meanjoe

Nice looking car.
You didn't need to remove the oil cooler. I did cam, heads on mine and it stayed put. You can remove radiator and AC condenser as a unit and just leave them out of the way without disconnecting your freon lines.

Good luck!

big_mike_eu

Thank you

I wish I knew that, could have saved me a bit of work haha. I was trying to get the shroud out so I can see better how the radiator is held. Shroud was attached to the bumper, so I decided to pull the bumper, noticed that the hood needed to come off for the bumper so it was like a chain reaction hahaha.

Correct me if I am wrong, sure hope that I am, but if I disconnect the lines going in the condenser to pull it out as a single unit with the radiator wouldn't all the Freon leak/vent out?

C6Z06Silverbullet

Not unless you disconnect the lines.

big_mike_eu

Makes sense. The bottom line that goes into the condenser is metal and I am a little afraid of bending it to mode the condenser and radiator out of the way.

big_mike_eu

So yesterday on the way home from work I was next to a 2nd gen CTS-V (that will be the car that I want to replace my daily driver in a couple of years) at the light. Not sure what the guy had done to it, but for sure it had a cam at the very least. That thing sounded amazing. At that moment I knew since I am doing all of this work, I will most likely do cam. Before I was leaning more towards staying with the stock cam if not damaged, but I want that mean sound and the extra power. I am strongly considering the torquer 110. Just wanted to give you guys an update on the cam decision.

C6Z06Silverbullet

Katech torquer 110 all the way. Never look back.

big_mike_eu

Hi guys, I need a little advise on how to proceed. I ran into a snag yesterday. I got some time to work on the car, separating the radiator from the condenser. The problem that I am running into is, when I try to pull the condenser up and off of the hooks. The lower left hook/tab (facing the car) will not come up. I found that the reason for it is due to the condenser line hitting the radiator. I was thinking of trimming the plastic hook with a dremmel to be able to remove the condenser without disconnecting the A/C line. Do anyone have any tips or alternate ideas of how to do this?

All Stock Ls2

If it's a lifter go ahead and get new lifter trays to go along with the lifters themselves. Check the cam or whatever else may have been the culprit to begin with. I didn't read all of the comments before so I don't know if you mentioned it but if you haven't already fixed the valve issue that's so notorious on LS7s go ahead and knock that out too while you're at it. Best of luck brother

big_mike_eu

Yup, most certainly will get the trays along with the lifters. I am really hoping that the cam is undamaged, mostly due to any metal shavings. I intend to do cam upgrade in the process since I'll need to tear things apart. I had the heads done/fixed about 10k miles ago by WCCH. I got the stage 2 package, opted out on the head milling since I intend to go FI in near future. Thank you! I will most certainly need all the luck I can get

All Stock Ls2

Seems like you've got all bases covered be sure to update us brother and if you have any questions feel free to pm me!

big_mike_eu

Thanks brother

I might take you up on that offer as I start digging deeper into it. I am sure I'll have plenty of questions. Not much update so far. I had to do timing belt and water pump on my daily driver this past weekend so I haven't had the chance to work on the Z. I'll spend some time later this week though. Hopefully I'll have some progress to share with everyone

All Stock Ls2

Looking forward to it and if I'm not able to answer your question off the top of my head I'll do some research for you brother I know how frustrating cars can be and how much of a life saver someone knowledgeable pointing you in the right direction can be.. again good luck brother feel free to message me I'll be more than happy to help

big_mike_eu

Hi guys, I got a little bit of time to work on the Z yesterday. So I thought I'd share with everyone. It's small progress, but still progress haha. I was able to take out the radiator, leaving the condenser in the car. I used a drammel to shave down the side of the lower passanger side radiator hook. Otherwise, the hook would always get caught on a weld edge on the condenser and it would not budge. I figured, didn't want to risk damaging the condenser so I with the this option. All worked out in the end.

I noticed that the power steering cooler has some damage on it. Not sure if it was the guys that did my heads few years back or the previous owner (that's why I don't like to take my cars anywhere). Do you guys think if should replace it while in there? It has no leaks, but the fins look quite bent.

Silly question, speaking of power steering, are the lines going to be in the way of getting to the cam? Should I drain the PS system?

In the meantime, I think the next item that I'll tackle is the intake manifold and headers

C6Z06Silverbullet

Just straighten the fins up and your fine.

big_mike_eu

Sounds good, thanks C6Z06Silverbullet

Dan_the_C5_Man

You can buy a small plastic tool to straighten the fins, I think I probably bought mine at HF, but you could get one from Amazon as well.

big_mike_eu

If you have a chance, would you mind snapping a picture of the tool you purchased from HF? I've been thinking to stop by HF, might as well buy one.

wjnjr

This should work. It's a coil comb used to straighten the fins on A/C coils. I got this one at an A/C supply house, but HF, Northern Tool, Grainger, etc. may have them.

Dan_the_C5_Man

That's the one, posted above..

Undy

Having owned a HVAC company for 40 years I've found those fin combs to be a POS. They will tend to tear the aluminum fins. I've always used, with tremendous success, a regular small "tweeker" pocket screw driver. It would take me about 5 minutes to straighten all those fins out, with a couple minutes to spare. I just had to straighten out a bunch smashed fins on a system I just installed in my Flori-duh home.