts to the knuckle. The later aluminum knuckle N-bodies and W-bodies can exchange hubs, for example. They both have the 5x115 bolt circle, but the W-body has MUCH larger hub splines than the N. I've read somewhere that C5 Corvette front brakes will bolt up to an N-body knuckle. I'm not sure if that applied to the Corvette hub as well or not.

[draven]

Other than coating it properly for corrosion, would 1/4" 7075 aluminum pose any problems in this situation as a hub and caliper plate vs mild steel?

I've got a local metal supermarket that can water jet or cnc off of a cad file.. so I'm dusting off my intro cad skills from college with freeCAD , 20 years ago...

[draven]

While waiting for the engine to finish at the shop (Machinist time remember) and finishing up the engine bay and interior... I'm looking at the front suspension.

I've SCCA'd my old 87 back in the 90s enough to know that even with koni's, eibachs, new bushings, etc.. that the front can be very twitchy and difficult to drive at the limit.. I plan on joining a sports car club at Road Atlanta and running my ghetto sled theire 2-4 times a year so a more stable front susp. to go along with the rear 88 cradle might be in order..

1. I have a line on a nearby 88 front suspension for next to nothing. Will, what is really involved in swapping the 88 susp. into a pre88? I've already looked around Old Europe and understand most of the issues involved.

2. Does anyone have any quality information on the Ryane / Held / Aurraut Slalom suspension? (shiver) (lots of talk but no hard numbers as to how it relates to the original or 88 suspension i.e. roll center, travel, anti dive, anti squat, total travel, etc...) I'm also well aware of the quality problems involved with the slalom suspension as well.

3. should I just shitcan my whole chassis and go with an 88

My biggest constraint is time as I want this pig back on the road..

[Series8217]

1. I have a line on a nearby 88 front suspension for next to nothing. Will, what is really involved in swapping the 88 susp. into a pre88? I've already looked around Old Europe and understand most of the issues involved.

2. Does anyone have any quality information on the Ryane / Held / Aurraut Slalom suspension? (shiver) (lots of talk but no hard numbers as to how it relates to the original or 88 suspension i.e. roll center, travel, anti dive, anti squat, total travel, etc...) I'm also well aware of the quality problems involved with the slalom suspension as well.

3. should I just shitcan my whole chassis and go with an 88

My biggest constraint is time as I want this pig back on the road..

1) If this is easier than switching to an '88 chassis, do it.

2) Don't bother. There is no indication that they know what they're doing with suspension design, and no indication that you won't be replacing all of the parts due to quality issues anyway.

3) See #1.

[draven]

wahoo! got the block, carriers, and heads back from the engine shop... only 7.5 months............

pics to come of the assembly

Has anyone turbo'd a fiero lq1 with the stock 96 intake manifold with a N* throttle body?

Didn't Aaron do this?

<edited for brevity>

[Aaron]

That's exactly what I did, built a custom aluminum 3" intake arm with 3/8" flanges and mounted a N* throttle body. Works great!

[draven]

That's exactly what I did, built a custom aluminum 3" intake arm with 3/8" flanges and mounted a N* throttle body. Works great!

What numbers did you put down with your setup? dyno? You utilized a GT35, correct?

thanks...