ls1 rebuid info

[bigneilsen]

hey guys,
was off my P's last sunday, drove home in my new Vt SS Ls1 on monday.(125000km on the odo)
couple problems come up with it, its now blowing a little amount of smoke out the busted PCV hoses. gonna get it compression tested next week but i am bracing for the worst .

if the rings are busted, im in a couple minds. either brand new forged internals (crank, rods, pistons, rings) or crate LS1/Ls2.

just wonding if anyone know what prices im looking at, ive got $5000 MAX to work with.
what could my options be?

[GEN3RATD]

if you are going to rebuild it, id stroke it as well. looking at about 10k for that.
a new crate, i wouldnt bother with an LS1 again (can make a lot more power from an LS2), and id expect around the same for that.

so yeah almost double your budget, not sure how you could work around that.

[bigneilsen]

yeah thats what i was trying to avoid. after reseaching some more, im starting to think its just the valve seals. ill start it up again tomorrow and check for smoke from the exhaust

[bigneilsen]

started it up this morning, little puff of smoke on first start up (cold start) then no smoke at idle. got my misses to give it a rev and it was blowing little bit of smoke each time just after the throttle closed

[Darren_L]

if it's only puffing oil smoke on startup then it is more than likely valve stem seals.
Seems very unlikely that it would be anything more from an engine with just 12000kms on the clock.

You can do the valve stem seals without removing the cylinder heads. Should be able to knock it over in a few hours

[bigneilsen]

started it up again. now its smoking a fair bit while its reving

[m1lky]

Have you done the compression test yet?

[OFF T4P]

mate the early ls1 had a few dramas. if you got books with it, try find out if it was rebuilt befor. When you first start it cold does it have piston slap. The first batch of ls1's had teflon coated pistons, the teflon wears away allowing oil to pass the compression ring and be burnt which would make it fairly smokey. The fix was just to rebuild it using different piston and rings.

[bigneilsen]

nah engine sounds fine on cold starts, went through the log book and it hasnt missed a single serivce, every 10,000kms. no where on the log books does it say the previous owner ever complaining about piston slap either. getting compression test early next week (so will know for sure then). found a bloke that does reco'd engines for 5000, that might have to be the go.

im thinking cos it is so low kms. Could becuase it would of sat in a garage for quite sometime without driving, that a rings/valve seals has hardened/dried up over time then after running it a few times hard after that completly f**kd something?

[Zeussy]

You can get a brand new 5.7L crate engine for 5 grand. Or go LS3 for 7g.

[bigneilsen]

yeah but you gotta add labour ontop of that. id love to stretch to a ls2 or ls3 but then ill have to get it retuned and thats gonna add to the bill even more

[GEN3RATD]

Looking at about 12k I reckon for an LS3. Worth it though

[Zeussy]

So is that 5g to pull the motor out, rebuild it, then put it back in? Or just to rebuild the motor? Tunes aren't that expensive.

12g seems a bit excessive to me. Easily 10g, less if you can swap the motors over yourself.

[bigneilsen]

i dont have the tools to do it myself, its 5000 for a previusoly recon'd LS1 with most internals are new. like rings, pistons,rods. they fully chemically clean and crack/pressure test heads and block. plus it comes with 6yr unlimited km warranty.

see if i had 10,000 to spend id still rather spend 5 on a LS1 and spend the other 5 on stronger internals, better heads, bigger cam, exhaust etc. where as for 10g you get a ls3 but its still stock.

[Zeussy]

That's fine you don't want to spend 10g on getting a LS3 put into your car, that was only half of my post.

I'd spend 5g on a brand new crate motor for basically the same price as your 'reconditioned' LS1.