My Yellow VK 3800 & VK Berlina 304

[VK SL 3800]

Well for over a year i have been planning my V6 conversion into my Vk, it has remained completely stock except for the wheels right up until i began my conversion. So i finally got all my bits and decided to do it I have a few pics of bits along the way.

Heres the Vk when i first bought it, first thing i did was remove the pin-striping:


My donor car was a VP ute with low k's and a manual, has had a heavy impact to the front left but didnt damage the engine or front suspension.
The Donor ute:



Engine Coming out of the Ute:


The car with a few bits removed:


Another View:


Bits and pieces waiting to go in:


The best way i thought to do this conversion is to wack it all in in one hit, and remove it the same way as well so i raised the body and sat it on some tyres and then pulled the engine out the front.

Engine Coming out:


Other views:



Whilst the engine was out i did all the under bonnet wiring while it was easy to get to, because the battery is moved to the opposite side you have to run a new power wire back to the fuse box, and another big earth to the body and earth the old wire that used to run to the negative terminal on the battery to a good earth somewhere.

Next i did the master cylinder and booster, i opted for the VT upgrade with VS booster as it was a bolt in upgrade and Im terrible at fabricating stuff, they teach welding in 2nd year at tafe thank god, cant wait. I re-bent the brake lines and bolted it all in sweet, no problems the only modification is to drill new holes further back on the front bracket as the master doesn't stick out as far.

Next job was to fit the new intermediate shaft as im using the vp rack, i used the VP intermediate shaft as it had the square drive down the bottom but i had to replace the top yolk with vk one so it would fit onto the column, went on no worries.

I fitted the VK springs to the VP front end because i thought it would be best to keep it the way it was in that respect.
I havent got any pics of the V6 going in but it went in front suspension and all very easily- you only have 4 studs to line up and make sure the 2 stuts dont catch on the gaurds.

Engine in:


I havent got any pics of it in except that one, i will have take some soon as under the bonnet is finished. For the engine harness is was able to make the loom fit through the firewall using the original VK EST wiring hole, VK V8s just have a blanking plug if you (god forbid) replace a V8 with one of these. Then i mounted the computer with a strip of aluminum using the original computers mounts with the new computer screwed to that.
I used a VK V8 radiator and modified the original fan shroud and made it fit- i highly recommend buying an aftermarket one as i was a real prick of a thing to fit.

Next cut out your battery tray and remove the A/C dryer if it has one as its in the road of the air box. I buggered around with air intake for a few hours until i was happy i had good enough, still not quite 100% happy with it yet. My problem was i fitted a CAI of a Super 6 which made it hard to line everything up.

Mounting the battery tray was easy, i bought a tray from bursons for 12 bucks. And then i mounted the charcoal canister to the tray.

Then mounting the gearbox, this i had a lot of little problems with, the crossmember in the kit i bought wouldnt fit the way it was then after modifying to the way i thought it should have been, the T5 mount ended up being to short and it sat to low. So i used a Turbo 400 mount (repco pn MT8008, Thanks Scott!) with a small spacer and it sat perfectly. I recommend people use the original crossmember and just weld some angle iron on the ends like most people do, my conversion one sucked.

Tailshaft- i used the VP utes front half and i got a VK EFI rear and they bolted together, a V8 shaft will also bolt to the VN- onwards shaft but a 6cyl one except the VK efi one will not. Was the perfect length.

I also did a rear disc brake conversion after asking other members on hear how to do it, was pretty straight forward because my vk has a borgwarner diff, so any VN, VP ect disc rear ends will bolt on, just remove the axles and drum brake plates, remove your old wheel bearings as the only difference is the oil seal, because the disc brake plate is thicker the seal has to be thicker, press you new bearings on and collars then wack it all back together using the backing plate of a disc braked commy. It is a DIY job except for replacing the bearings and seals as you need a press.

I got my hands on a VK EFI tank, and although battered and bruised it wasnt leaking and the swirl pot wasnt broken so i fitted the unleaded filler off the VP ute with a new hose and put it in. bolted up sweet. to fit unleaded filler all i did was cut the original filler off and slide the new filler on with the rubber hose, was very simple.

I fitted my dash and clicked the ignition on and all was fine except the oil pressure went over to past high, took me ages to work out why but i turns out if the sender unit is disconnected and the sender wire doesnt connect to anything the gauge goes ballistic, it has three inputs, solid earth 12v power and the variable earth from the sender. So it must require the variable earth to hold it back somehow, im no VDO technician lol. Figured out it was normal by putting the other V8 Vk ive got to an open circuit on the sender and it did the same thing.

I have a few things left to do:
Bleed brakes
Modify the tunnel plate as the T5 sits a little further back
Get some rear rotors,
Get my Disc handbrake cable (i have one elsewhere)
Mount the fuel pump,
Get an exhaust made up.
Start it.

Ill get some more pics tomorrow

[chrisso 82]

Nice ride mate good pics and write up GREAT WORK cant wait for new pics!!!!!!!!!!

[RazzaCaine]

wow thats a pretty awesome project. the vk would go pretty well with the buick in it compared to the old 202, would use a lot less petrol as well. top work, keep it up!

[VK SL 3800]

Mounted the fuel pump and filter, now all i have to do is wire it in then i can start it. YAY!

Found a pic of the two shafts, bottom is the VL power steer intermediate shaft which people use with the VN rack but i wanted to keep my VP rack as it was in good condition. And to my amazement the VP shaft was the same length as the VL one from the bottom to the top uni.

The two shafts:


Few pics of the engine bay:












And few other bits and pieces:

[RazzaCaine]

fantastic work, absolutely love it. so do you plan on keeping the buick reasonably standard or are you going to warm it up a little?

[VK SL 3800]

Thanks mate, Itll be standard for a while but ill end up doing something to it, what i dont know at this stage. And great news, it goes! Thats means i got all my wiring right woohoo.

[RazzaCaine]

awesome, how does it go with the buick in it? must be a world of difference compared to the old 202

[fuzzy2308]

awesome work how does she run?

[Verynice]

Some great pics there man, love the clean engine bay.

I'd imagine it would run a bit better with the buick hey

[DANNY8]

Great job mate and good write up!

Keep the pics coming!

[VKCOMMO]

nice man

Should cam it..

[VK SL 3800]

Took it for its first drive today, only to work so i can make up an exhaust so i was driving with a pussy foot but it went really well, no noises, brakes are really good - there not even bedded in yet! Very happy with it. Needs a wheel alignment something shocking though haha. Much smoother then the old 202. Cant wait to drive it when the exhaust doesnt resonate through the cab while you accelerate.

[soop]

Nice work.

Whack a decent exhaust on it and slot a cam in, should be a torque monster in comparison.

[VK SL 3800]

Yeh plans are to just dodgey up the old vp exhaust for a little while so i can drive it while a get a few quotes on a full system. Then save up some more money and get a cam and maybe some head work.
Im sure the extra power of the stock engine will keep me happy for a few months until i get a bored of it

[VS_Pete_1]

Nice work mate

[VK SL 3800]

Well still waiting until the exhaust shop opens up next week so i can get a real exhaust, nothing else has changed really, i did the rocker cover gaskets today. thats about it. All in all its going really well, pretty good on fuel and plenty of extra power. Not having any cooling problems with the V8 Vk radiator and 105kpa cap instead of 135 which the engine is supposed to have (was worried about blowing out the heater core).

[VBRED]

Mate That is excellent. I drove my beast from Melbourne to Maroochydore and back two weeks after getting it regoed. They are so reliable. I found the biggest improvement to performance was a 70mm throttle body HSV3800 chip and injectors. Enjoy it.

[VK SL 3800]

Thanks mate, yeah im loving it! Im looking at a throttle body soon and a few other little mods for the time being, ill see where my funds are after the exhaust system is paid for haha. What injectors did you put into the VR engine when you had that in your VB?

[chooky1980]

awesome job mate well done.looks very neat.cheers

[Hangman]

Nice job mate. As my signature points at, I'll be doing this conversion once I get all the bits I need, but putting one in a Torana instead.

[VK SL 3800]

Are you going to be buying a pat gardener conversion kit?

[Hangman]

Most likely mate. What did you use?

[VK SL 3800]

I used a pat gardener kit, the wiring part was good, instructions were about as good as "put V6 into car", the gearbox crossmember decided it wouldn't fit the way they said it would then when i made it fit like it should the gearbox sat too low anyway, gave me the shits a bit but it was well made, even if it didnt fit properly it was easily modified to make work. The speedo cable was a laugh, the drive end was to small to drive the actual speedo and just spun inside without turning anything, and at the gearbox end the drive coming off the gearbox had the conversion speed sensor screwed into it then the cable into that which made it really long and it tried to kink the cable on a mad angle to clear the firewall so it was just crap. Got my local shop to make me up a good cable for $70 using the sensor i got in the kit but putting it inline further down, working a charm.

But really anything you modify your going to run into trouble i just expected everything in the kit to fit better then it did.

[sheeks84]

Just a quick one regarding the VP front end. Does fitting the VP front move the front track outwards, as i believe VPs have a wider front track than VB - VN.
Cheers

[VK SL 3800]

Nup, its identical, 1451mm i think it is for VB-VP from memory.

I also thought the VP track would be wider (VP looks wider in pics compared to a VN).