96GS#007

Since everyone else is busy posting pics of their engine builds, I figured I may as well do the same. If any of you peruse the For Sale section, you've already seen some of the parts from the prior engine.

Since there always seems to be a lot of questions about pulling the engine with the hood on...







Dangling from the TPiS "Happy Hooker"...




Teardown...





Of course a new 383 build needs new parts...

I'm going for a lighter rotating assembly, so I'm switching rods. New SCAT forged H-beam Q-lite rod with preservative goo is on the left / SCAT forged H-beam is on the right



Forged lightweight Eagle crank is on the right vs stock LT4 crank


AFR 195 Eliminator Competition Cylinder heads





The AFRs don't match up to my old LT4 intake which is ported to the GM "7777" off-road gasket, so I had to get a new intake. Also picked up some new rocker arms since self-aligning rockers won't work with the LSx style lightweight valves in the AFR heads



All for now. Rainy season has started here in the Pacific Northwest so I'm in no particular hurry. As I make progress, I'll post pics and such.

STL94LT1

Gotta love that "Happy Hooker"!!

reoch999

I don't see a smiley for jealous, so I'll use this one. Good luck on your winter project!

steve40th

What is the specs of the build?
Can you divuldge the pistons/rings and what compression you are going for.
And my 2 cents, stay away from low tension rings. Lesson learned here as 500-750 miles a quart aint worth the extra hp.

96GS#007

So it's still somewhat being determined. In addition to the above, so far it's:

- Goal is ~420-430hp to the wheels
- Peak hp @ 6300rpm
- Peak tq @ 4800rpm
- Cam is tbd, but expect something along the lines of 230/236 duration and .58x lift with an LSA around 112*
- 52mm throttle body (I'm just not sold it needs a 58mm)
- SPEC steel flywheel and Stage 2+ or Stage 3 clutch. I'm going steel vs aluminum to retain some civility since I do drive it on the street
- ATI 6.875" aluminum balancer w/ steel hub. Compared to the LT4 balancer, this is about 5% underdriven. When the balancer arrives I'll lay the two out side by side for a pic
- Compression ratio will be ~10.8:1. Looks like I'm going to use SRP forged inverted dome pistons, -16cc (heads are 55cc).
- Standard rings...probably Perfect Circle
- Block will be decked to give me pistons that are .010 in the hole for good quench
- Stock GM lifters
- EM Long tube headers thru Random Tech cats into my existing Corsa exhaust

88BlackZ-51

Another motor with the Eliminators in the near future!

steve40th

Cool, your engine is very close to my 396. I have a comp cams 230/236 cam with 112+2 and 544/555 lift. I have CNC heads, not nearly the AFR heads(easily 20hp difference) you have. I also have SRP -14cc pistons with angle milled heads at 55cc and Impala gasket to give me with the block machining 11.1 to 1. ANd with Long tubes (no cats) and an auto I am putting 425 rwhp.
he 58mm isnt , IMHO necessary.

MarkBychowski

Looks like a great plan! I'm sure you'll be happy with the results.

Your old engine looks cleaner than my new one!

cv67

I bet you get close to if not meet your goal with the new build.
....billet steel flywheel (from Carolina clutch ?)
Have a stage 3 here, nice looking piece.

Those shortys or LT1 manifolds without the covers?

LD85

I never get tired of seeing these types of pics!

96GS#007

Not sure yet where I'm going to buy the flywheel from. I've bought from Carolina Clutch in the past, good company to do business with

Those are Hooker shorties in the pics. Sold those a couple weeks ago. The new engine will have EM LTs.

5abivt

havn't used my happy hooker yet but it looks like it works wonders for pullin the motor out ! Good luck on your build sweet selection of parts !

rklessdriver

Jim
Looks like pretty good stuff so far.

Those Perfect Circle Rings (with the Napier second) are a good prouduct. Highly recommended.

Best of luck with it.
Will

Sidney004

Very impressive, who is doing the assembly and machine work? If you don't mind me asking, what do you project the cost of the engine to be? I am looking at going to the 383 road race setup one day and want to compare this route to an LT1 crate engine. Will it be an emission legal cam? This should let you run with the big dogs now!

96GS#007

Short block assembly and machine work will be handled by Tom Wong & a shop in Portland that Tom works with. The rest by me.

By the time it's all said and done, I'll have close to $10k in this build so a crate engine would be way cheaper....but also have about 175-200 less hp at the crank

Since the planned cam has moderate duration, with a little tuning work it'll pass a sniffer test and frankly in the interest of having a good tune and all around driveability I'll tune for that. Of course since '96 is OBD II, all they do is plug in and look for codes and make sure the correct flags are set. Fundamentally all this does is verify the sensors and PCM are operating correctly regardless of what is spewing out the tailpipe.

Sidney004

Are you going to have a custom cam or an off the shelf grind?

88BlackZ-51

I was kinda curious of that as well. Maybe give Tony from AFR a call, and ask him, if you haven't allready. He had alot of say in my combo!

96GS#007

Custom. Plan to work thru Crane Cams.

96GS#007

Thanks Will! I appreciate the advice you've provided.

Orr89rocz

go more on the lift. those heads are just beginning to flow at .600 230 duration will be enough, but i'd like to see abit tighter lsa. For tuning/sniffer purposes i guess you have to go to a 112

That setup will be very very streetable