Been Lurking for a while Ls1 Conversion
 

Hi all, I never officially introduced myself here but you guys seem like my kind of Miata guys. Anyway here's my car tell me what you think

It uses a v8roadsters standard kit
-Ls1 I rebuilt with an Ms4 cam/t56 6-speed
-Rx7 TurboII rear end/axles with Miata Roadster swap hubs
-Custom torque arm and traction bars
-Seam welded most of the car
-Tein coilovers
-HUGE ebay aluminum radiator
-ac/ps/heat delete
-sanderson shorty headers/custom 2.5" duel exhaust with no crossover/x pipe
-s2000 steering joint
-tooo much to list :blaugh:

I built this car with my dad as a father son project. We did EVERYTHING using HANDTOOLS and FLOORJACKS. The only thing we didn't do is rebuild the trans, I sent that out to Tick transmissions. We even do the wheel alignments on all our cars

I brought this car back to life with a whole bunch of little modifications that added up to a much better package. To start I purchased a proper welder that runs on a 220 line and not on my crappy garage 110 that was hindering my other welder.

-I re-seamwelded the transmission tunnel inside and outside
-made the fuel tank bottom sump with an 8an fitting welded to the bottom
installed braided line and relocated the fuel pump to the bottom of the car where the original fuel filter went
-I strengthened up the mounting of my jdm ;) s2000 steering joint
-welded 90 degree 2.5" pipes to my headers and put flanges at the bottom
-strengthened my rear k-member
-installed a much larger aluminum radiator, and did a whole bunch of other things I can't think of right now.

Next on the list of things to do is to re calibrate the eddy carb with new jets and metering rods. I'm shooting to lean it out a lot. Tell me what you guys think

My favorite new additions by far are my 15x9 Nickel 6UL's wrapped in 225/45/15 Hankook RS-3's. Check it out

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1349645715

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I have matching 3/16" steel plates with four holes each on the top side of the floor pan that the plates welded to the DOM tubing get bolted to. Also, while it was out of the car I seam welded it all up. The DOM tubing btw is 1.25" with .25" walls. Real over kill

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Carbed LS1???

Fail.

Horsepower tv had a section a while back where they proved the addition of nothing but a carb and high rise intake when compared to the stock set up yielded close to 100 crank horsepower on a stock ls1. Not only that, but the carb set up is easier to work with and much less expensive then fast-efi ls1 stuff/having it professionally dyno tuned. But to each their own right? Thanks for the input

edit: link to your sr20 build thread if you have one? If you do I must have skimmed over it when I checked your threads

2nd edit: heres an old vid of it

Welcome to the forum.
Good job pulling off a v8 conversion. That already is a big accomplishment.
However obvious stupidity like thinking carburation is superior to efi will get you eaten alive on this forum. Seriously, they're ruthless when it comes to intentional ignorance. So just be careful and try not to throw out statements like that unless you actually want people laughing at you.

Car sounds good and looks like its a lot of fun despite the carbufailsion;)

I forgot to mention... awesome build otherwise. With a bit more education/experience you would realize that EFI really isnt the black magic it is made out to be. In fact GM's ECU's are pretty awesome for open ecu style tuning. So yeah, making any "Carbs are better" statement on this forum is bad lol.

Always good to see father son projects tho. enjoy the car

Oh and no I don't have an sr20 in my miata. I had 240's before getting into the miata world. Everyone makes mistakes...mine was being a ricer. lol.

I remember the last guy on here who had carbs.
It didnt end well.


Seriously, Megasquirt that thing. Carbs are shit.

Thanks for the welcome. I understand efi is superior to carburetion, I never said it wasn't, but the stock efi setup greatly limits performance. If I had the money to get a proper setup to support my engine modifications, I'd do so without a doubt and get it professionally tuned. Some day i plan to go efi but for now the old fuel toilet is staying on. People over on ls1tech have gotten 22+mpg in cars 1500 pounds heavier then mine with similar carb set ups. I might be able to get something better out of my primitive dumb set up with new jets/metering rods

Nice car! Those poor brakes looks so small lol.

I appreciate the compliment/advice. As I keep saying, efi is in the cards for this cars future

Haha thank you and yes they're wayyy to small

David, glad to see you make it over here. If you guys ever have a chance to view his build thread on m.net you will see a determined young man that knocked out this car in something like 4 months. He started way after I did and was driving it WAY before I was.

Welcome, ls1mx5. Check out the Miata Gallery and post up some pics!

Thanks a lot John I appreciate you saying that. What's your username over on m . net?

Thank you I will! See how many people can get mad at my carb:giggle:

Nice build, too bad its carb'ed. Have fun getting it kind of running ok in one or two conditions while getting dirty and covered with fuel and getting your eyebrows cooked off from a backfire tuning it in. I'd only point an laugh a little bit while comfortably sitting in the car with the laptop making it run perfect in all conditions with hp tuners on the stock ecu and wiring harness.

Using easier as an excuse for a carb ls1 is just silly. The ls1 engine harness is already setup as a standalone harness from chevy. Zero wiring additional to the carb install is normally required unless you want it to look pretty, just route the wires, plug things in, starts on the first crank (after disabling the anti-theft with hptuners). Then getting that magazines 100 hp gain is as simple as throwing on a different manifold, tb, and intake (maybe injectors, forget the stock limit on those). But you've already done it and had to cut the hood to make it fit, so be it.

FAST? Haven't you ever heard of LS1Edit? Painless makes swap harnesses, or you could easily just hack up a stock LSx car harness and use the factory PCM......


Carbs fucking suck, but None the less, Cool swap anyway.

That post makes it official. You're a complete fucking retard who has NO goddamn idea what you're talking about. Please... Just stop.

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1349734762

Thanks for the compliment, I can't use the stock PCM because of my massive cam. It's the biggest one that can be used without notching the stock pistons for valve clearance.

Actually no I haven't, I will look into them. Someday as I've said this thing will be fuel injected. I want to daily drive it and have it run better, I've all ready made it this far might as well make it better.

Thanks for the compliment/input/etc. I'll look into hp tuners as well

This project has been on hold because of school and my cbr600 f2 streetfighter project. I plan on cleaning it up a lot and installing a classic round headlight:

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Lovely execution. The car looks fantastic, did you paint it too?

BTW, does your rubber fuel feed line run over the motor?

Thanks a lot, I didn't paint it but at one point it was repainted. I have ocd so I stripped the car to a bare shell and did a bunch of strange obsessive things before I even started the v8 swap to make sure there wasn't any bondo anywhere, no frame/accident damage or rust.

The rubber fuel line goes over the passenger side valve cover to the carb feed but sits pretty high above it, as in about a foot~ or so. Why are you asking? (no sarcasm, I post my cars on the internet mainly to get advice/feedback and to learn)

Stein there, also.

How did you cut the hole in the hood so perfectly?

I wouldn't say the feed line placement is the worst, but it will indeed heat up and at some point in time start to leak. I would run some longer hose against the firewall and/or at a minimum, firesleeve it properly.

I saw your thread a couple years back on m.net...
I know you fucked up the build somewhere and on your first test drive, your engine went dry and you blew it. or something along those lines.


Still... not bad for a 17 year or something along those lines.

If you worry about that, you would completely shit bricks at classic car shows.

Fire sleeve is pretty cheap for the legit eaton/aeroquip stuff. Of course its a major function > form thing since it only comes in orange. I normally buy stuff like that from plumbing monkey.

Hey, I have a CBR600 F2 Streetfigter project also! We can chat about them some time!

My CBR is named FiFi. Which stands for Forced induction Fuel injection. The two big projects I am doing to make her more fun..... It sure will be nice to get rid of those carbs. :wavey:


:fael::giggle:


Very nice car by the way. It just needs more turbos!
Welcome.

LS1 Carburetor V.S. Computer Performance Test - Super Chevy Magazine

tl;dr carbs make 462hp, efi 482hp

Not to mention throttle response, idle quality, and overall driveability.

I'm quite sure even a big cam could be tuned out with the factory PCM. We've come a LOOOOONG way since ford EEC-IV!!



That's a friend of mine's LQ9 powered Caprice running a factory PCM. Quite the cam it has... ;) (I don't care either way, Carb'd LSx > myshitty4bangercar any day!)


How the hell DID you cut such a clean hole in the hood??????



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Showing your infinite wisdom again, I see.

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What, praytell, is that??

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Or that??

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Or that?????

Those dont look like they're the eaton/aeroquip fire sleeve. Black one does look pretty close to the real deal, but not quite since its too glossy. AEROQUIP FIRE SLEEVE from Aircraft Spruce

Everyone gives me shit for having that stuff on my car. They say the color is horrible.


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They are right. But better to have ugly heat shielding than pretty melted hoses.

Couple of things to consider about that test. First of all, The EFI set up is more expensive than the carb set up. Secondly, the carb used may not be the best size for making the most power.

If you had an equal budget, invested in an adjustable choke carb, and spent the required time to tune the carb, you would get a whole lot closer to that 482 horsepower.

They never said how much time they spent on the tuning process, or if they run the carb with the stock jetting. There is not that much difference between what a carb will make and what EFI will make. The real difference is the fact that EFI is much more consistant and now easier to work with.

All good points. It was more aimed at OPs claim that "nothing but a carb and high rise intake when compared to the stock set up yielded close to 100 crank horsepower on a stock ls1"

holy mucking fess lol. that engine bay man... just man...

Brush up on your reading skills before you assert knowledge of something. My oil pump randomly failed, a common problem on 98' ls1's. I spun some rod/main bearings, none of it was any fault of my own, and yes I was 17 when I started building the car. I made some silly mistakes along the way and have learned a lot since then as we all through the car building process/life experiences, but I never made any mistakes serious enough to cause my engine to "blow".

Thanks for the welcome/compliment, I'd be interested to see your bike. To be honest I can't tell if you're being facetious or not. You're converting an f2 to run fuel injection? Why not just start with an f4i? Anyway if you are doing that more power to you, sounds radical.

All that expensive aftermarket efi stuff isn't stock and costs a lot more then my carb'd set up. But yes as I've said many times in this thread, ultimately efi is better and more expensive.

That was a sweet run man, what system did he use to tune the stock ecu?

That hole in the hood was cut by my father using this with a cut off wheel:
https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1349825312

At closer examination it's not as nice as it looks from afar but it's pretty close to a perfect circle

Very true.

That claim is correct, do more research if you still refute it, but thanks for that link

I will probably switch over to steel braided when I go to efi

Thanks for the input everyone

Semantics. I read that thread years ago man, I don't remember specifics. All I know was it went broken. Still impressive, IIRC it didn't take you that long to assemble everything together. I have an FD roller at the hangar, been there for years and haven't even started my ls swap in that except gutting it, and selling my drivetrain. lol

So any future plans?

Thank you, yes I work fast especially when I have funds readily available, unfortunately that hasn't been the case since I initially built the car. If I had the money right now I'd get boss frog frog arms, an autokonexion trunk lid with the huge lip, roll bar/half cage set up, quieter exhaust with electric cutouts, stiffer springs for the teins, and of course efi; probably all FAST stuff and have it professionally dyno tuned.

Get back to your FD man, that's my favorite unibody factory body style. If my wildest wishes were granted I'd have a wide body fd with a 4 rotor setup

Meh... FDs are cool...
Mine stateside didn't last too long. I had it running for about 2-3 months.. put it on the lift, yanked the guts out, sold em... and well... yeah. I'll go back to it whenever I'm back stateside every now and then and do little shit. Got a ls2 to put in it, but the old man decided it would better be put to use in the sand rail. So she sits.

Came to Japistan.. decided why the fuck not, got another FD. Been headache after headache, finally got every single problem fixed on it, went single turbo and was pushing over 400hp and loved every minute of it... except gas.

Sold it, and pending purchase on a miata out here.

They're cool cars, not for the faint of heart. Paranoia pays, and shit always breaks. Just the nature of the beast.

I'd hate to own a 4 rotor, would sound insane, but I'm done with rotary motors honestly.

You don't get out of accusatorily misrepresenting what a person has done by calling "semantics," you piece of shit.

Yeah, duh.

Thats what I thought when I read his response. His initial comment was just a random untrue attack for seemingly no reason that could have served to damage my reputation had it not been exposed for being the lie that it was, but I try not get "mad" over the net. Glad someone besides me called him out. Any way, its been cleared up, alls well that ends well, no beef etc

My uncle worked with/on a lot with rotaries over the years and he shares the same feelings as you so I understand. Anyway if you make any progress put it in your build thread so I can say I know your stupidity and lack of common sense caused all the problems you stand to incur. JK jk, but seriously I'm interested in seeing a 400hp rx-7 and potentially an ls2 powered one

It runs now, working out a few bugs but here is a vid/some pics. Also have added a corrugated plastic radiator shrouding box since the pics



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Nice work. How do you like the change?

sounds fantastic. good job

This makes me want to LS my car even more. I love seeing LS'd miatas.... bad thoughts

So, you're going to turbo it right? :party:

Looks awesome just read the thru the thread at first I thought fail for the carbs now I see you have injection excellent choice. I know it is more of a pain to start with but worth it in the end. I have lots of friends with ls cars and the stock ecu is very very capable with hp tuners. It is pretty simple to use just do a good bit of reading first so you can understand what tables do what. Awesome build. I am jealous that your hood fits. lol

I like it a lot. It idles and cruises like a normal car, and can safely run more lean producing less exhaust odor. It was damn expensive as I said it would be but is better then the carb

Thanks

Ls Miatas are fun, especially mine with my traction bars, coilovers, torque arm, seam welded chassis, and of course the frame rail braces that most ls miatas have. It handles like a stock miata but with more grip, less chassis flexing, and less body roll. I'm sure the weight distribution is very close, especially with my heavy torque arm toward the bottom and rear of the car.

Yea maybe after I rob Peter to pay Paul for all this expensive efi stuff

Thanks for the kind words, I'm happy with how it's turned out. I got a mail order tune from frost who apparently has done thousands of these

This sounds like a solid rear axle car. I doubt the handling claims.

Internet sarcasm I'm not getting? Or maybe you missed the first page? You can't seriously believe it has a solid rear axle so why wouldn't it handle well in your opinion?

Here is the rear k-member with what I call traction bars (work similarly in design to fwd Honda traction bars, or a stronger version of what Mazda had in place on the later year cars):
As for the torque arm, I have no good pictures of it attached, but it connects the 3 studs on the front of the rx-7 turboII diff to the trans mount. It's about 3 feet long and 70-90 pounds.

Aside from that and the coilovers, the suspension is stock

edit: to help you get a better picture, the turboII diff has the same 2 "wing" mounting points as the stock miata diff. I am also using stock turboII axles with miataroadster hubs

Oh, ok, so it doesnt have traction bars or a torque arm setup. It has bracing and a PPF. Traction bars are suspension members and so are torque arms.

No, the ppf connects the rear end to the trans, and I'm pretty sure is unique to miatas (in stock form), what I have connects the diff to part of the car's frame (in this case the trans mount). It is technically a torque arm. If I'm not mistaken, solid axle mustang torque arms can be modified to fit irs cobra rear ends. They are still called torque arms.

Why put that shit on the breather hoses and leave the coolant hoses that are 2" from the manifold exposed?

what coolant hoses?

Selling 4 banger aquiring ls1. I want v8

Set your FS thread on autopilot to post and retract every 2 days.

Noone wants a fastback. Tired of low ball noobs.

The ones going to the heater core.

Will u take 50 bucks shipped?

Doesn't appear to be any heatercore hoses left.

Yes. 50 bucks and your cats.

I'll give you my stock cat from the exhaust.

For $50 I'll let you ride in my car. Most likely doing an ls to mine