Heck yeah that's more space than I had for years. You have to get a little creative sometimes but nearly anything is doable in a small garage. My biggest advice is to do research before starting a project and to always buy the right tools for the job and quality tools at that. However Snap on or Matco Is not necessary. Plenty of my tools are from Harbour Freight, Lowes, and Amazon.

My new shop is 24x26 and I have my RCSB, Two 4wheelers, a golf cart, 2 kayaks, and 4 or 5 rolling tool boxes. I still have room to swap a motor drop a trans and do other stuff.

 

Your Camero sounds pretty nice. Post pics of the toys it always makes threads better.

 

This won't mean a whole lot to you because you don't know me or my truck, but I built my Tahoe from a bare body to what it is today in a 17x23 garage. I don't have photos of it in the garage: but imagine a bare metal Tahoe

I have my C5 Z06 damn near a bare body in the exact same space. If you're smart and organized, anything is possible

Ive built my MR2, Tahoe, C5 and most of my Toyota Crawler in this space. Yeah it's small and it's sketchy sometimes, but it works

and TBH I second the turbo idea

 

Thanks guys, I think like you said as long as I try to keep things organized I think I can do a lot in a small space. I think also having patience is very important and as long as I have something else to drive I can afford to have the escalade down for a while.

Besides going to a 706 or NNBS 5.3 243 head and milling them I guess there is no way else to cheaply raise compression? I think there must be something wrong since I can't find where anyone has done a dedicated E85 build. To me it seems you could go even past 13:1 compression and it will allow you to get some of your efficiency back lost from the lower energy in ethanol.

 

I would forget changing the heads and do forced induction. 317's are not really bad at all with FI especially on a 6.0. I had Patriot stg 2's on a 4wd 6.0 with turbo and had trouble keeping it in my lane with stock suspension. For a DD a TVS or Whipple would also rock. I would cam it and do FI and do something about the trans when you can. Forget ripping the long block apart imo.

 

I wanted to bring this back up for an update. So far I have a set of 12613412 6.0 Flex Fuel GEN IV injectors, a Walbro F90000274 450LPH (supposed drop in bucket setup for returnless systems), and Delphi to EV6 harness adapters. So far the biggest PITA has been trying to find info about fuel system upgrades, its like no one will even consider trying to work with the 04-05+ returnless systems or add voltage boosters to them. I have heard the Walbros are kind of crappy so I plan to do the cut the hole in the floor to make a fuel pump "access" panel.

I am still looking for a 4L80, but the 4L65 with a servo (maybe I can pull it and put in a shift kit or something) will have to do while I piece together how I am going to build the turbo.

The hardest part of this is trying to stay in a budget, which is extremely frustrating given how we are in a age where do-gooders might be able to ban internal combustion engines and some of these aftermarket LS stuff has been out almost 20 years and its like its almost still the same price. I just don't get how everything is so expensive.

Anyway my plan is to find a set of 706 4.8/5.3 heads and port them and install 2 in intake valves and mill as much as I can (I've heard about no more than .030 or you run into IM fitment issues). I will probably get dual valve springs so I can run something with higher lift, but I want to try to find a cam with somewhat lower duration since I don't want to spin this thing to too high of a unreliable limit.

This will be a guaranteed 100% full time E85 motor. I want to get the maximum amount of compression I can and take advantage of the ethanol. Single turbo will come eventually, I may pull engine and increase ring gap as well. I plan on maybe buying a somewhat nicer manifold, downpipe, and wastegate kit from Trick or KB, but then run a cheap Chinese turbo. I really really want to keep the stock exhaust and stock cats(I know I will get bashed for this but I like stock luxury sound and zero smell) it looks like its going to be very difficult to do with a turbo system?

Main thing I am worried about is the 8.6 10 bolt, but being AWD hopefully will split the load between the 8.6 and whatever they put in the front? I have heard you don't really have to worry about the BW T case, but I guess you can upgrade to the GMT 900 Escalade/Denali system but have to mess with shaft sizes.

I know I am going to get doubted on running high compression 706 heads on a LQ9 with a turbo, but I think I can do it and I'm not planning on high boost (yeah I know everyone says this).

My issue now is trying to figure out how I am going to get my heads ported and milled with bigger valves installed (or should I just keep the smaller 5.3 valves?) I was going as high lift cam as possible but this may not work if I can't make a 706 head flow any better at higher lift. I may just go to the junkyard and pull a 706 head set and send it off to TSP (I got my GEN V LT1 head sported from TSP) but it just seems like they are charging way too much all to just have a CNC run a preset program on them? Anyone know anything else I can do? Thanks

 

I use those same Gen4 injectors in my Gen3 2005 LQ9. The injector data is different between the gens and you need the data converted to use in the Gen3. There is a sticky over at Tech that has the converted data. Works great in my setup and easy to tune.

LS1 Tech Injector Data post 14

I have attached the file below.

Why not send in the 317's for head work? They're already at 10.1:1 compression and some milling should be the sweet spot for compression with a turbo. The 317 is a good flowing head and some cnc work should make them great especially with a lot of valve lift. If you were staying N/A the 706's would be a better choice IMO.

 

Thanks I appreciate the info, I picked the injectors from reading your thread, I was going to try going the decaping route to try to be cheap but figured it would probably be cheaper this way after I try to mess with flowing the decapped ones.

The main thing I am interested in is trying to get the highest compression as possible being that I will be only running E85, not sure if they have "Spinx" up your way but in Upstate SC they have them everywhere with E85. I may actually stay NA after I figure and come to reason that I will never really make this thing "fast". I really like the idea of trying to build a ethanol "optimized" engine. From my calculations I believe the maximum compression I can get from 706 heads and a LQ9 piston is maybe a little over 12.5:1, I would really like more than that.

As far as I know I am going into uncharted territory as I can't find anyone else who has done anything like this. I found someone who had a short thread that they were going to build a E85 motor with 13:1 but there was limited into and I'm not sure if it even happened. I had some flow numbers for stock and ported 706s and 317s I was looking at but now I can't find them does anyone else have some?

I would love to be able to get into porting the heads myself, I do have a mechanical engineering degree so I should be able to figure it out haha. The problem is since moving away from home I just don't have anywhere besides my small 20x20 garage to work in, but I would love to try to build my own flow bench and ports my heads, headers, exhaust and whatever else I could get my hands on and try to save some money as well.

 

Kyle over at "Goat Rope Garage" says the decaped injectors have a really bad spray pattern. He went on to say for drag racing not that big of a deal but they're a headache on the street trying to tune for a good idle. No E85 around me that I know of... I'd convert my system over if I could find some close by.

I'd be a little worried sinking a lot of money in some 706 castech heads since they're prone to cracking. There is a rebuilder on e-bay that tig welds the areas around the bolt holes where the cracks originate. I'm sure a good automotive machinist knows that same bandaid solution on the castech's.

 

Yeah I agree, I don't think a de-capped injector is worth it especially since the GEN IV 50 or 60lbs or whatever they are aren't too expensive. I just have to worry about the fuel pump now, I am really hoping the Walbro drops in and works like it says it will. Does anyone know how the 05+ returnless GMT-800 fuel system works? I don't understand why everyone is so adamant about converting to a returnless? I know the GEN IV stuff has a fuel pressure control module and I think you can get pump voltage boosters, but I have looked everywhere and can't find anything out about the GMT-800 ones? Do they have a module that controls the PWM feed to the pump? I am assuming there is a PWM feed to these pumps? It is my understanding that there is just one single line to the rail and that a module located somewhere just sends a PWM power to the pump and there is a fuel pressure sensor on or near the rail that provides feedback to this module? But then I get more confused because I hear people talking about a built in regulator inside the tank drop in part? Why would there be a mechanical regulator in these returnless systems? Shouldn't the fuel pressure control module or PCM or whatever controls the pump just be able to receive a feedback pressure signal and provide a PWM power to the pump and everything be good?

Another thing that worries me is I just have liability on this truck, so if I spent $2500 on heads and cams and another $2500 on turbo and another $1000 on 4L80 and drivetrain upgrades, what if someone who didn't have insurance came and hit me and it ended up breaking the transmission or ruining the engine? I don't think I could get the other parties insurance to pay for my aftermarket "upgrades" given that they are "illegal" and aren't supposed to be on a street driven vehicle. Another very very likely scenario is a fire (I know turbos like to start fires and I've seen a lot of threads on the subject given oil feed turbos). I mean I think a fire extinguisher could only go so far and you would have to catch it quick. The truck also has a salvage title so most insurance companies would not even sell me a policy on it. Anyone know of any good strategies here?

I guess a basically stock engine and a turbo is looking better after all.