FC3S Murray's never ending LS1 build

[FC3S Murray]

Hello all,

I have finally decided to come over to the V8 side of life. I have spent about 8 years in the rotary scene and have went through about 6 motors in 6 years. My latest build was a very very thorough 13BT build that was heavily modded. I just spent a whole year researching and trying to do it the "right way"...........unfortunately the day of WOT tuning I cracked a front iron doing a 1-2-3rd gear pull  AFTER about 20 + 4th gear tuning pulls earlier that day.



I will start to part out all my rotary build soon so "hopefully" I can get some cash to cover the LS1 and T56 combo


I have been researching LS1 swaps and have been PM'ing members who have been successful in this swap. I plan on taking my time but most importantly I want to do a set up that is basically drop -in- and- go that will require little fine tuning. My goal is around 380 rwhp and I am aware of what mods might be needed to achieve this. I am mechanically inclined BUT all of my in depth "car" engine experience is rotary powered platforms. I have never really dug into piston motors besides exterior accessory maintanence (no cam, valve, lifter, block work).


I will continue to research as much as possible but would like to ask you fellow members for any advice or insight you may have to prevent future headaches, ect.  Any credible LSx sellers, members  and shops would be appreciated as well.


Here is a picture of my FC:










And the old engine bay...





So I am very excited AND a little nevous about this new platform but I hope you guys here could be a help and give a little guidence along the way

Thanks for looking

[digitalsolo]

Welcome to the site.   Looking forward to the build, yours is one of my favorite rotary FCs over on the 'club.

I'll defer to my PM with you over there, but feel free to post any questions up in the tech sections.   

[Simplex Effect]

Wow, love your FC. Going to be even better with an LS. ;-)

[FC3S Murray]

Welcome to the site.   Looking forward to the build, yours is one of my favorite rotary FCs over on the 'club.

I'll defer to my PM with you over there, but feel free to post any questions up in the tech sections.   

Thank you Blake for the kind words. I will be posting...trust me 

Wow, love your FC. Going to be even better with an LS. ;-)

Thanks! I am looking forward to having the LS in it......it will take some time but hopefully when I bear fruit it will not go rotten right away lol.

[ProjectD]

I followed your rotary saga for quite some time. You have one of the cleanest FCs i've seen. I'm looking foward to your swap. The rotards will be pissed about this one lol.

[lm38330]

your RX7 looks freakin badass!! it'll be better with the LS,Good Luck

[FC3S Murray]

I followed your rotary saga for quite some time. You have one of the cleanest FCs i've seen. I'm looking foward to your swap. The rotards will be pissed about this one lol.

Yeah they are quite pissed 

your RX7 looks freakin badass!! it'll be better with the LS,Good Luck

Thank you! 

I look forward to this build too but I will need your guys help along the way....I have many questions and no real place to start. I am parting out the rotary as of now. After I sell evrything and get some cash I will start looking for a motor/tranny

[sciff5]

If you know the rotary and the car you'll be fine.

Pulling the original motor and putting the ls1 is a bolt in affair that is the easy part. wiring should be easy if you know how to read schematics, the rest of it (at least for me) was fixing all the fucked stuff on my shell. Your car looks clean so it should literally be a week at most of work.

I put my ls1 in and had it all wired plumbed ect this weekend by myself.

[FC3S Murray]

Good to hear. I am pretty crafty at wiring...shit most of my FC harness is bare bones from the PFC conversion.

QUESTION: I am trying to figure out what aftermarket accessories I need to keep for the LSx swap. I am thinking about keeping the Innovative wideband and my Aeromotive FPR. My only concern with the wideband is how you guys monitor AFRS with a dual bank engine....you must run 2 WB sensors since most of you run a "true" dual exhaust.

I have also thought about routing my exsht into my Racing Beat cans but am unsure is this will be too much of a head ache.   Only reason I ask is these items will only bring in more cash for the swap so I want to be sure if I need them or not.

Thanks guys. 

[digitalsolo]

The rotary catbacks, especially nice ones like the Racing Beat, usually sound pretty nice with an LSx, and flow plenty of power, FWIW.

I run a single wideband for monitoring, and just watch the stock narrowbands to see what is happening bank to bank.     As long as the banks match on the narrowbands, then I can trust the wideband to be accurate for both banks.    Dual WBO2 is a bit overkill for a basic build.

[FC3S Murray]

Good to know Blake.


I was just wondering if I will need to do a total fuel system flush on my tank and lines sine I ran only pre-mix for my rotary set up. I would imagine flushing the tank a couple times with regular gasoline should do the trick. You guys know of any major issues if a little 2-stroke oil gets in the LS1 for a short time??

Is that LS1 FC sticky of Joel's pretty accurate in parts I will need? Seems like my best bet is to find a LS6 out of a a totalled ZO6 Vette. Is the LS1 hard to convert to the LS6 power levels (I am sorry..I know this is a general question. I am just trying to get my feet planted)?

[sciff5]

An Ls6 for all intensive purposes is an ls1 with better flowing heads, slightly larger cam and better flowing intake.

More than likely all things your going to upgrade no matter if you go with an ls6 or ls1 so you might as well save the money up front, plus the later ls1s came with ls6 intakes anyway.

So the ls1 and ls6 have the same potential to make power once you want more.

[FC3S Murray]

Thanks for the response. That is what I have determined after a little research, they are basically the same besides the minor window changes in the block and main web strength addition.

So I am going t0 try to find an LS1 from a 2001 + BUT if i find a screaming deal on a 1998 I will go that route.

[nofxrxmxpx]

that is a very beautiful FC! Looking forward to the build!

[sciff5]

BTW thats a very clean FC including your engine compartment.

I'm sure you'll want to keep it loking clean and simple. Just a heads up the Ls1 is really a very ugly motor, lots of wires (which are hard as shit to get look right again once you start opening up the harness) I would highly suggest up front using pez's pedestal corvette style mounts (they just look tits).

I would prob look up some of the other builds and look into a setup that relocates the coilpacks to the firewall or somewhere else other than on the engine. Then you can get some good looking valve covers and make the engine look cleaner/simpler which is better.

I would also look into some good wire covers. The factory black plastic isnt going to win you any best of show awards. I was planning on using the braided covers but then you need to depin every connector run the wires through the covers and then put the connector back together. The other option that you see a lot of is to just run the corvette engine covers and that will hide most of the mess.

These things seem minor but if planned from the beginning it can help you do it right once or twice instead of 3 or 4 times.