🔧 BUILD LAME Turbo V6 Camaro

[v6buicks]

Hmmmm... Although MY cluster gear does not seem to be made anymore. THIS one (1352077070R) with the same tooth count is cheap and plentiful. I wonder if it's the same everywhere else.

Edit: I was wrong. These clusters do NOT have the same tooth count. My cluster can be bought new, but it costs about 2.5x the price of an entire transmission on marketplace.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

superseded part numbers are common as hell

 

[v6buicks]

superseded part numbers are common as hell

Yep. Normally a list of alternate numbers are easy to find, but I'm having trouble getting that sort of confirmation. Every process is like running through quick sand with this car. Lol

 

[02TurboMaro]

Look at it this way you could always buy you a blown head gasket manual camaro for 500 buck and shove the trans from that one into yours. Gonna be hard to find the right gears for that trans because nobody uses them. They just don't hold anything over 300/lb of torque as we have seen hahaha.

 

[v6buicks]

I'm getting some much needed garage therapy today.

First I just started cleaning the garage. It was nearly impossible to navigate with the Buick 350 on the floor. I was super happy to get that boat anchor back on a stand, keep the crane on the floor, and squeeze the GN back in it's spot. I've never been that organized. I also found a way to pull the transmission swap mess in and out of the way in seconds.

I basically turned my wheel dollies into a rolling parts shelf creeper. Its simple and handy!

After a disappointing conversation with Full Throttle, I decided not to do an E85 conversion on the GN right now. It would require another fuel pump upgrade which I'm not prepared to do quite yet. Besides, I need to remember that the Camaro has more issues than just a blown trans. Open downpipes on stock 3800s are not cool. I don't care if it has a hair drier on it!

I'm hosting a party at the house next weekend. Hence, the garage cleanup. I don't want to make that big of a mess. However, I ordered a bunch of tube so that I can start making my new down pipe and waste gate dump next week! It's going to require modifications to the existing pipes, and even then squeezing the pipe between the hood, shock tower and valve cover is going to be tricky. Regardless, in excited. I wish I could build one out of stainless for the ultimate sexiness, but I don't have a TIG machine. Some day.

Today's update: I finally spent the 10 minutes to shorten the IAT harness. Lol. Sometimes I need a boring day to knock out the dumb little stuff.

 

[v6buicks]

I don't want to make that big of a mess

I posted that and immediately threw the idea in the trash.

See how I made a full 90 degree bend up to the turbo? I think I'm going to cut it off at 45 degrees and weld a new flange on there. I did that thinking it would be easier to change turbos, but how often am I going to need to do that? Hopefully not a lot! The current transition from round to square is a disaster and lowering the turbo a little will allow a bigger bend radius on the down pipe.

As for the waste gate, I think I'm going to cut the perch down a couple inches, face the outlet the other direction and dump it to the ground. This all works in my head, but we'll see what happens when it comes time to re plumb the vacuum lines and stuff. I just hope that I won't have to move the entire perch. If that's the case, I'll have to rebuild the whole merge thing.

 

[GTPpower]

Interested in an electric cutout? I have one I'd sell for cheap.

 

[v6buicks]

Interested in an electric cutout? I have one I'd sell for cheap.

Started a conversation. I'm interested.

 

[v6buicks]

Sorry for not having pictures. To be honest, I'm not feeling much more pride in Merge Pipe 2.0 than I did in the original take. I quickly ran out of shielding gas so I switched to flux core. My flux core welds are actually some of the best welds I've ever made with this machine. It just sucks that I had to get spatter all over the place and weld over a bunch of really crappy MIG welds. One more negative. I am using anew turbo flange which is considerably thinner than the one I cut off. The finish was junk when I got it anyway, but I probably warped it as well. I'm going to have to try belt sanding it smooth.

Here's the old flange ?

On the plus side, I took a lot of extra time to orient the flange at a more pleasing angle. It might be hard to tell in pictures, but the turbo always had a tiny bit of lean to it. After lots of mock-up, that should not be the case anymore. I also put some more effort toward making a smooth transition from the round pipe to the T4 flange. Despite needing to shave down some ugly welds, it looks like it flows much nicer.

The waste gate flange was pretty cut and dry, but I flux cored that back on as well. I'm going to get some shielding gas tonight so that I can at least MIG the DP, but the good news is that this whole thing will be getting re painted and rewrapped anyway. As long as there are no leaks, I'll call this out of sight and out of mind! I dropped a decent amount of weight off of this merge pipe, but it would be nice to brace it somewhere to prevent cracking. Now that I'm going through all this again with the updated heater hoses and tensioner, the heater hose retainer bolts look like a decent spot to anchor a support bracket.

 

[v6buicks]

Good thing I'll be wrapping this back up. ? Nobody wants to see that! I mocked it up one last time so that I could sit the turbo on the flange and get an ide for where the down pipe is going to go. The tight radius bends I bought are going to make it way easier/simpler than I initially planned. I'm going to true up the flange on the belt sander first, but what are everybody's thoughts on welding the bolts to the flange? Removing and reinstalling the turbo is a massive PITA even with the whole pipe off the car. I'm probably going to do that.

Well I know to never attempt head porting. ? Hopefully the gasket seals.

 

[TurboTJ]

Hey if it works and doesnt leak, it works and doesnt leak right? Lol
Anyways i was catching up on the tread and noticed you mentioned the 90* turn and WG placement and i instantly thought cut the angle out and lower the WG tube to only see you did that. Good work man! But honestly with the trans issues i woulda auto'ed it way long ago.

 

[v6buicks]

Hey if it works and doesnt leak, it works and doesnt leak right? Lol
Anyways i was catching up on the tread and noticed you mentioned the 90* turn and WG placement and i instantly thought cut the angle out and lower the WG tube to only see you did that. Good work man! But honestly with the trans issues i woulda auto'ed it way long ago.

Very true. I did find a pinhole already though. ? Last time I did this I boogered it, wrapped it, and sent it which resulted in a whole bunch of undetected leaks. Since I had an open downpipe none could be heard, but I'm grinding my boogers and finding these leaks now. Even when I'm done welding, I'm going to hold off on wrapping so that I can hear, feel, and fix any other pinholes. Then I'll wrap it, and have an ugly, but nice system. lol

I hear ya, but I really don't think an auto swap is going to be as cheap or easy as as it sounds. Having an electric throttle means no TV or kick-down cables. 4L80e is the only sensible choice IMO. The good adapter is about $600. Then I need a controller which is $500 or more, a transmission ($???), shifter, console, pedal, wiring, driveshaft, crossmember, new tuning, and who knows what else. I'd be in it the same amount or more as a TKO. Yeah it would make the car faster, but I still think the reward is going to be worth the pioneering. It will certainly help to stop making such stupid mistakes like installing clutch disks backward.

 

[v6buicks]

Neat

Remind me never to attempt head porting.

Double not neat

First of all, welding the bolts was a bad idea. This turbo will not allow me spin the nut in the last pic. That's China for ya. Luckily I only welded one flat, so unoing this weld should be fairly easy. Needing to use two wrenches for one connection is better than the turbo sliding all over the place while you try to shove bolts through.

Second of all, the little drain adapter that came with turbo isn't going to work anymore. I'm going to need one that is extended and points straight down. The one I have shown was made to point away from the compressor housing. I hope getting one that points straight down, but has a long shank will suffice.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

From my work with the Transmissions you should be able to control a 4 L 80 e with the 3800 PCM.

 

[v6buicks]

From my work with the Transmissions you should be able to control a 4 L 80 e with the 3800 PCM.

Would I have to swap it out with an auto ECM or should the manual ECM have all the functions? Either way, good to know.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

only difference between manual and auto is a setting/tables used in the bin file

the 4t80e is close enough that you can do it, later l80e's will have the ISS to keep driveline diagnostics happy

 

[v6buicks]

I went back to work yesterday!


Again, it's not pretty, but it will work! I find it kind of dumb that the turbo is cast in such a way that I cannot tighten nuts and bolts down, but I expected nothing less from an ebay unit. When my bolts weren't welded this didn't matter because the nut was captured and the bolt could be turned instead. I'm glad I took the time to make this change. I shouldn't need to take the turbo on and off a lot, but it will certainly make the process a less of a headache in the future. Shaving that one stud down a couple threads will make downpipe removal a ton easier as well!

Speaking of downpipe,

I am so happy with how this is turning out! As I suspected, spark plug changing with the downpipe installed is a no-go. Oh well. Undoing and redoing two v-bands is hardly a process. One big win here is finding that tight radius pipe which allowed me to go straight back instead of building a crazy bullhorn deal. Another big win is clearing the oil filler neck so that I don't need to do anything stupid for oil changes. There should be plenty of room for engine movement between the DP and the strut tower. Most of all, I think it looks pretty cool.

I haven't decided which way to go with the wastegate zoomy yet. I thought about running it similarly to how the original downpipe went, but that's a lot of pipe which would require bracing. For simplicity I think I'm going to face the wastegate outlet to the passenger side and have it dump almost straight down but to the driver side of the merge. It's hard to tell by the pictures, but facing the gate the other way would make belt changes a bear. dumping straight down from the other side is not quite going to clear because of the sway bar mount. Trust me. It's simple!

The only thing I have yet to set in stone is a turbo brace. I've been running without one this whole time. The mounting as-is is very solid, but I do not feel great about having all that weight hanging completely unsupported. I was thinking about using the unused bolt holes by the oil feed to tie it to the heater fittings, but I'm not sure if that will really do anything for support. I might be able to triangulate it to one of the AC bracket holes, but I worry about the whole thing looking cluttered. We'll see. I'll worry about that after I get the rest of the plumbing sorted. I still don't know if my drain plan is going to work. I'm waiting on slow-boat parts from China to address that..

 

[v6buicks]

I came across a transmission deal that I couldn't refuse.

I'm going to make the 10 hour round trip to snag it after work tonight. I know it isn't going to be "the fix" for my problems, but it will make my car functional again once I finish this exhaust. I'm thinking that I'm going to pop the tail housing off, drop in a billet bearing retainer plate, set the end play, and send it. It's not worth putting in any money or effort into a T5 rebuild. I'll just try to drive it nice and easy until I can scrape up the cash for a TKO.

Since the GN needs a lot of exhaust work, the C30 needs brakes and control arms, I need to consider buying a new daily, and the 240s power steering pump is on it's way to see god, a $150 band aid for the back up car sounds a lot nicer than $2600.

 

[v6buicks]

Damn I'm tired. I've driven pretty far out of my way for super trick car parts, but I've never done anything like this for a mass-produced tooth pick in need of a rebuild. This thing has clearly been sitting outside a while. When I was dumping the remainder of the fluid out, it showed up quite diluted and hardly red. Hopefully the ATF was enough to repel water off the gears and keep the damage down to only surface rust. Either way, it's looking like I'm going to end up pulling THIS trans apart for a clean-up if nothing else. At that point, I might just harvest the third gear and cluster for my trans. I was able to shift it into all gears and watch the output spin, but there's no telling what those synchros are like. I don't feel great about this buy, but it was only $150 which was about what I was hoping to spend on a gear set anyway. I'll be fine!

Some shots of the ride. I passed by the Duquoin State Fair grounds, and a lot of nice scenery to remind me why I miss Little Egypt.

Where in the Eff am I??

I ended up taking a completely different route home after Mt. Vernon. GPS said it was a similar ETA so ?‍

After working more than a full shift, I drove 10 hours for a junk T5. I'm special.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

I always get the feeling that the short bus I'm on is 3800 powered

 

[v6buicks]

That's pretty sig worthy. lol

 

[02TurboMaro]

Be a g and put a 45 and connect your waste gate exhaust to the downpipe. the 45 will be so you don't get back pressure into the wastegate. This is if your running a open downpipe which I'm assuming you are.

 

[02TurboMaro]

also brace your turbo to the engine not the frame. the motor moves and the exhaust is connected to that motor not directly to the frame so when you get torquey it will actually put the tubing in a bind if you are braced to the frame or body rather than braced to the motor itself. should be able to find a hole that already has a bolt. built a bracket to bolt to the motor and either weld it to the turbo or make a cradle for the turbo to rest in. Hope this helps a little.

 

[v6buicks]

Be a g and put a 45 and connect your waste gate exhaust to the downpipe. the 45 will be so you don't get back pressure into the wastegate. This is if your running a open downpipe which I'm assuming you are.

The turbo setup was done already. The whole reason I'm doing this is so that I don't have the open downpipe anymore. Lol I'm not connecting the waste gate to the downpipe because it's nice to know when it's actually open. If I'm not beating on the car, it'll be quiet. If I'm beating on it, I don't care if it's louder.

 

[02TurboMaro]

To each is own haha