Joel's LS1 FC parts list/swap thread (remixed)

[frijolee]

Intake Tract v1.0:
 
Eventually I intend to build myself a cold air box so I'm running my air filter off on the side of the bay.  I found an intake kit from a 96 impala on eBay that used 3 1/2" piping and had ordered that a while previously.  Once I saw how far it stuck out I knew I was going to need to fab some support for it.  I lengthened the leads to the MAF and bent some 1/8" aluminum bar stock into supports so my intake is basically on a tripod with the elbow being the 3rd leg.
 

 
 
I put all the flat faces of the barstock in the direction the engine will shift on its mounts and rubber mounted the far tips so it can flex.  That box under the headlight is the fuel pump resistor relay that's not needed with the ls1 and has since been removed.  (It basically makes the mazda pump see partial voltage when not needed)Here's the final version:
 

 
 
By the way the elbow needed is a 4" to 3 1/2" not a pure 3 1/2" 90.  I don't know how I got this wrong but I did.  I called JTR to order the right one and Mike was cool enough to flow that to me as a thank you for taking all the pics during radiator install.  Props for good customer service.... :yeah:
 
Parts list:
-4 to 3.5" elbow
-3.5" pipe (bought a kit from a 96 impala)
-3.5" coupler to MAF
-MAF to 3.5" intake
-4x 4? ID stainless worm gear hose clamps
-1x 4.5? ID stainless worm gear clamp
-Plus those couple strips of 1/8? x 1? aluminum I used to support the cantilevered end.
 
I eventually made 436 rwhp through this setup.

[frijolee]

Wiring Notes Consolidated 
 
[Ed Note: I put this together way after my car was done because I had Danzan and Brismo7 help me out on the first pass.  Still, this is where it belongs in sequence so here you go.)
 
Wiring: it seems like that's a place a lot of folks get stuck... I've tried answering a few PMs on the topic so I thought even a high level overview might help some other folks out.

No one has ever really done a full up set of wiring instructions (at least that I know of). There are lots of bits and pieces out there but the closest in my opinion is the instructions to install a pre modified wiring harness from Brismo7/Danzan (now Dan.Snyder).  Brismo was doing DynoTested's harnesses for a while there and may still be but the idea is similar.

The easiest way to address the wiring harness is to modify a GM harness and then deal with the interface to the chassis electronics. Most of the stock Mazda engine harness can go away (all but the wipers and ABS--if you have it--on the passenger side). The drivers side has a bunch of spare connectors you can weed out but I tend to recommend that you you leave it alone until the car's functioning and you can see what you really need. You don't want to lose your turn signals by mistake.


That said, you really only have six or seven things you need to hook up to the car, the challenge is weeding that GM harness down and bundling/bringing the wires out to interface. I tend to suggest it's well worth the ~$180 to have this done for you (just don't use Hinson as that's really not one of his strengths)

I'm enclosing Danzan's wiring install directions which include a bunch of notes I took during my install. Be warned that these were written to cover the interface once harness mods are done. If you feel like doing this from scratch the writeup includes link to GM pinouts so hopefully from there you can do a bit of reverse engineering, and figure out what you need to do to pull the leads required...

Interface to the car is:

- 12V continous
- 12V ignition
- starter
- VSS
- ground
- fan relay
- fuel pump relay

There's also a resistor required to feed the alternator the correct voltage to turn on properly. If you search for "resistor" and "alternator" you'll probably find it. I believe there was another resistor you could install to disable skip shift but most folks do that in the ECM anyways.

Both constant and ignition on power leads run to multiple things (each injector etc). But it's not too bad you just have to take your time and recognize that in some cases the ECU provides power to a relay and in some cases it provides ground.

Good luck, take your time, and solder/heat shrink EVERYTHING. You'll be happy you did down the road.
 

following is my latest harness mod writeup.  it applies to the FC as well as the FD.  1999-2002 LS1
 
It is convenient to pull the following wires out of the camobird connectors
 
...C100...black 10 pin connector.
............J- dk green (cooling fan 1 relay control out)
 
...C101...grey 10 pin connector.
............D- dk green w/ white stripe (fuel pump relay control out)
 
...C102...
............A- purple (starter solenoid "start" power in)
 
...C105...black 8 pin connector.
............G- white (tach signal out) 
 
There are 5 pink wires going to the F body external connectors.  cut those wires off to equal length & skin about 1/2" of insulation.  Twist the ends & solder them together, along with an extension wire.  #10 wire will do for the extension.  That wire will go to the ignition-on wire at the ignition switch.
 
There is an orange wire on the F body external connector.  That wire will connect to battery constant.
 
After you do these power wires, you can cut off the F body external connectors.
 
There is one very long bundle that has a rubber grommet on it.  Be careful when you cut that bundle off, because there is a loop of orange wire, that comes out of the fat harness shroud, at the top end of that bundle.  There are no needed wires in that long snake.
 
You may want to save the long wires, for use later.
 
4.  Solder a 470 ohm resistor in the red wire coming from pin 15, red connector. 
 
5.  CAGS-  Cut off the CAGS plug from the harness.    Solder a 2.2K ohm resister between the  two cut wires.
 
BLUE CONNECTOR WIRES.
 
1.  Fan control, low temperature-dark green wire coming from pin 42, blue connector. 
 
2.  OBD2.  Dark green from pin 58 blue “serial data”. 
 
RED CONNECTOR WIRES.
 
1.  Speedometer control-Skin about 1/2 inch of insulation from the purple/white wire from pin 21. red connector. If you are using a smart speedometer, the purple/white wire goes to the speedometer input.       
 
2.  Tachometer.  White wire on pin 10, red connector. 
 
3.  Fan control- High temperature.  Dark blue wire, pin 33. 
 
4.  Starter-Use the purple wire already in the harness.
 
5.  Oil pressure.  A wire must be added if the Mazda gray/red wire is missing.  One end will go to the gauge.  the other end will go to your sensor.  This wire will come out of the harness at the location of your sensor installation. 
 
6.  Coolant temperature.  A wire must be added.  This wire will go from the sensor location @ the threaded hole at the rear of the passenger side cylinder head, to the gauge. 
 
7.  Check engine light.  Use the brown/white wire from pin 46.
 
8.  Fuel pump relay.  Dark green/white wire coming from pin 9, red connector. 
 
9.  Back up lights.  Not controlled by the PCM.  connect one plug wire to ignition-on, & the other to any red wire, that goes to the lights.
 
10. Reverse lockout-automatic only- light green, pin 44 , red, if you are lucky
 
GM A/C
 
11. A/C request.  Dark green/white-pin 17
 
12. A/C status.  Dark green-pin 18
 
13. A/C clutch.  Dark green/white-pin 43

[frijolee]

The Devil's in the details...
 
So this is a bit of a cleanup post to document a few of the things that were hard at the end of the road.  If you're reading really carefully you might notice I predicted startup "next weekend" on Nov 6, 2005 and yet didn't fire it for almost three and half weeks.  Why?
 
Sway Bar:
 
I had a couple problems here.  First, I didn't like the angularity that the end links made when using Granny's relocating brackets.  The problem is actually the urethane style end links don't have the same range of motion that the stockers (which use ball joints) do. 
 

 

 
I?m just going to have to run the stockers.
 
While I have it back out I'll fix something else that bothered me.  The swaybar mounts have perfect spacing but I'm a little worried about the aluminum threads while running a thick bar.  The new holes come into the frame rails blind so you either get to cut off the stock bolts or run different hardware (which in my case meant the closest I could find only engaged 80% of the aluminum.  I decided to go with door number three.  I cut off some longer bolts so each screw tip had minimum taper and I engage threads all the way through.
 

 
 
The bigger issue is that on the Corvette the pulleys and belts all sit ~1" closer to the block than do the F-body goods.  This meant that my sway bar would rotate up and INTO the bottom flange (AC portion) of the pulley when both sides compressed.  I eventually added 3/8" to the Grannies sway bar spacers for a total of 1 1/8" down and 1/2" forward.
 
I debated trying to machine off the A/C portion of the pulley since I can't run the corvette AC compressor with Grannies mounts.  See here for that whole debacle.  However, this is a balanced piece designed to spin 7000 rpm and I just didn't trust that it'd be right.
 
The added spacers still weren't getting me the clearance I wanted with the suspension compressed so I finally broke down and ordered the ASP under drive pulley. My stock pulley was a smidge less than 7 1/2" diameter at the flange.  The ASP (-25% main, -10% AC) is about 6 5/8" 
 

 

 
Couldn't get the tape quite at the right surface ignore the tape readings.  What matters is that I gained another 3/8" and now I look good to go.  Running the bar spaced down that low meant I used the stock end links with ball joints and had to hammer the sheet metal clevis (where it attaches to the lower arm) forward into a parallelogram to keep the links from binding.

[frijolee]

LS6 PCV and steam tubes:
 
There really are some differences in the ls1's between all the years of LS1s.  As mentioned earlier I swapped heads from a 98 to late model.  Man did this ever burn me.
 
-98 coils bolt directly to valve covers not to a bracket then to the covers like the rest of the years (I knew this)
-98 valve covers have a different bolt pattern (around the perimeter rather than the normal 4 bolt up the center style <- I didn't know this)
-oil filler cap on the 98 valve covers doesn?t use the riser tube (GM #1255-9505).  You?ll need this or the cap will interfere with the front-most coil
-98 coils can be used with 99 brackets but one coil on each bank has to be flipped over to mount properly
-there are TWO types of coils that came on the 99-02 ls1.  Brackets DO NOT mix and match (guess who got the wrong ones.)
 
The other detail about heads was that the valve covers I ended up with only had one port on the passenger side.  This meant that the 98 ls1 pcv system wasn't going to work.  I had ordered the breather kit from Speed Inc before doing much research since I was pushing hard to get this done.  The idea is that you put a breather in each head, or even just one head if you trust bay to bay transfer.  The problem is that while you do relieve the pressure you don't clear out any blowby gases and the life of your oil goes to crap because of the junk getting in it.
 
So I caved and bought the ls6 valley cover.  Yanked the intake manifold off one more time.
 

 
 
Here's the difference in valley covers:
 

 
 
By sucking vapor from the valley you get a lot less oil consumption, plus as mentioned, the PCV still works properly and that was the only way it was going to happen with my valve covers.  There's a good write-up on how to do the swap and the parts needed on ls1howto.com.
 
The only piece they don't talk about much is the crossover tubes (AKA the steam tubes from my inquiry earlier in the thread.)  In order for the stock ls1 tubes to be used I had already done quite a bit of rib carving on the bottom side of my ls6 intake.  However the PCV pulls from the a line which conflicts with the stock tubes such that I decided not to keep bending and prying.
 

 
 
Instead I just did it right and used the ls6 tubes (which is really a single side to side up front and plugs for the back) I got a while back.  I thought the ls1 would be better but as the engine does tip up somewhat those back vents probably won't do much for letting coolant bubble out anyways.
 
[Ed note: if you?re feeling hardcore you can get adaptors for these fittings into AN lines.  That lets you run all 4.  See 65imp?s ?TVR? build for details.]

[frijolee]

OEM Oil Pressure sender
 
I should point out the picture with the intake manifold off one more time as this shows off the easy way to integrate your Mazda oil pressure sender.
 

 
Oil pressure is the gold sender I have mounted top rear on the block where the GM unit went before.  To do this you need:
-an m16x1.5 to 1/8? NPT adaptor
-a 1/8 npt 45 degree fitting (to help the sender clear the intake manifold )
 
You can also relocated the sender onto the firewall or elsewhere but wiring is a single lead that just goes through the block so make sure you maintain good grounding.  I eventually ended up plugging in my Accusump here and running the sender off a T fitting close to the electric check valve.
 
Last thing to mention, if you do plan to run an Accusump here you may want to open up a restriction just inside the block at this port into the oil galleys  More info here?

[frijolee]

Water Temp Sender Adaptor
 
I've been unhappy with the options available for mounting the water temp sender in the LS1 head.  You need an adaptor to go from the 1/8" npt thread on the sender to the m12 x 1.5 thread on the LS1 block.  (Anyone else amused by the fact the domestic manufacturer uses metric, while the import uses SAE?)
 
Anyways, the nose on the sender means you have to drill out the adaptor or you can't get any thread engagement.

 
 
I had heard the brass adaptor fittings were pretty weak so I ordered two.  The area under the o-ring has a minor OD of 0.375 vs. 0.292 for the OD of the nose.  With a 5/16 drill bit that's only 0.035 wall thickness remaining.  Then it strikes me:  Why not just cut the threads off one adaptor, drill out the base and weld the additional NPT threads so I've got a bigger void for the nose to extend into?
 
After looking into it a bit more I settled on silver solder (SSF-6) from www.muggyweld.com.  I used a mini oxy-acetylene torch to heat it up with the two parts held in a pair of vice grips.
 
Only advice I have is to heat slowly.  You want a dull orange color (see demo vids on muggyweld).  I ended up blowing away some of the brass by mistake.  If you see the brass surface start to blister you need to BACK OFF.
 
Used a sander to clean up the messiness a bit and here's the end result.

 
 
You can see how thin the walls of the drilled out portion I cut off became.  Not my prettiest work but it look like it'll function fine...
 
-Joel

[frijolee]

Battery relocation (v 1.0):
 
My rx7 came with 3 full sizes batteries and a ton of stereo gear -- most of which I parted out because I want to track this car.  I had a yellow top in the bay and a Exedy deep cycle battery, in each passenger bin underneath the carpet which was kind of folded inside out.  The nice part was that power was already run.  Mounting turned out to be a pain. 
 
I bought a nice mounting kit from a company called Production Engineering that I found through eBay and which was designed for my Optima.  It's a slick billet piece and pretty light.  I knew because the base of the pad was wider than the base of the battery that I'd need to use some risers and longer bolts.  Here's an early test fit.  The whole car is wrapped in dynamat from its boomin system days.
 

 
 
After I got everything where I wanted it and picked up the 2" bolts I discovered that the contour of the carpet is such that it won't let the mount drop in all the way.  I tried detaching the carpet from the frame of the bin but it curls inward and I knew it was going to annoy me just knowing it was there.  SOOOO.... I added another 1/2" to my wood risers (total thickness 1 1/4" BTW) and it finally fit nice.  Here's the frame inside the carpet:
 

 
 
I'm using a 140 amp breaker so I can disconnect the battery easily and I also placed things so I can still use jumper cables without too much difficulty.  Here's the final version:
 

 
 
Came out clean and I'm happy with it.  I'm using a simple power distribution block in the engine bay.  You can see it on the driver's side fender lining in a few of the shots above.  4 gauge cable to the block and then to the starter. 
 
EDIT!: I've been driving the car for a month and half now and the only thing I'm really unhappy with was the battery wiring...  Due to the Dynamat mentioned above I keep the 4 gage cable that was in the car (it was run below said sticky madness).  Although a wire can be treated as an electrical node in theory (meaning equal voltage everywhere) this is not true in reality particularly when you talk large amperages over any significant distance.  Because I ran fom battery to distribution block on the drivers side and THEN around the front of the car to the starter I have probably 22 feet of 4 AWG cable between my battery an the starter.  When I try to start my car it turns over weakly.  This is especially true when I turn the car off and then try to restart it 5 minutes later.  It's enough that it pops my 140 Amp breaker ALL THE TIME.  I can usually get it going but it's annoying as all get out and is especially lame when you want to show off the beast.
 
I reran power using 1/0 AWG cable through a 250 Amp breaker directly to my starter on the shortest path (~11 ft total), then it goes from there to my main fuse block with the 4 gauge I already had run and finally from there to the alternator...  Post on that redo is here..]
 
Joel

[frijolee]

A couple more things:
 
Lengthening throttle pedal:
 
I didn't like the fact that the Mazda throttle cable was designed to drop through the firewall at a downward angle but the Camaro cable I'm using goes straight through.  It means that the cable itself has to turn a downward corner and is undoubtedly going to saw through the plastic housing over time.  I also noticed I didn't have enough pedal travel to open the butterfly all the way.  I decided to kill two birds with one stone and had a 1" extension welded in to the upper end to lengthen the pedal. 
 

 
 
The pedal itself unbolts easily.  I'll let you know how it works out but it looks like I should be a lot better off.
 
Finally much thanks goes to my wife Tamara for putting up with me being a basket case for the last couple months.  This shot was from last night as she was helping me bleed the brakes.
 

 
 
If you look close you can see the delrin shift knob.  I bought one designed after the c5r race car (but made for a c5) and lathed off a few hard edges.  Then I discover that the vette knobs use a 9/16-18 thread instead of the m16 x 1.5 on the Camaro.  It's the same trans!  What the heck was the general of GM thinking?!?  Mixing and matching in these cars can be painful.  Re-tapped the threads and it finally came out nice. 
 
Car should move on its own this weekend.  I have an appointment at the exhaust shop next week.
 
Joel

[frijolee]

wondering for my own H/C knowledge... r your heads milled?  which f13?  compressed gasket thickness?
 
oh, and great thread.  i love the link in ur sig.  if proper utilized w/ the other resources on the web, there should be alot less repetitive questions asked on here.  thanks for taking the time to document everything, i know i am always to impatient to take pics and write stuff down.

No, my heads are not milled.  I'm using stock OEM gaskets and a Futral F13 cam.  After talking to Allan at Futral it seems that there's some "indifference" <- (his words, not mine) in the tolerance stackup of all the timing pieces.  In my case this meant that retarding ~1.7 degrees put my P to V clearance within a 0.001 of published specs on the cam.  Any time you're playing with aggressive cams they want to open the valve as soon as possible during intake event and leave it open for as long as possible during the exhaust stroke.  It pretty much makes sense where the piston to valve clearance gets close.

[frijolee]

Brake prop valve interference:

With the engine all the way back against the firewall you may have an interference between the brake prop valve (little hydraulic manifold that distributes fluid to the 4 corners) and the most aft coil on the drivers side head.  I solved this via flipping my distribution block around backward and trimming the mount. 

Before:




After:




[Ed. Note:  This still rubbed on the spark plug line just a hair so redid this one more time.  Bending the mounting point out a bit further than 90 degrees appears to be the hot ticket]

After part 2:

[frijolee]

Heater hoses (v 1.0)
 
For heater hoses I basically figured out where it needed to bend and went looking for formed hoses.
 

 
Might be a bit hard to see here but the three hoses are Goodyear part numbers
63244 (bent shorty)
63824 (medium)
63107 (long)
 
That 63244 is the money hose for getting up and out from behind the intake manifold.  I reused one of my stock rx7 hoses but you could just as easily buy two of the 63244 and trim them to fit.  I was able to cut enough off of the long one (63107) to reuse a piece of that to run along the firewall to where my hoses come in together and turn 90 via the adaptors.
 
Don't know who carries which hoses but these were all bought at a local Kragen.  The only other thing you need to be careful of is the fact most of these hoses taper from 5/8" to 3/4" (or the opposite depending which end you started with).  It works out to use the two long hoses with both bends down at the water pump and trimmed so they stick out an even 3" or so.  You'll need to put a bit of thought into which clamps face which way as well.
 
Other than exhaust here's my finished engine bay:
 

[frijolee]

First Motor Firing
 
IT'S ALIVE!! Muahhaahhhaaa!

VIDEO. 
 
Now you can watch me try to twist the throttle body the wrong way...    What can I say, I was tired.  When it revs up there?s just a bit of a staccato to it that makes me wonder if it's missing.  Might just be the cam though.  I don?t have educated ears yet.

I recognize I need to fill in a bit more info on the build process to get from the last post to here... (probably do that at Christmas break) BUT I had to pass the good word. I've been pushing on this so hard for so long I wasn't sure whether I'd be excited or just relieved. It lit up on the first try and I was jumping around like an idiot.

Now all that's left is the wrap things up and make the wiring pretty, bleed brakes and clutch, hookup the cable x box, and a few other do-dads. Oh and putting the seats in and the wheels on would be a good idea too. :yeah:

[frijolee]

Diff Control (v1.0)
 
I had one invention to add to the discussion about diff control and avoiding wheel hop.  As I see it the two big aluminum ears coming off the case of the diff are responsible for controlling 'roll' and the front mount has to control 'pitch.' 
 
Controlling the front seems to be pretty well covered by setting the pinion angle parallel to the output shaft of the transmission (1-2 degrees at each end gets you enough motion of the u-joint), and using a pinion snubber and/or harder durometer rubber (Mazda calls it the competition mount).  I?m not a fan of trying to weld the front mount solid.  This just tries to make it carry the roll with a tiny moment arm and pretty much guarantees you'll crack something in fatigue over time.  The only way to run a solid front mount IMO is by building a vastly fortified mount to the subframe.   If you try it make sure you run solid mounts in the rear ears to match.
 
I wasn?t going to there but I still wanted to try increasing the stiffness at the two ears as simply as I could without going to delrin mounts or something harsh.  I'd noticed on my former diff that one ear would knock up and down on accel/deccel and that the rubber crown looking section doesn't do anything unless the inside bushing extends downward enough to touch it.
 

 
As such I built some spacers to make this carry a bit of preload.  3/8" thick plastic and a couple sizes of hole saw and I was good to go.  Remember that hole saw's are always measured at the OD of the hole so OD of the circle you cut ends up being at least an 1/8" smaller.  Here's my end result:
 

 

 
[Ed Note:  I?ve since discovered that you can use the same principle by trimming the sleeve inside the rear mounts so the cover plate sees preload.]
 
New bushings and good condition shocks (there's some debate over coilover vs stock) are the other two mandatory wheel hop remedies.

[frijolee]

First Pics on 4-wheels
 
I took the car for a spin last night with open headers.  It was about as stealthy as an Abrams tank on the freeway but I got away with it.  No sign of wheel hop but I won't really know until I get to launch it on sticky tires. 
 

 
It pulled pretty good but definitely felt ragged.  More vibration that I was expecting but that might have something to do with the open headers and the fat shockwaves under my feet.  I dropped it off at the exhaust shop today on my lunch hour but before I leaving work I lit it off in the parking lot.
 

 
Who says FCs can't turn heads? :yup:
 
Joel

[frijolee]

Well, it's back from the exhaust shop and man does she drive nice...  The Magnaflow mid-muffler didn't fit (would have to be too close to the trans mount) so I went with a regular x-pipe.  I did successfully have them route it up and over granny's trans mount.
 

 
Had the shop guy build me a driveshaft loop while he was in there:
 

 
The 7" round Magnaflows with a standard x-pipe are surprisingly quiet.  That said, I like it nice and mellow so it's perfect for me.  If you want a bit more roar don't be afraid to try out the 6" version.  I need to double check my tuning and all that before I start driving hard but I'm smiling big so far.
 

 
One more on the road baby!
Joel
 
PS:   Per request here's my list of tubing used for the exhaust...
 
It's 100% 304 stainless stress mandrel bends in 16 gage walls (0.065).  Everything was bought from Racing Solutions.
 
(1) 2.5" stainless super intercooler builder kit
(1) 2.5" stainless 180 degree bend on 3.75 radius (needed one more than the kit)
(8ft) 2.5" stainless straight tube (7 ft would have been fine if you could get it in two 3.5 ft pieces)
(1) 3" stainless 90 degree bend on 4" radius (to turn upward after the header flange).
 
I also bought 2.5 to 3" transistions but the jump was too sharp so I didn't end up using them and just had the exhuast shop do some stepped stretching where the 2.5 meets the 3.
 
3" V-band clamps came with my JTR headers up front.  In back the 2.5" clamps are from summit.  I used a magnaflow x-pipe but if you wanted to build your own you'd only need 1 more 2.5" 180 deg (or 2 more 2.5" 90s).  Finally I had (2) 3 ft sticks of 3/8" pencil rod for misc hangers.
 
The magnaflow 7" round cans are killer for a daily driver.  If you wanted it a smidge louder you might try the 6"s instead or even jump to the 80mm Corksport catback (that sucker?s loud and mean sounding) but means you only need to build a Y-pipe and it saves weight too.
 
[Ed note: I've been pretty happy with having exhaust sectioned just ahead of the rear end.  Makes working on the diff or trans a lot easier.  I'd definitely recommend this to anyone looking to "design for maintainability."]