Rally Pat

Sunday morning I focused on getting the valve springs done and getting the cam pulled so I can send it out. Thanks to Mike, I had access to a BTR valve spring compressor tool. Heres a look at an old spring next to the new PAC-1218's that I installed. The kit comes with a hose for airing up the cylinders to hold the valves in place while changing the valve springs. It makes this job really quick, I think I was done in about 40 minutes with all 16 springs. Gotta give all the valves a nice bop with the deadblow before winding them tight or the keepers won't let go. Some required multiple bops and tries with the tool. I put the keepers in a magnetic parts tray while changing the springs, and then when putting them back on the valves, a little grease helps hold them in place while taking the tension off the tool. Finished job!

Thats the most Anthony way things could have gone lol

I didn't take any pictures of taking the rest of the accessories off, but just imagine a 3/8's electric impact taking off a bunch of 15mm bolts and boom, you got the picture.

My next problem is the factory clutch fan. It took me a bit to figure out how I was going to get it off. None of my adjustable wrenches were big enough, and I didn't have the appropriate size wrench. What I did have was a big C clamp that I normally used for brake jobs and the like. I cranked it on there as tight as I could and held the water pump in place with vice grips. Applied some leverage, and off it came.

The claw for my engine stand has been permanently stuck in Subaru mode for about 10 years now, so it actually took a little work to get it repositioned. I also needed to go to the hardware store and get new bolts as the stock bolts weren't long enough for the fingers on my claw. When I got back and positioned the claw on the engine, no matter what I tried positioning wise I couldn't get all 4 attached, so I just let the last one dangle.

Ok, first thing I did Friday after work was go rent the crank pulley puller from AutoZone. The night before, I was having some issues with the crank moving on me while I was trying to undo the torque converter bolts, so I walked away but I got it when I went back by wedging my long breaker bar against the ground. The 4l60e didn't put up much of a fight after that and let go.

Received my Dirty Dingo Adapter plates, for the price of these I probably could have found the right intake, but I am gonna send it anyway because I am curious to see what happens. Super nice billet and nice hardware along with it!

My valve springs arrived the other day - PAC-1218's, basically the standard issue valve spring for people running the Sloppy Stage 2. In addition, my slightly longer and hardened pushrods should be arriving today so that I can maintain correct valve train geometry with the reground cam. Mike is going to let me borrow his LS valve spring compressor kit, and since I need the lifters held up I might change out the valve springs before pulling the cam so I don't waste any time unnecessarily. Also, my kit from Texas Performance Concepts is on order. They are a pretty small shop, and the information for the parts they offer is super out of date. They actually offer way more than is listed. I opted for a few things that I was going to source myself originally purely out of convenience. For example, they offer a complete hydroboost install kit that includes everything you need to plumb it and attach it to the firewall. In addition, I was planning on piecing together my own fuel system, but they offer everything I was going to buy including the corvette filter with the built in regulator. You can spend a lot there, but I opted for basically just what I needed to make the car move and stop. Down the road if I keep the car around, I will go back to them for other stuff like the AC kit they offer.

Last night, I started to tear the motor down. She dirty! I got the harness mostly off, but some of the cables were pinned between the block and the Hoosier I have it siitting on, so I pulled the hoist out to lift it up. Man are those injector plugs annoying. I started to unbolt the torque converter but, but it was getting late and I didn't have anything handy to stop the crank from moving on me, so I will pick that up tonight probably. I need to get them trans separated and the engine on a stand so I can flip it over and pull the cam out so I can send it off for the regrind.

Depends if it a Gen 3 or Gen 4. If its a Gen 4, it may very well make it to north of 1000 hp before it lets go. Matt just posted another "dont BS me" 4.8 clone that he tuned, 700whp.

Depends if it a Gen 3 or Gen 4. If its a Gen 4, it may very well make it to 1200 hp before it lets go.

I would say its the second most popular Miata engine swap behind an LS, theres even a whole company that makes parts for it. https://kmiata.com/

So I've been on the phone with Kent at Texas Performance Concepts customizing and hammering out the last details of my kit before I pull the trigger on my order, and I made one big fuck up. I assumed that Corvette accessories would fit fine as in a lot of swap kits, Corvette and CTS-V Accessories are the most preferred because they hug the engine so close. Well, as it turns out, in this instance F Body and CTS-V Accessories are what are required. So, my kit will still be on the way, but I need to find different accessories if anyone knows anyone who has some.

Awesome project! BTW We have a whole section of this site just for projects - http://www.columbusracing.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=59

I need everything including the balancer, let me know what you have, please!

A 4.8 is more like $150-$300, mine was $500 because it came with a transmission which I plan to sell. $750 would get you a nice 5.3 and maybe even a 6.0. For an aluminum one, they are usually in the $1000-$1500 range. Thats probably phase 2 after its running already.

A little understeer never hurt anybody. It will be a nice balance for the new power at the rear. We will eventually do something with the suspension, but the goal for right now is just for it to move under it's own power.

Thats it for whats done to the car right now, but that doesn’t mean I was idle in the Junkyard LS community for 2 years. I really believe in the mission of Matt Happel and Sloppy Mechanics, and I wanted to get involved in my own way. The main cam that gets recommended is the jokingly named “Sloppy Stage 2”, which is a .228/.230 cam. It goes by many part numbers different places, but the main provider is Elgin where it is part number 1840P. Jegs has their own version, Summit has their own version, allegedly both by Elgin as well. If you look in Elgin’s catalog, its actually labeled “Sloppy Stage 2” now. Its arguably the single most popular LS cam shaft outside of Chevy ones. Its sold out everywhere a lot of the time. I thought it would be cool if there was something we could do with all of those stock truck cams that people are pulling out of their $100 junkyard motors, as to not let anything go to waste. I teamed up with Jon Bodwell, the owner of Delta Camshaft, a legendary cam shop in Tacoma, Washington, to make tooling to regrind stock LS cams to the specs of the Sloppy Stage 2. Jon is a legend in the Honda and Subaru communities for his regrinds, and his shop works on cams for everything from aircrafts to antique vehicles and has been doing this for 35 years. He provides this regrind service for the Sloppy community for $120 dollars with the customer providing their stock cam as a core. We have quite a few customers running this cam already, including an LS powered boat! Before any one asks, no, there are not problems with the cam being too soft, the grind doesn't go all the way through the hardening. Of course, I will be running one of our regrinds in my engine, because it would be stupid if I didn’t run my own product lol. I didn't pick the name, although I do think naming a reground cam "make america great again" is clever.

Scott Cordell also visited us while we were working on Saturday, and I bought some Corvette stuff off of him. The kit I am using from Texas Performance Concepts uses a Corvette bellhousing and an adapter plate to mate it to the stock 944 torque tube. Scott had a bellhousing, and I also purchased an almost complete Corvette accessory drive. The intake is an LS3 intake, which means I will have to run adapter plates. I am curious to see what the torque numbers are like with the adapter plates, as technically they are increasing the runner length. This also opens up a door for an LSA down the road as well. Even with the adapter plates, I have still spent less than buying a proper fitting manifold for my heads, which is good enough for me. We also talked quite a while about tuning, and its sounding like I am going to give HP Tuners a shot instead of buying a Holley Terminator X like I was planning originally.

He does all the research, shows numbers, proves combinations, tests theories, and documents it all for free including the tunes so people like me that are just getting started on this platform have a resource that isn't digging through forum posts from 8000 years ago written by people who barely passed 3rd grade reading. Why shouldn't people follow his information?

Mine will have a cam and springs, and this is going going to be just a couple of months until its running and driving (hopefully). The main things we are waiting on is parts coming in and for Sean and I's schedules to sync up. The goal is to get the car to move under it's own power, then from there we can put whatever bottom end in we want or put a spooly boy on, but this is an autocross and track day car, 300 hp is plenty to get started. The trans I have is pretty weak too, so until I can find a turbo one or I buy the kit to put in a corvette torque tube and transmission, 300 hp is another good thing.

4.8's are excellent engines and they are dirt cheap. Matt Happel's made 356 NA HP with an NNBS intake (best flowing stock LS intake) and a Sloppy Stage 2 cam (228/230). In my configuration with a much more restrictive car intake, it should make around 300, which is the perfect power level for right now. He made 498 with a 200 shot, and right after he put an LSA on it and its currently making 600 something. He also just got running his "8's for 8's" project, which has a bone stock junkyard 4.8 at it's heart with cam and springs - not even gapped rings. The goal is to run 8's, obviously, and once they do that they plan to turn things way up and go a lot faster. He also has the famous "Don't Bullshit Me" Colorado build that there are countless clones of running out there, which in it's final configuration with a 7875 made 630 something wheel.

Not done posting yet

I don't have tons of pictures of the teardown because I was just working like crazy, but heres the aftermath.