Brendo's HSV Senator 355 Stroker

[Brendo169]

Name - Brendan

Model – VS II Senator

Colour – Genesis Blue

Body kit – Standard HSV kit

Engine –355 Stroker built by Kwinana Performance

Gearbox – Rebuilt 4spd with stage 2 kit and 3000 high stall

Power – 205rwkw or 275rwhp

Torque - 315ft/lb or 427nm

1/4 Mile Time - 14.665 @ 95.03mph (before stroker....yet to run with new motor)

Exhaust – pacemaker extractors, full twin 2 ½ inch, dual hi flow cats and dual straight through mufflers

Diff – LSD, rebuilt with 3.91 gears

Brakes – RDA slotted rotors with QFM HPX pads all round

Suspension – king springs S/Lows front and rear with superpro 4 point camber kit

Rims – 17” ROH

Interior - Full Clubsport interior (dont hate....the senator interior was ruined)

Stereo – pioneer head unit, splits in the front, 6 x 9’s in rear, kenwood sub. Never listen to it to be honest

Other Mods – alarm, tint, clear side indicators, jaycar speedo corrector

Future Mods – t56 conversion, VE brake upgrade, 19" VZ Clubby rims, whipple charger, respray, leather interior, kaaz lsd, au thermos

I love this thing...its my daily driver!
























And my old Clubsport which i crashed and was the donor car for all the running gear in this Senator!!

[Brendo169]

Alright ill give the rundown of how i came to get this car!!

I started to get into commodores when i was 18 because a friend had one and i loved it!
i bought my first commodore which was a VR executive

I had that for a year or so then one night another mate took me for a ride in his VS SS 5L and i just had to have one!! (Crewsy see here A Manual VS SS)

Bought the white VS Clubby which you can see here (Brendo's VS Clubby). After owning it for about a year everything started going on it and i ended up spending around 4 grand fixing it up in a period of two months. Then it ran for another month until one day out of nowhere i lost heaps of power and had a massive rattle coming from the valve train. The 5L had got hungry and decided to start eating some cam lobes

At this point i had been wanting to build a 355 stroker for a while (yep another mate had one. See betts here 355 Stroker VS 97' S Pack Utility) and so i figured if i going to be spending money rebuilding the engine i might as well go for broke and build a stroker!!

So i did that and it was the best thing i had ever done!! i loved it....

That was short lived as i had an accident after 1 week of owning it and the car was declared a write off...i was shattered.....

I received my insurance payout and bought the car back

Have since bought this VS senator and now the diff, gearbox, suspension, interior and most importantly the Stroker have found there way into it!! (took 4 months from accident til now)

And im happy again (and also poor)

From before the accident to now has cost me over 5 grand...but at the end of the day im stoked with it and it puts a smile on my face everyday!!

All this and ive only just turned 21!! cant wait to see what cars my future holds!

[Clint_G]

Good to see you got yourself another ride man. Looks sweet to

[PirateJoe]

Nice car mate, good to see you got to keep your engine! Insurance companies are usually dicks about those sorts of things..

[Brendo169]

i cant say that they knew about the engine!!!
i may mention i was forced to buy this car back at auction!!

[walesy]

before i seen that last pic of the white clubby i was gunna ask why you had a clubsport gear lever surround :P and a holden airbag? nice ride mate ive got a couple mates with 355 strokers, one in a VS GTS and the other in a VH SLE... they swear by them

[Brendo169]

yeah im not sure about the airbag....was like that when i bought it!
as to the interior the car when i bought it was missing interior parts everywhere. Seats had tears (they were velour NOT leather).... console was ruined, especially the wood grain. so i figured id switch them!

im very happy with result!!

[walesy]

yeah i bet! i had my caprice tuned at KP in 2008, theyre not big on LS stuff but ive heard they really know theyre stuff with 308/304/355's, i used to live in port kennedy just up the road but moved back to nsw in december, any plans of taking it down to the motorplex to see how the new engine goes?

[HamaTime™]

Keep us posted on what this would do on the 1/4 Brendan.

Also whats the nm torque figure? Did you get that from the engine builders/engine dyno?

[Brendo169]

yeah i heard great stuff about KP and thats why i ultimately ended up going with them. Im still running in the engine as its only done 350kms since first start up! Once ive done about 1000km its going back to KP for a final tweak in the tune and full service as its still running run in oil!! Will also get a more accurate power figure at this point! so when thats done its motorplex here we come!! i see ur caprice is running a lowish 13 down the quarter! thats a killer time for a rig like that!

[Brendo169]

dont have the nm torque figure as of yet but i will be getting another dyno read out in a few weeks and have asked for both power an torque to be graphed! so ill keep you posted!

[VS 5.0]

Good to see you're back on the road with a nice ride.

What happened to the Senator rims ???

[Brendo169]

i still have them....was running them on the car for a few weeks but i just didnt like them at all. Plus they have pretty bad gutter rash and all the tyres need replacing which i just can't afford at the moment! (especially with fuel prices rising like they are haha)

[betts]

The pictures look great man! Looking forward to cruising, and heading to the drags together sometime.

[PirateJoe]

Nice to see you got it back though from the auction. Hope you didnt have to fork out to much!

[Brendo169]

i had to pay way WAY too much but i couldnt let that brand new motor go!!!

[Jacko84]

what u do with the motor out of the senator. nice car mate

[Brendo169]

what u do with the motor out of the senator. nice car mate

in order to do the engine and driveline swap i needed more tools and a hoist so i made an arrangement with my uncle (mechanic) who has all this gear at his place. I get to use his tools, his hoist and hassle him where i needed help and in exchange he gets the wrecked clubby, the engine, diff and gearbox. Everyones happy. I get the stuff i need for a full driveline swap for free. He gets a new project car to fix up with all the driveline free

Worked out a treat

only things i had to buy was new water pump, fluids and a few exhaust gaskets!

[Jacko84]

fair enough mate got yourself a good deal there, does he want to sell the motor? i have a nice clean Berlina been looked after real well so im after a 5l to drop in it i work at a tranny shop so have sorted diff and tranny out now to just find the motor and kframe. hope it does well down the strip check out myride on the cccwa website

[Brendo169]

i think he is planning on rebuilding the car and unfortunately he does not want to sell the motor!

[PirateJoe]

Hope the chassis is all good.. ouch! Glad you got it back.

[walesy]

! i see ur caprice is running a lowish 13 down the quarter! thats a killer time for a rig like that!

thanks mate, that was before the built box and stally so should get a 12 out of it now :-D then time for a shot of nos to reach my goal of an 11

[VS_Pete_1]

Mate that is nice.

[Disturbed_vegeta]

how come you put the clubby interior in the senator? the devonish seats are porn to sit in.

[HamaTime™]

how come you put the clubby interior in the senator? the devonish seats are porn to sit in.

I was just thinking the same thing.