1984 "Rustang" GT (Slow Build)

[WallaceMFG]

I like keeping cars brands match motors too, but I get the LS conversions.
Bonus, that LS1 has similar weight to my Turbo Lima 2.3L at 450 lbs.

I'm getting it more too now! lol. Hopefully I can lose some weight with the swap, the Aluminum LS will save me some weight, but the T56 is going to add some compared to the T5. Wish I could have weighed the car before removing the old powertrain.

Wow, what an update! I'll be watching your swap with great interest. I'm the exact opposite of your beliefs, hot rodding is engine swaps! Good luck!

I mean, I'm not against engine swaps, just try to keep the brands the same lol. In a perfect world I'd be doing a Coyote swap, but it's just too expensive compared to the LS. So to the dark side I went lol.

[WallaceMFG]

Well, I got my LS1 back from the machine shop, but not with good news. The rust in the cylinders was more than a 0.010 overbore could clean up, so the block is useless. Probably going to be made into a coffee table now. Fortunately, I came across an aluminum 5.3 block for a good price and I grabbed it. Current plan is to get it bored out to LS1 spec so I can use the LS1 rotating assembly. So in the end, I get to keep my aluminum block that I wanted. And since it is a Gen 4 block, I can get it sleeved for big displacement in the future if I want.

22179 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr

22182 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


Since I can't do much with the engine currently, I tore my trans apart to work on fixing the failed bearing. Again, my luck seems to be bad, the bearing race seems to be welded to the mainshaft and I haven't been able to get it off. I've found one other bearing that wasn't in good shape, but otherwise the trans is in great shape inside. So worst case, I need a main shaft. Even if I need it, I still come out money ahead compared to buying a T56 from a junkyard.

20210113_071926 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr

20210112_203249 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


Progress will continue slowly. I'm currently hunting for an SN95 K member to make the swap easier. Found one at a Junkyard, but don't want to pay their prices if I can avoid it.

[WallaceMFG]

Hey all,

Made some progress recently. Managed to find an SN95 K member local to me for a good price and picked it up. Ordered some motor mounts for a Modular 4.6 and tried to bolt them to the engine. Apparently the "4.6 mounts bolt right up" I was told was a lie. The front two bolts had to be enlarged one size with a unibit, nothing major. But the rear bolt is at least an inch away from lining up. So I'm going to weld another plate on to extend the rear bolt flange to make it line up and I will be set. Overall, not that bad of a problem to have. I also had to notch the K member for oil pan clearance since I'm using the F-body oil pan that came with my LS1. I knew that going in, so it didn't bother me. I cut the area out and will box it in for strength.

After all that I checked that everything was going to fit.

20210207_202622 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr

20210207_202629 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


I stuck the F-body manifolds on just to see how they looked, they cleared everything easily. Not sure if I will use them or not, I will have to see how the steering shaft clearance is in the car before I'll know. Either way, it was nice to see how well it all looks like it will fit. I need to find a starter too, that area might be tight with exhaust.

Otherwise, since my new block is at the machine shop I got started on prepping some of the car. I may have gone a little further than I planned...

20210207_202618 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


I wanted to clean up the wiring, and it has turned into a much bigger job. There is lots of stuff that is not needed any more I can remove, just need to find where it all terminates so I can remove it while keeping the rest of the car functional. I'm also going to run all the wiring down the drivers side fender, instead of down both as it was before. I hope that will keep all of the wiring in one place and look cleaner, especially once I add the harness for the LS.

Progress will come as I'm able to get out in the garage!

[WallaceMFG]

Howdy!

I made more progress over the past few weeks. Here's an image of how the 4.6 motor mounts had to be modified to work with the LS.

20210213_145401 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


I boxed in the K member where I notched it for oil pan clearance.

20210213_145428 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


After that, I got the K member put into the car. The rear bolt holes have to be slotted to line up with a Fox, so I did that and trimmed it shorter to clear the frame rails. Got it in and dropped the block in to see how it looked.

20210216_144836 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


I have lots of oil pan clearance to the rack.

20210216_165647 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


I threw the rest of the parts on to see how it looks.

20210216_165653 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr

20210216_165703 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr

20210216_165733 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


It's definitely tight in some spots. The steering shaft goes right through the driver exhaust manifold, so it looks like swap headers or a different manifold are required. The heater hose outlets are aimed right at the coils, so I need to figure that out. And one coil hits the brake booster, so a coil relocation kit may be in order.

Otherwise, I ordered a bell housing and crossmember for the T56 so I can mock up the trans in the car. I don't anticipate any issues, but want to make sure all the bell housing bolts will go in with how tight it was to the firewall. And as always I'm still working on wiring, taking all the crap out of the harness that I don't need but being careful to make sure the car will still work as before. Fun stuff!

[WallaceMFG]

Hey all,

Not much to show but I have been making progress. Since my last post I received the bellhousing and crossmember for the T56 so I could try putting it in the car. Overall, it fit ok but needed improvement. The shifter was perfectly centered in the floor opening, but the body of the trans was hitting the top of the tunnel. Also, I discovered that the back of my intake manifold was hitting one of the ribs on the firewall and wouldn't seat properly. So I decided to kill two birds with one stone and fix both problems. I took my motor mounts that I had previously modified and modified them again lol.

This time I extended the front of the mounts and relocated the rear hole, to push the motor forward 3/4". This gained me the clearance I needed for the intake, as well as gaining clearance in the trans tunnel. The shifter is still pretty close to the perfect location, I can use an offset shifter if I need. A result of the mount change, I had to redo the notch I previously put in the K member. It now goes all the way across for oil pan clearance. After those changes, the motor now fits very nicely in the bay.

20210321_173220 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


Aside from that, I've been picking away at my PCM wiring. I got an 0411 PCM and harness from a truck and have been weeding out the circuits no longer needed. It is a slow and dirty process, but going well so far. I've found a few places where wires have damaged insulation from sun exposure which isn't ideal. But since I'm going to be extending the harness to mount the PCM in the fender, I'll be able to do some creative splicing and fix all that. I'll be sure to show how much I pull out when I'm done lol.

20210321_173217 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


Otherwise, I make progress when I can. My wife and I recently purchased a new to us toy hauler that needs a little rehab, so I've been working on that a ton to try and finish before summer arrives. And the usual project list for the house, kids, etc... I want to have it running by the end of the year if I can! lol

[Mikey97D]

Nice progress.

The prices on toyhaulers right now are nuts. Well, nuts on any rv. Good luck with the new to your toyhauler.

[WallaceMFG]

Nice progress.

The prices on toyhaulers right now are nuts. Well, nuts on any rv. Good luck with the new to your toyhauler.

Thanks! And yes, they are crazy right now. Plus there's just none available. And when you start looking for a specific model it gets even harder. Less than a month after we got it the stimulus checks hit and people got tax returns, trailer market literally dried up overnight.

We had decided on what we wanted, so had to pay to play. 07 Weekend Warrior FSW3200.

20210306_151024 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr

[WallaceMFG]

Hey all,

Still making progress as I can. Been picking away at the PCM harness, finally got all the unused circuits weeded out. Here's the pile of unused wired from the harness, almost bigger than what is left lol.

20210417_180134 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


Threw the harness on the car to start seeing how things are going to go.

20210411_190546 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


Not sure if this is final, but the PCM fits pretty good right here. And the harness might not need extended at all, or very little.

20210411_190539 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


And in other news, my new block is back from the machine shop. 5.3 now bored to LS1 spec, ready to go together. Just need to order bearings to start checking clearances.

20210417_142139 by Nelson Wallace, on Flickr


Things are going well!!!

[WallaceMFG]

Hey everyone,

Been a while since I've been stalking the forum. Life has taken a lot of turns since the last time I made a post on here, time for a recap.

I had not posted about it on here, but my wife and I welcomed our son to the world in October 2020. Life was chaotic as expected but everything was going well in the household with him and his older sister. However, there were some circumstances that were starting to change that situation. The short reason is that we were spending tons of time commuting between Yuma and Mesa. Only about a 3 hour drive, but making that drive every Friday and Sunday was wearing us out. Combine all the driving with having an infant who did NOT like to sleep in the car, we had finally had enough with all the driving.

Shortly after my last post on here, I interviewed for a new job. I had not been planning to leave GM, but my dad who worked at Allison Transmission told me they were about to have an opening for an Engineering position. I decided to throw in an application, thinking I would not get the job as I did not have tons of experience yet. Nearly 3 months went by and I figured I had not gotten the job. Well, suddenly I got a phone call with a job offer 3 days before I was leaving on a vacation. I decided to accept the job, but we had to keep the details quiet until I returned and was able to submit my leave notice to GM.

Most of Summer 2021 was consumed by packing our house and moving back to the Phoenix area. I quickly packed the Rustang full of it's own parts and dragged it to my parents house temporarily. The housing market was absolutely crazy then, we were terrified about finding a home since they were all selling before we could even look at any. Thanks to help from my parents, we actually ended up with a house about a quarter mile from my parents, great so I can use the shop! I started with Allison Transmission in July of 2021 and had a steep learning curve. Part of the agreement with the wife was that I would shelve the Rustang project for a while since our new house cost so much more than we wanted due to the market conditions. I agreed, and luckily the house has a carport in the back yard I've been able to keep it under. So it's not for a lack of desire that the Rustang hasn't been worked on, just a reality of life unfortunately.

Now the bad part of the life update. In December 2022, we unexpectedly lost my Dad to an obscure brain infection. It has been hard would be an understatement to say the least. Our family has been lost without him, he was our ring leader and was the one always planning new adventures for us to go on. I work in the same office as him and work has never been the same. We still miss him every day, and the only comfort we can take is that he's not suffering anymore.

Since losing Dad, all of the project cars have been in a bit of limbo. I have not done much to any of them past general maintenance or fixing things that are broken. Here's a bit of a summary of all the projects:

• Our 69 Torino is the reliable one, but not able to be used half of the year due to no A/C.
• The 69 Chevelle has been completely and utterly unreliable. The trans broke 6th gear in March 2022, and the replacement we put in is geared for the drag strip and sucks to drive on the street. We have had a constant stream of issues from the Fitech EFI. Currently, I have it back to drivable and it will probably stay that way for a bit. Hope to put a TKX in it and replace the Fitech soon.
• Dad had a 1971 C10 that he was getting ready to build into his new daily driver. We have a 525hp LS3 crate motor with 6L90, Vintage air, suspension, wheels, etc… It is waiting for us to have time to get started on it.
• I bought my wife a 1980 Suburban since we needed something larger for the family to take to car shows. It’s a runner, and the long term project is I have a Duramax/Allison combo to put into it.
• 1967 Mustang GT sitting in the garage, not sure what we will do with it yet.
• 1970 Mach 1 Mustang, same situation as the 67 except I want this one so it’s not going anywhere.

And finally, back to the Rustang. I haven’t done much of anything to it except for hunt for parts here and there. I have the aluminum 5.3 that I was planning to use, needs pistons and a bunch of other parts to be usable. I also have a gen4 6.0 that was given to me with a spun cam bearing. The bottom end is in fantastic shape, so I’m cleaning it up and seeing if the block is able to be saved. I don’t feel any grooves in the cam journal where the bearing came out, so I am hoping it can be saved. I think I’ll accept the weight hit for the iron block if it means I can have a usable engine for cheaper. I also just recently found a new main shaft for my Viper T56. They have been unavailable anywhere for the last couple years, I got lucky and found Hawks Motorsports had one listed on eBay the other day and I grabbed it. So at least my trans will be usable eventually.

I’ll get around to posting some pictures of stuff soon. The only good thing about the long delay is my son is now almost 5 and loves to be out in the garage with me. So with any luck, I can get back to working on the Rustang with him.

Looking forwards to talking with people again, and having some fun things to work towards.

Nelson

[Mikey97D]

Sorry about losing your father.