Yep, I miss that car







but it was easy because I had a company truck so I could do whatever I wanted and have it take as long as it took... Problem I have now is parking. Now that my girlfriend lives here, the other driveway spot is taken. My HOA doesn't allow parking in the street, but a lot of people do it anyway. I do not like shuffling cars around so there's a possibility that I locked the truck in the garage and drove the DD until it's done, then sell the DD if she runs good

 

As Choda said, they will nickel and dime you to death... here is my list and prices for my budget build

960$ JY motor 4.8 2009
141$ Head stud Kit
94$ TSP pushrods 7.4
168$ Pac 1218 springs
109$ LS2 timing set
439$ Stock48 cam
99$ Ls7 lifters
109$ LS9 MLS head gaskets
28$ Front and rear main seals
$2147
this was a 150km motor, tore it down checked everything and just re assembling now, my plan was to sell my current motor but we will see not easy to find cheap decent ones around here

 

Problem with rod bolts is they are one time use anyway. When you tear it down to inspect the bearings it makes sense to replace them with better parts. 2 of the LS engines I have seen let go were due to rod bolt failures and one of the two was NA. Even GM has upgraded the rods and rod bolts a few times in stock applications. Should tell you all you need to know. When a rod bolt breaks it is almost always letting off at high rpm and the damage is catastrophic.

 

Eh, torque em to 50ft lbs and let it eat. Lots of things are considered TTY but countless times that's been proven to be something that is irrelevent.

I'm too backyard mechanic to care about most stuff, hell I'll re-use head bolts because it works. If you want a good proof that doing it works, just watch what matt hapel does. Making at times 700+ or even nearly 1000hp on stock parts without them blowing up and still running for thousands of miles.

 

I also saw your thread the day I decided to build my own. I would follow a very similar path as you did, and honestly I don't think $2200 is bad for an engine that can last a while at daily levels. I know these engines work great never being cracked open, but I want to do the things that most people recommend which is very similar to your list. That seems to be a copy paste mod list for a good reliable LS

 

Decided to compression check the engine and here are the results:

drivers front to back
192
189
192
189

passenger front to back
187
185
189
190

I was expecting lower results with 155k miles, but could have been rebuilt at some point, there's now at to know. This was 7 cranks of the engine in accordance with the Haynes manual

 

That was better than mine was. I was in the 170s i think. My pistons were already gapped wide enough for boost too. I just cleaned it all and reinstalled. Looking back I didnt have to touch the bottom end at all and could left it alone.

 

I've moved away from the idea of this thread, I'm now definitely using the engine in the truck. I've made a long long list of things to do to get ready for turbo. A lot of the list is similar to yours, painting valve covers, rerouting heater lines, that sort of stuff. It will take a full weekend to do it correctly, but should really help the engine bay