Fixing up a '71 Grand Safari

I've never seen bolts screwed into an aluminum head, for fastening an exhaust manifold. In fact, I don't even recall seing them used likewise on cast iron heads. It seems like the dumbest thing to do, on an engine. I'd convert it over to having studs stick out and then use bronze nuts to fasten the manifolds, if possible

 

Steel fasteners, in cast iron, let alone aluminum, is a fact of car life. Anti-seize is your friend.

 

I will just chime in and say that the motor mount situation is unacceptable for what I know you paid for those mounts. This isn't rocket science, those mounts should be a bolt in application with no modifications necessary.

 

I agree, but I don't think the mounts' manufacturer is totally at fault. I've had GM cars and trucks with crossmember bolt holes that were either punched out of place, or stress of the frames has 'bent' the holes out of place.

 

I would agree, Silver, however the original engine mounts still lined up perfectly.

 

After much reading and consideration I decided to go with the Holley 302-3 oil pan. While I was awaiting for the new, new oil pan to arrive I pulled the sending unit out of the new (1994) Caprice gas tank.





The picture below shows the reason this gas tank is used. The baffles shown hold the gasoline so when the fuel is low it does not slosh away from the pump. I cleaned away all of the debris.





Then I tested the new Delphi sending unit assembly to make sure it was registering 0-90 ohms between empty and full.





There were several differences between the original unit and the new unit. One was the way the wires hooked to the sender. Another was the addition of a blade connector hanging down from the lid of the sending unit assembly.





The wires on the new sending unit assembly were soldered and riveted to the sender. This mean you could not disconnect the wires and reconnect the wires from the new harness. Also, the manufacturer has changed their harness so the fittings and connectors are not the same as they used to be and past explanations on how to adapt this harness are no longer relevant. This company does not send instructions with their products. They require you to register for an internet forum which then must meet a moderators approval. As a result, I did not have access to the instructions the first day I tried to install these items. After receiving approval to the forum I found that the tech seemed unaware of the changes to the harness. I took the picture below and labeled all of the items with inquiries, however was still unable to get an answer to solve the problem. With help from a few other people online, I believe I have finally figured out how the new harness should be modified to fit on the sending unit assembly, but as of now I am not 100% sure.





The new Holley oil pan arrived that week and on Saturday my Father-In-Law was in town and helped me pull the engine out once again.





The Holley pan requires the use of an F-Body windage tray or a modified truck windage tray. Since I plan to use the F-Body oil pan that I'm now not going to be using on The Caprice for my '37 Chevrolet project and I won't have any future use for the old truck oil pan I decided to use the windage tray from the truck pan and modify it as described in the Holley's instructions. When I originally modified the pan below I cut it too long because I was using the portion of the directions which showed a close-up shot of the tray. I had to go back and recreate the cuts shown below at the next set of bolt holes on the tray.





I had some business on Saturday and when I got back my Father-in-Law and Father had the F-Body oil pan removed.





We installed the modified windage tray, pickup tube and Holley oil pan and then installed the engine.





The new pan fit great! It has somewhere around 1 3/4" between the sump area on the pan and the crossmember. What a relief. Unfortunately, the compressor on the lower passenger side will not fit. This BRP kit has been an utter disappointment. First the frame mounts did not fit and required modification. Then the instructions were abysmally insufficient causing me to have to communicate with the company several times. I will say the company was good to respond to my communications. Then the transmission mount, which was not supposed to require any drilling, turns out to require some very difficult to locate holes to be drilled in the frame. Then the bolts for the transmission mount aren't long enough, or they sent too many shims, I'm not sure which yet. I have contacted the company again to try to find out. The engine was very difficult to align and took the three of us several hours to get bolted into place.





This is how much room I have between the firewall and the back of the engine. I know some guys like to push their engine back as far as possible, but I'm more concerned with having sufficient room to reach the back of the engine for maintenance.





The photo below shows the compressor mount on the passenger side contacting the frame. The compressor obviously will not bolt in place and I am currently assessing my options on what to do about this situation. If I could move the entire engine forward 1 1/2" I believe the compressor would clear, but the oil pan would be very close. I test fit the new radiator to make sure I had enough room up front to play with. Other options involve cutting the frame to make room for the compressor or relocating the compressor. I believe the engine mount location will make notching the frame a non-option.

 

I'd consider worrying about the compressor later. It shouldn't be a deciding factor, as to where you mount your engine and oil pan. For now, the car will drive, without the A/C. In a worst case scenario, you might end up constructing your own brackets for holding a York-type compressor or mounting any compressor which'll fit backwards, if there's enough unused space between the engine and radiator

 

I have spent so much time researching my options for how to make a compressor fit on this car it's maddening. There are different types of compressors and different places to mount those compressors depending on what type they are. The best option would to be to get an entire accessory mounting kit to change all the accessories to better locations, but unfortunately those are very expensive and this project has already fast approached its budget. If I move the engine forward the power steering pump will hit the steering box. If I keep the compressor down low it will interfere with the crossmember. There isn't much room to cut and re-weld a relief in the crossmember because of the location of the engine mounts. The compressor is set back further than the rest of the accessories and runs on its own belt. There are kits to move it forward and have it run on the same belt as all of the other accessories, but even this will now allow it enough room to clear the crossmember. The company Sanden makes a mini-compressor that could possibly fit down low in the forward position, but it is my opinion that this will not give me the cooling capacity I would want for this car. Also, the location is so tight that I woudln't know for sure that it would fit until I ordered a kit and tried to install it. There are kits to move the compressor up, to the topside of the passenger side, and although this is an expensive option, and also creates a more cluttered engine compartment, after much consideration this is the route I chose to go with due to elimination of all other options. Unfortunately, no company that I have been able to find makes a kit to relocate the original compressor at all.



Holley offers two kits that mount a Sanden compressor up top. The kits include all the hardware, brackets, pulleys and idlers necessary for the installation. One kit includes a Sanden 508 compressor and the other kit includes the Sanden SD7 compressor. This is where the problem comes in. I ordered the Holley SD7 kit from an online company, Summit Racing. When it arrived, I found that they had included a SD7 mini-compressor. Sanden produced two compressors that I am interested in for my application, a 508 and a SD7. Within each kind, there are 3 types. The SD7 has two regular sized versions and also makes a SD7-B10, which is a mini-compressor which is physically smaller and has reduced cooling capacity. Some have indicated anecdotal evidence that this smaller compressor has adequate cooling capacity in automobiles comparable or even larger than mine, however after reading the statistics for the output of each model given by Sanden I have concluded that I do not want to go with a mini-compressor. To my knowledge, there is no notation on the website I ordered the kit from that indicates the SD7 would be a mini-compressor rather than a full size. To further complicate things, I looked up the specifications of the kit I ordered and the kit which comes with the Sanden 508, a full sized compressor, and found that both kits come with exactly the same part numbers for the brackets and pulleys, meaning the only difference in the kits is the compressor. I looked into the details for the part number of the bracket that comes in the kit and found that it fits both the Sanden SD7 and the 508. Since my kit came with a SD7-B10 (mini) and the same kit will fit a 508 (full size), it seems to reason that the same brackets would fit the SD7 full size models. Rather than return the entire kit, which is quite large, I called Holley, and waited on hold for a while, to see if they would exchange the compressor. They said I would have to call Summit, the company which I purchased the product through. I called Summit, and waited on hold for a while, and understandably they are not familiar with the intricacies of what is included in each Holley kit because Summit sells thousands of parts from many different vendors. I explained the situation and they ended up calling Holley tech support. At this point the Summit support tech is acting as proxy between Holley and I because the tech refused to talk to both of us on a conference call. Holley denied there was any difference in size between the SD7 and 508. I had the SD7 they sent me on the table next to a 508 and there was, no doubt, a difference. I explained this to the lady on the phone at Summit and she ended up calling Holley tech 3 times. Each time, I had to hold for a lengthy amount of time. Each time, they assured her there was no difference between a SD7 and a 508, and refused to acknowledge that a SD7 "mini" existed. The lady at Summit, who was very understanding and helpful, finally told me I would have to call Holley. I called Holley, again, and waited on hold for almost an hour. When I finally spoke with the tech, they again told me there was no difference in compressors. I explained that there was, that I was physically looking at both and also provided the measurements given on the Sanden website as well as a vintage air website which specifically gave the difference in measurements between the SD7-B10 (mini) and a 508. Finally, the tech agreed there was a difference between the SD7 and 508, but said that all SD7s are the same size. I explained that there are 3 types of SD7s (2 regular sized and one mini) and the one included in the kit was a mini, and that since my kit fits a 508 (regular size) or a SD7, I naturally concluded it must be a regular sized SD7 that the kit was supposed to include, because again the website did not distinguish. The tech then told me that they simply order an SD7 from Sanden and there is no distinguishing as to what size it is. The tech explained they did not distinguish in their description on the kit because they do not offer anything other than the mini, so it is not listed as a description. This is not my first experience with customer service and I realize that a person must maintain an impartial and non-confrontational attitude when dealing with this issues or the results will become less than favorable. This situation was very frustrating and Holley has an issue with a lack of understanding of the product which they are selling. Unfortunately, there was little to no interesting in resolving this issue. My next step will be to call Summit and ask for the SD7 mini to be swapped out for a 508. Fortunately I made sure to get the direct line to the Summit tech so that when I call back I don't have to re-explain all of this information to a new person. I preferred to have a SD7 full size, however I believe the 508 will be an adequate substitution. Had I known the kit I ordered came with a mini, or had it been in the description of the kit when I ordered it I could have avoided this very frustrating and time consuming situation entirely.



I was supposed to go down to a local exhaust shop on Saturday and borrow some F-body manifolds to make sure they will fit before I try to buy some, but unfortunately I was preoccupied listening to the on-hold music from Holley all morning until the exhaust shop closed, so I didn't make it. While I was on hold, I rewired the fuel pump, which is another frustrating experience with a after-market LS swap manufacturer. I would say dealing with vendors, their products and their instructions has, without a doubt, been the most frustrating and difficult part of this process so far.



The car goes back into the air. I hope to one day have a shop. I spend a lot of my limited time just getting the car and tools pulled out and put up each time I have a chance to work on the project.







The company I ordered the fuel pump from also makes a harness upgrade for the wiring harness that is in the fuel tank going from the pump to the bottom of the lid on the fuel sending unit assembly. The harness they make is not updated to work with the new-style fuel sending unit assemblies which are now made, but rather are made to fit the stock, original style fuel sending unit assemblies, which, to my knowledge, are no longer made and have been updated. This gas tank is from a 1994 Caprice and the in-tank harnesses were a known issue due to poor design, hence the need for an updated harness.



The company does not provide instructions and requires each buyer to join an online forum to get instructions. When I received approval to join this forum I found that the techs giving the advice did not realize that their harnesses no longer work. I found a different helpful individual on a website devoted to B-bodies that had figured out much of this problem and he helped me a lot, however the company's harness had also been re-designed since he had worked on the problem, however the redesign did not help the harness fit with the new sending units. After several attempts at answers from the company's forum tech, which proved to be insufficient or outright wrong, I realized I would be better off to figure this out myself with the help of the individual from the B-Body forum. Here is part of what I did. I won't know if this solution works until I try to start the car.



I had to remove the sender from the sending unit assembly. On the newer style units, the wires to the sender are riveted or soldered.





I had to drill out the top rivet and replace it with a screw and jam-nut to hold some of the new wires I would be adding. The wire for the sender provided by the company's kit was not long enough to reach the soldered location on the sender so I had to remove the connector from the original sending unit wire (blue wire) and replace the new harness' wire with the original one.





Part of the kit includes removing this connector and clamp from the sending unit assembly lid. I found removing this part to be fairly difficult.





The new piece has 4 pins instead of 3.





The fuel pump (purple) sits inside a case. I had to use a file to open up the hole so the new plastic hose could fit through.





I had to use these clamps to secure the plastic hose. I did not have experience with these clamps and it took a little while to figure out exactly how I was supposed to utilize them properly. Again, proper instructions would have been very helpful.





This is how I ended up wiring the final product. A 1/4 hole must be drilled in the lid so a brass stud can be installed which acts as an extra ground.





I then installed the assembly in the '94 Caprice gas tank. Fortunately, Dad happened to stop by and was there when I installed the unit and noticed I had installed it backwards in the tank. You would think I would have noticed when all the metal lines were pointed the wrong direction.



One thing that takes so long with projects like this is learning simple things you just didn't know and have no experience with. At first I was unable to get the AN fittings to clamp and secure the -6 fuel lines properly. After a lot of trial and more and more error I found out that these are not the same type of AN fittings as I have used in the past. These fittings are called PTFE fittings, which means they have the brass ferrule, or "olive" as they are referred to, in the picture below.





I was simply installing the fittings as shown below. This is incorrect. The proper way to use these fittings is to slide the fitting on the very right of this picture on first, then use a small screwdriver to peel the steel braids back away from the hose inside. The ferrule then slides over the hose but under the steel braid. When the fitting on the right in the picture below is then slid forward and screwed onto the threads it creates a sandwich of the tube from the fitting on the left going into the hose, then the hose, then the ferrule over the hose, then the steel braids over the ferrule and the fitting on the right on top. After I learned this, getting the fittings on the lines was not much trouble at all. Also, the threads of the fitting need to be lubricated. I used air tool lubricant. This step is on all the instructions I saw for these fittings. I forgot to use lubrication on one of the threads and when I got the fitting screwed together I could feel the heat from the friction.





The adel clamps I ordered to secure the fuel lines would not fit with the original bolts that held the old fuel line clamps. I had to drill out the holes in each clamp and also trim down part of the flanges on each one of them.





The fuel rail only has one line because this 2004 5.3 LY7 is a returnless style fuel rail.





The line runs down the passenger side and over the frame rail to the filter/regulator, which I mounted mid-way on top of the framerail. I have not yet installed all of the clamps to secure the fuel line. I almost mounted the regulator in the very back of the car over the axle, and I saw where many people have done this, but I decided to move it forward, mid-way on the car. I don't have any evidence to support this but I feel as though this would give the regulator an easier time of managing the PSI in the shorter line running to the fuel rail than if I had mounted the regulator in the back of the car. The stock locations for these regulators seem to be about mid-way on the car as well, but this could also be a space requirement more than a design choice. Also, the pump I purchased was for an LT1 and is slightly under the 58 psi of what a LS motor requires. I have heard that others have used this setup with no problem, but I suspect that relieving any extra load on the regulator would be helpful.





The line continues down the frame rail, using a stock location from the old fuel line for the new adel clamps.





Another reused stock clamp location using new adel clamps. These clamps seem to be a bit oversized for the -6 lines and I may end up replacing them with clamps that will hold the lines a bit tighter.





The line continues over the frame in the rear, which is over the top of the rear axle. I will add more clamps soon.





After going over the axle the lines go through the original fuel hose bracket.





They finally terminate at the tank. I have not yet installed the fuel tank vent tube.





If you look right above the lines here you'll see the old exhaust hanger mount. I no longer use this mount because of the dual exhaust. I've removed this mount and I am going to weld a mounting tab to the bottom to provide a mounting location for two more adel clamps.

 

Man, I feel for you. I plan on doing an EEC V EFI swap into Babe, my '79 Ranchero in the future, and I hope I do not have half the problems you're having. And I am with you in your anger and disappointment that Holley and the fuel pump company just do not know what is going on. I literally would've lost my temper at the Holley dumbass. I mean, how can someone deny what they did, and remain credible?

 

Wouldn't it have been easier to use the grounding tab, instead?



Here's what I meant about mounting the A/C compressor backwards. The following image is the best I could come up with, right now. I have a perfect illustration, in my Haynes. But, Windows 7 will not recognize my older scanner.
You can barely see what's left, since they dismantled what we need to see, in order to fully comprehend. The air pump was mounted backwards, because there was no room for mounting it like they mounted the alternator:



This following image gives a better idea:

 

Using the grounding tab wouldn't have been as effective because the tank is plastic and the harness hit has a ground wire that bolts to the top, outside part of the brass stud and goes straight to a frame ground.

As far as they seemed to be concerned, they offer a kit with a Sanden SD7 and it is the size it is. I tried to mention that they should explain that their SD7 is a mini-compressor, but I was talking to a tech support guy, who probably has very little interest in the product development or sales side of the business I suppose.

I'm not interested in having the compressor mount backwards. I'm not sure which one, but I believe the Sanden 508 can run backwards but the SD7 can't? I'm not sure. Either way I think I've got it figured out for the most part now.

 

I know, it's too late for this suggestion (or is it?). But, a recent ad just reminded of a compact backwards-running candidate.
My Haynes says that those Renaults were optioned with A/C. But, I've never yet seen one of those. Will keep digging, despite

 

I hope after all this headache and effort that it is worth it!

 

Too bad no one has figured out how to use and power up a Toyota hybrid A/C compressor. It has its own drive motor, but it's driven from the battery pack. If someone could crack that code, you could put an A/C system in the better places in a car, instead of cluttering the engine or none at all.

 

They even run on twelve volts