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Convincor LS Swap Project Thread

I'm sure the pics show no justice for all the hard work he put into it. I wish I lived closer as I'm sure it's a sight to see in person with out a doubt.
 
Thanks guys, that means a lot!!! There was a lot of hard work that went into it, and its still not done. Not gonna lie, I'm a little burnt out on it. I'm gonna give it a week or so, then start back to it. I had a slight cooling issue, but with talking to slingblade and a few others, I think I have a good handle on what it is. I'm going to re-do the collant crossover set up that comes out of the cylinder heads. Right now I have it done with stock LS stuff. On a car it dumps back into the radiator, well since this is a boat, I just dumped it back into the t-stat housing. Well, this is causing a restriction and the cylinder heads were getting warmer than the engine, which is why my gauge was reading warm, because the sending unit is in the starboard head. So now, I am going to run all -AN lines to all four corners and dump them into the thru-hull fitting that my exhaust dumps out of. This will ensure that nice cool water is running through my heads at all times and not just setting in there allowing steam pockets to form while waiting for the thermostat to open up. Just another one of the little things that looked good on paper, but didn't execute to well in the field.

Then its time to start playing with props and drive heights!!! I have a 1" drive spacer lined up to try to get my prop a little more into the water, and I'm also going to put in a call to BBlades to see what he might suggest. Hopefully I can start to get her dialed in!!!
 
Brianh said:
Get any speed numbers yet?
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No speed numbers just yet. I went down last weekend and installed the four corner crossover set up. When I fired it up on the hose, the temp still creeped up to about 180 degrees and just stayed there. The crazy thing was, I could hold my hand under the water coming out of the thru-hull fittings and it was barely luke warm. My dad even said "I drink my coffee warmer than this." I was pretty sure I knew what was going on, but I wanted to talk to my engine builder first, so I didn't risk taking it out. When I went up and talked to my engine builder, he confirmed what I was thinking, that I am getting a false reading on the gauge. The problem is, with these LS motors, no coolant flows through the intake so there are only two places to install a sending unit and they are both in the cylinder head. Since the holes are metric, you have to put in a brass adapter and then screw in the sending unit. My engine builder and I think that the gauge is reading more of a cylinder head temp rather than a water temp. So next time down at the lake, which should be next weekend, I am going to relocate the sending unit into the bottom of the remote t-stat housing to hopefully get more of a true water temp reading. I'm 99% sure that its going to be fine, and if it is, its going to be game on for some prop/speed testing.

I also did call Brent from BBlades to talk about prop selection. I told him my concerns that I might have taken too much weight out of the back of the boat and that I was going to have trouble getting the bow lift I need. His exact words were "I don't care if its from the nose, middle or stern, anytime you take that much weight out of the boat, its a good thing. We will make you a prop that will make it work great.". He thinks that a bravo 1 prop is still going to be the best prop for my boat. He wants me to try a 24p and a 26p to see which one gets me close to 5700-5800 rpms. Then he will work his magic with the prop to get me the bow lift I need and will also pick up 200-300 rpms to get me close to my sweet spot of 6000-6300. He also said I can count on picking up a couple hundred more rpms as the motor gets broken in. I can try a 24p bravo through his prop test program, but I need to track down a 26p bravo because they don't have any in stock. Apparently they are on national back order. He also said that the 1 drive spacer probably wasn't a good idea. He said that if the x-dimension was good before, its still good now, so no reason to mess with it, we just need to get a prop to make the boat handle the way it should. He also said he wasn't concerned with the rooster tailing either.

So hopefully I'll be able to start letting her stretch her legs next time I'm at the lake and can report back with some numbers. I am thinking that by the time I get her all dialed in, I'll be running mid 70's.
 
Chellems said:
Good luck with the prop testing! It never seems to end.
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Heck, I can't wait till props are the only thing I have to worry about!!! lol


RNGRDVE said:
If you have a 1" hub you can steal mine for a weekend.
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I sure do!!! I'll take you up on that man!!! I'll be heading down that way a week from tomorrow. I'll get with you this weekend maybe if you aren't going to be out with it.
 
Not gonna lie, since I practically replaced every freaking part except for the block this kind of makes me wish I had went LS instead of a gen vi bbc.

I still kinda wanna put together a jet boat with a 2jz in it as well too :rof:
 
I love the inovation in this. I'm thinking of putting a 6.0 out of a 2001 Denali in my recently aquire 91 maxxum 229. I've already went the LS route with my 68 chevelle and added an S475 turbo to it. I'm not sure if I'm going to go N/A, or twin turbos on it. I'll most likely go N\A at first, since I have no prior boating experience. I didn't notice if you put together a parts list to complete the swap.
 
I went N/A just to keep things simple since I was doing something different. That's also the reason I went with a carb set up, well that, and to keep the cost down. I haven't put together a parts list yet because I'm still buying parts!! LOL. Once I have it all dialed in and running well I plan on putting together a list of parts I used hoping it'll be helpful to people wanting to do this in the future. I know having a list would have helped me alot as I bought many parts multiple times. I would buy a part thinking it should work, and of course it wouldn't.

I actually have a 67 Chevelle that I am going to do a LS/t-56 swap into. That'll be a walk in the park after doing this!!!
 
Corey, any updates to your adventures in LS land? I'm really excited to see some speeds and your parts breakdown. Even though there's a ton of one off custom bracketed and parts youve made!
 
Well, as much as I hate to say it, there probably won't be any speed numbers this season. I took it out a couple of weeks ago for the Lake Cumberland Poker Run. I had it idling in the no wake zone and was watching things in the engine compartment because I had to build a new water pump bracket since my original one was failing. I noticed a little bit of steam coming from the breather in the starboard valve cover. So I felt the hoses coming out of the engine into the remote t-stat housing and found the one on the starboard side was still cold and the port one was hot, so for some reason water wasn't flowing on the starboard side. My first thought was maybe with all my reversion issues I was dealing with, I might have hurt a head gasket. I checked the oil and it still looked at good as the day I poured it in, no water at all, but something was up. So I put her back on the trailer and pulled her home and put her in the barn.

My plan is to go back down and pull the motor out this weekend and bring it home with me. I already talked to my engine builder and I'm going to take it up there to take apart and see what happened. In a way I'm bummed that I didn't get to run it hard yet, but I'm also happy to be pulling it in a way. See, I can be pretty OCD when it come to certain things, and my boat is one of them. That's part of the reason this project has taken me so long to complete. A part of me has had doubts about the motor ever since I dealt with the reversion issues. In my head, I thought having all that water sucked back into the motor could NOT be a good thing, and a big part of me wanted to pull the motor right then and there, but I had a lot of people telling me it should be alright. So against my better judgment, I ran it. But everytime I had it out, I had this little voice in the back of my head telling me something wasn't right. Also, I have this other nagging feeling that I am leaving 20-40hp on the table. So after we go through everything and make sure the motor is fine, I'm going to re-dyno it and see what I have. The thought of converting it over to a closed cooling set up has crossed my mind once or twice recently, so that's an option. I am also going to get a jump start on cleaning, sanding and repainting my bilge area this winter. I want to make the engine compartment look as good as the motor, so I'll clean up some of my rigging too.

So if all goes well, I'll have it back out EARLY next spring and ready to enjoy next summer. I have learned a lot doing this project, the biggest thing being when you have a project like this, take your budget and timeline and throw it right out the window!!!! LOL
 
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