Devo Project: Turbo 5.3L Tri Five Shoebox
For a while now I’ve wanted to show people what we can do with turbos and V8’s being that they’ve seen what we can do with turbo four cylinders. I originally had really wanted to do a low and laid out rusty rat rod for this project but after seeing all of the available bolt on parts for the Tri-Fives, I had changed my mind. We may do a rat rod as our next project, you’ll have to wait and see. So, I picked up the 5.3L from a flex fuel 2004 Chevy Tahoe from LKQ for a steal a couple months back.
It’s just waiting for the right transplant vehicle to come along.
So the story begins about finding the car….
Looking at old 50’s Chevy’s can get quite expensive depending on condition, etc. which is why it has taken some time to finally pull the trigger on a good candidate for this project. I found the ad on Craigslist for a ’55 Chevy Belair 4dr, and though I first was originally looking at two doors I started considering doing a 4dr since the car is going to be kept a cruiser. It may end up with a lot of power but I plan to make it totally reliable for 2-4 people to hit the cruise spots come the nice weather. The ad said 80% restored and interior needing to be done, which was about all I had to go off of since the owner didn’t have more pictures to send me besides these that were in the ad.
It was obvious that the car had recently been painted and needed all the trim put back together but that isn’t an overwhelming task. So a friend and I set off to Indiana where the car was located with truck and trailer. After pulling up to the owner’s house and seeing the car I had good feeling it was the one. Definitely needed more than just the interior put back together but after short inspection of how solid the under carriage was I was pretty much sold on it, and yes it did come with the sweet confederate flag covering the pretty much gone back seat. Here it is on the trailer.
Pretty cool pic of it on the trailer with the glow of the brake lights.
The car has a 350sbc from a mid 70’s K5 and a turbo 350 in it already, which is coming out sooner than later, but it’s completely drivable now. As I clean it up it seems to show better every time I stop and look at the progress.
We even took it to lunch in it’s current state.
So after sitting down and discussing the project collectively with everyone involved we’ve decided that it definitely needs a Borg Warner T6 S400 80mm turbo and keeping the vintage look and reliability we’ve decided to go with the Edelbrock carb manifold kit and msd box to run the coils topped off with a CSU blow thru carb with Turbo bonnet. We are more than familiar with Borg Warner’s S400 turbo line being that it’s the same turbo we’re running on Reichen’s Mile Evo II.
I’ve decided for now while I’m getting everything together for the 5.3 and deciding what transmission we’re going to run the SBC that’s in it should get a big dose of nitrous and start with trunk mounting the battery. We’ve already got in the power brake conversion as well that comes with drilled and slotted rotors and 2” spindle drop. The rear is getting a 2” leaf drop and new shocks all the way around.
Stay tuned for the updates…
For a while now I’ve wanted to show people what we can do with turbos and V8’s being that they’ve seen what we can do with turbo four cylinders. I originally had really wanted to do a low and laid out rusty rat rod for this project but after seeing all of the available bolt on parts for the Tri-Fives, I had changed my mind. We may do a rat rod as our next project, you’ll have to wait and see. So, I picked up the 5.3L from a flex fuel 2004 Chevy Tahoe from LKQ for a steal a couple months back.
It’s just waiting for the right transplant vehicle to come along.
So the story begins about finding the car….
Looking at old 50’s Chevy’s can get quite expensive depending on condition, etc. which is why it has taken some time to finally pull the trigger on a good candidate for this project. I found the ad on Craigslist for a ’55 Chevy Belair 4dr, and though I first was originally looking at two doors I started considering doing a 4dr since the car is going to be kept a cruiser. It may end up with a lot of power but I plan to make it totally reliable for 2-4 people to hit the cruise spots come the nice weather. The ad said 80% restored and interior needing to be done, which was about all I had to go off of since the owner didn’t have more pictures to send me besides these that were in the ad.
It was obvious that the car had recently been painted and needed all the trim put back together but that isn’t an overwhelming task. So a friend and I set off to Indiana where the car was located with truck and trailer. After pulling up to the owner’s house and seeing the car I had good feeling it was the one. Definitely needed more than just the interior put back together but after short inspection of how solid the under carriage was I was pretty much sold on it, and yes it did come with the sweet confederate flag covering the pretty much gone back seat. Here it is on the trailer.
Pretty cool pic of it on the trailer with the glow of the brake lights.
The car has a 350sbc from a mid 70’s K5 and a turbo 350 in it already, which is coming out sooner than later, but it’s completely drivable now. As I clean it up it seems to show better every time I stop and look at the progress.
We even took it to lunch in it’s current state.
So after sitting down and discussing the project collectively with everyone involved we’ve decided that it definitely needs a Borg Warner T6 S400 80mm turbo and keeping the vintage look and reliability we’ve decided to go with the Edelbrock carb manifold kit and msd box to run the coils topped off with a CSU blow thru carb with Turbo bonnet. We are more than familiar with Borg Warner’s S400 turbo line being that it’s the same turbo we’re running on Reichen’s Mile Evo II.
I’ve decided for now while I’m getting everything together for the 5.3 and deciding what transmission we’re going to run the SBC that’s in it should get a big dose of nitrous and start with trunk mounting the battery. We’ve already got in the power brake conversion as well that comes with drilled and slotted rotors and 2” spindle drop. The rear is getting a 2” leaf drop and new shocks all the way around.
Stay tuned for the updates…