'00 FRC Hardtop - moar LS/Murica/long distance high speed cruising

[190Evan]

Haha! Full retard! I love it. Well thats good to see I get the gist now, Can't wait to see it

[nsogiba]

The old setup consisted of 2 cats, 2 small bullet mufflers, and no rear mufflers (straight pipe).

The new setup will be 2 cats, and Z06 rear mufflers (under the rear bumper).

The only changes happening in the system are shown here, before/after:


Cats are staying untouched. Yes the sound was that bad (drone) with Bullets since they're just a perforated straight through design whereas the Ti's are regular baffled style, so they're much quieter and more civilized.



i plan on also welding in a set of cutouts for those times when I leave the wife at home and feel the need to go full retard. Plan on mimicking this setup.

[190Evan]

In4 Zo6 exhaust, Wait, Im lost. Are you going from a straight pipe with two cats to an exhaust that has two cats and two mufflers? Is the sound that unbearable? I have a cat and a resonator and I'm absolutely dying to let my v8 breath more. I may be lost though.

[TWM Performance]

Damn this thing looks pretty clean. Love it!

- Renato

[nsogiba]

I mean, there were no leaks, but the piping was dinged in a few places and the angles at weld junctions were sloppy, which isn't ideal. It's a typical exhaust shop "performance" exhaust, with some cheap bullet mufflers thrown at it. the sad part is that the poor lady paid $800 for an x pipe, 2 bullet mufflers, and some cheap tips to be crappily MIG'd together...

[loekaaz]

Nice. Good call

Looked like a semi-hack job

[nsogiba]

forgot to add the pic of the stock heat shields on the new wires

_DSC4689 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

Super Bowl Sunday: spent a couple hours cleaning the old person smell out of the interior. vacuumed, cleaned glass, cleaned seats, cleaned dashboard/door panels, everything got a coat of armorall/leather conditioner and a quart of febreze spray. now it's inhabitable.

quick wash on the exterior. paint correction to come in a month or so
_DSC4690 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

_DSC4691 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

took a ride out to Rochester to grab Z06 Ti's

_DSC4692 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

_DSC4695 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

the "custom" exhaust needed to go. the shop that did the work was nice enough to weld in the bullets where the old flanges used to be, making the system one piece from the header flange to the tips. wouldn't be a problem if the exhaust didn't loop up over the axle. the bullets sounded okay when you romped on it but otherwise droned around town pretty badly.

The h-pipe was long gone, replaced by this x-pipe, which will stay


_DSC4698 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

generic bullets in all their exhaust shop crap glory

_DSC4699 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

snaking over to the tips
_DSC4700 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

Tip alignment wasn't amazing, and the tip diameter seemed out of place and too far apart between sides
_DSC4703 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

_DSC4704 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

chop chop. out they come

_DSC4705 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

_DSC4706 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

Blank slate
_DSC4708 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

pipes and flanges get in tomorrow, I need to mock up the mufflers and align the tips - then connect them to the existing x-pipe

[nsogiba]

Yes, air filter mod removes the shroud covering it so that the filter is open. I added some weatherstripping to the hood/bumper connection so that the filter wouldn't get drips of water on it when driving in heavy rain. Should have been there from the factory IMO.

There was a slight miss at idle once every couple seconds, after the plugs and wires it's reduced, but I only put about 20 miles on the car after the work, so I can't really say that it's gone yet. Weather here blows.

Picked up a sweet set of Titanium factory Z06 mufflers last night for a steal, I will need to modify the current exhaust to allow them to bolt up. Car is already up on the lift, I'll be cutting off the old exhaust tonight. My neighbors are not going to like me.

[hinrichs]

Running any better with the new wires and plugs? Air filter mod just runs open then right?

Looking good and awesome to see that some of the fluids were clean.

[nsogiba]

Time to resurrect my old LSX stainless license plate frame, which lived a life of glory and burnouts and commutes on my 6.0 LSX BMW.

_DSC4656 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

the mild hardware on the BMW plate had left its mark on the stainless plate frame. not good.

_DSC4657 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

the black background to the LSX nameplate had seen some mileage too.

_DSC4658 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

a brillo pad made quick work of the staining

_DSC4659 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

I ran the brillo pad over the whole surface of the stainless plate frame for good measure, the wife definitely won't be happy about the outline left on her kitchen towels from all the dirt and corrosion removed. I thought this was pretty funny

_DSC4660 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

the solution for everything is carbon fiber (3M wrap)

_DSC4664 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

lay the background against the vinyl wrap

_DSC4665 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

work the edges out with your fingers for a smooth finish

_DSC4666 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr


ok, so work out the edges, trim it, and put it behind the plate frame - now we're talking

_DSC4668 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

ok - let's get serious - no more cosmetic BS - time to get dirty

_DSC4670 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

I am a big fan of cheap/free mods that return REAL gains, so the zip tie mod was in order. the existing air filter had seen better days.

_DSC4671 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

this should breathe just a bit better.

_DSC4673 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

I am a big advocate of starting fresh on maintenance history so I decided to start fresh on all drivetrain fluids, starting with the differential.

_DSC4674 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

The diff oil MAY have been changed - not sure. At 105K I'd rather not take a chance
_DSC4676 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

What came out wasn't too bad in all honesty. A bit dark but overall clean with no particulate
_DSC4678 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

I also changed the trans fluid (T56) with new Dex III, no pics. What came out (again) wasn't bad, but wanted to start fresh. Finally, a fresh oil change with 5W30 Mobil 1 Full Syn. and AC Delco Filter rounded out the fluid changes.

the MaxJax lift makes things a bit easier

_DSC4679 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

_DSC4680 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

Oil and Filter
_DSC4681 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

Rounded out the maintenance with new TR55 spark plugs and Red Chevrolet Performance Plug Wires

_DSC4682 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

The old plugs looked so - so, but the gap on them was abysmal - up to .075" on the worst ones
_DSC4683 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

Driver's side 1 3 5 7

_DSC4686 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

Workspace

_DSC4684 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

105K worth of use
_DSC4686 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

new red GM Performance Wires
_DSC4687 by Norbert Ogiba, on Flickr

Luckily, I was able to reuse all the stamped metal heat shields for all the new wires.

Took the wife to the driving range and hit a couple buckets of balls. Car ran flawlessly. I spent Super Bowl Sunday morning washing the exterior, vacuuming inside, detailing the dash and door panels, cleaned glass, and cleaning the "udders" inside the engine compartment. Some minor leaves/crap in the udders, removed them and the AC drain and hosed them down inside and out.

Picking up a set of Z06 Titanium mufflers tonight locally to replace the droning bullet mufflers on the car now

Now that the car is pretty much all set with maintenance, I am going to passively start looking for some longtubes and and LS6 intake. In the meantime while I wait for spring I'll be trying my hand at paint correction since the clearcoat has random light scratches everywhere from 16 years of use. I think it has a lot of potential to look great with some work.

[loekaaz]

Congrats!!!!

Definitely do LCM5 and I highly suggest HP Tuners to kill the column lock. It blows when that strands you.

Chinese long tubes are worth it.

What this man says.

http://www.complianceparts.com/

[white out]

Congrats!!!!

Definitely do LCM5 and I highly suggest HP Tuners to kill the column lock. It blows when that strands you.

Chinese long tubes are worth it.

[royalife]

I loved your 5 series! Excited to see where youll take this.

[nsogiba]

I'm thinking either Style 65s or M-Parallels

[reiernumans]

Google doesn't know what it'll look like but I love style 65's so I'm gonna check in here to see how it'll look