Let me be shamelessly honest from the beginning: I'd like to support my family and my motor habit from my work in the shop & my blog posts. I've heard it can be done and I'm adequately equipped to do both. I've got a real, electronic computer for the blog, and a pretty decent, 'regular guy' shop just a few steps out the back door. I live in the country with hundreds of acres of orchards & alfalfa in all 4 directions. My nearest neighbor is 1/4 mile away across 50 acres of alfalfa. Sometimes (like today) I can hear the neighbors talking if they're outside on a clear day with a slight breeze. Sometimes I hear gunshots when they're having fun at their outdoor shooting range, or discouraging a varmint. At other times, they may hear my gunshots from my outdoor shooting range north of the house.
After being self employed for about 20 years, I did a short management gig as an employee of another man. After that experiment I decided that I was nearly retired, and began to look over my assets. I've got several 'vintage' cars and a couple of heavily modified road bikes, so I looked at them to see which would be the easiest to put in sale condition. I decided that my '79 El Camino was the most likely and if I was going to convince my wife and skeptical children that I could do it, I'd have to stick with it to the bitter end and not get sidetracked. I may have to work on an acceptable definition of "sidetracked" later.
The El Camino ran, but smoked. It reminded me of a hippie friend of mine on my high school track team. He was smoking a cigarette one day outside the gym doors waiting for the coach to get us organized. I asked him if he thought that was a good idea and his reply was something like, "It's okay, I burn it off during practice". It was 1970 and I wondered if he could be right, but of course, this was back before Google.
I drove the El Camino into the shop in March of this year and later that night I jumped on Facebook to let my fan base know that I was going to take a couple of weekends to do an engine/transmission swap and freshen up the faithful old car. I'll never do that again. Next time:
+Mocked+up+350+with+%2787+Corvette+Tuned+Port+Injection+intake+ready+to+assume+the+position..JPG)
Since the Elkie had a 267ci V8 and a factory-equipped Saginaw 4-speed I thought an upgrade to a 350ci V8 and a World Class 5-speed would simply be a matter of tidying up the engine compartment, shortening the driveshaft and making a new hole in the floor for the 5-speed shifter. THAT would've been a two week affair, or less since I already had a tried and tested engine that had come from my son's Camaro and the transmission had been inspected and prepped by PacTrans (509) 457-5005 in nearby Yakima Washington. What could possibly hold me up?
The problem is similar to going shopping for groceries when you're hungry. You buy one of everything because it ALL looks so good. With cars, it's a series of hypothetical statements that use the words: "Since...Then..." Such as, "Since I'm taking the engine out of the car, then I might as well have the steering column gold plated."
I reasoned that since I was going to ask top dollar for the car, then it was going to have to be specially equipped. That meant using one of my Tuned Port Injection (TPI) systems from the top shelf of the shop. It would be a perfect match for the World Class 5-speed transmission and really improve the gas mileage while providing considerably more torque. So, I put the replacement engine on an engine stand, repainted it and mocked it up with the TPI components. Did I mention that the TPI unit looks really cool? The mock-up is important so that you can make sure everything is going to work together BEFORE you get it into the tight confines of the engine compartment.
In this case the TPI unit was from an '87 Corvette. Lots of guys will say they have a "Corvette engine" or a Corvette muffler bearing. It sounds so aggressive to say the word: Corvette, and it strikes fear and inspires awe in the listener. If one car guy describes his car and says the word Corvette in his description, the other guy has to raise his eyebrows and just shut up. Sometimes when you go to the parts store and ask for a starter motor, or a windshield wiper blade, the parts man asks you what year and model of car it's for. If you say Corvette, then the people around you stop what they're doing and look at the way you're dressed, especially your shoes and hair. You receive instant gratification. Weaker customers, without much exposure to parts store banter, will occasionally forget what they came in the store to get. Sometimes the parts man will not acknowledge that you just said Corvette. He wants you to believe that he hears the word all the time, as if he lines his bird cage with Corvettes, but if you're prepared for it you can see him blink, or at least do an eye flicker, when you utter this ultimate word of power & class. Later, as you're leaving the store, he'll steal a glance at your shoes.
There is a way to confirm that the fuel injection unit is from a Corvette as opposed to coming from a more common Camaro or Firebird. There is a pair of tubes that are the fuel inlet and outlet tubes that come from the fuel rails on top of the manifold. You can see these in the photo above. The larger is the inlet or high pressure side. Both of these tubes come forward to the front of the engine where the Corvette unit will terminate just ahead of the front edge of the manifold, but the Camaro & Firebird units will make a 90 degree turn toward the driver's side for several inches before they terminate. The Corvette unit is more difficult to use because where the fittings terminate is right where the alternator or A/C compressor or the intake bellows also want to be. The other style gets the fittings off to the side where a connection to your fuel lines is more easily made.
Since I've done these TPI installations for a few years now, I had the fittings that angled away from the engine and to each side of the car, the high pressure line on the passenger side and the return line on the driver's side. I just happened to have the angles that worked best to route the fuel lines. I'm going to assume that some readers are working on a project similar to mine and will benefit from some more inclusive information. You'll want to know that these El Caminos along with Monte Carlos, Grand Nationals and the other "G" body cars of this particular vintage, will all have steel fuel lines going to and from the gas tank already. You'll need to incorporate an electric fuel pump to provide enough fuel pressure to make the TPI system work and I found it easiest to mount it to the floor under the bed right in front of the tank, above the axle. Here's a picture of my installation:
I used fuel line manufactured for fuel injection systems. It takes more pressure and keeps you safer. This is a good time to replace old fuel lines anyway. Mine were nearly 35 years old. One line ruptured while the car was still in my driveway, under pressure from the new fuel pump!
After being self employed for about 20 years, I did a short management gig as an employee of another man. After that experiment I decided that I was nearly retired, and began to look over my assets. I've got several 'vintage' cars and a couple of heavily modified road bikes, so I looked at them to see which would be the easiest to put in sale condition. I decided that my '79 El Camino was the most likely and if I was going to convince my wife and skeptical children that I could do it, I'd have to stick with it to the bitter end and not get sidetracked. I may have to work on an acceptable definition of "sidetracked" later.
The El Camino ran, but smoked. It reminded me of a hippie friend of mine on my high school track team. He was smoking a cigarette one day outside the gym doors waiting for the coach to get us organized. I asked him if he thought that was a good idea and his reply was something like, "It's okay, I burn it off during practice". It was 1970 and I wondered if he could be right, but of course, this was back before Google.
I drove the El Camino into the shop in March of this year and later that night I jumped on Facebook to let my fan base know that I was going to take a couple of weekends to do an engine/transmission swap and freshen up the faithful old car. I'll never do that again. Next time:
- I'll complete the project in secret,
- when I'm done I'll forecast that I'm going to get it done in the next 6 months,
- then 3 months later I'll brag about how great I am.
 |
| Too hot to do bodywork outside, I'll just have to vacuum everything later. |
+Mocked+up+350+with+%2787+Corvette+Tuned+Port+Injection+intake+ready+to+assume+the+position..JPG)
Since the Elkie had a 267ci V8 and a factory-equipped Saginaw 4-speed I thought an upgrade to a 350ci V8 and a World Class 5-speed would simply be a matter of tidying up the engine compartment, shortening the driveshaft and making a new hole in the floor for the 5-speed shifter. THAT would've been a two week affair, or less since I already had a tried and tested engine that had come from my son's Camaro and the transmission had been inspected and prepped by PacTrans (509) 457-5005 in nearby Yakima Washington. What could possibly hold me up?The problem is similar to going shopping for groceries when you're hungry. You buy one of everything because it ALL looks so good. With cars, it's a series of hypothetical statements that use the words: "Since...Then..." Such as, "Since I'm taking the engine out of the car, then I might as well have the steering column gold plated."
I reasoned that since I was going to ask top dollar for the car, then it was going to have to be specially equipped. That meant using one of my Tuned Port Injection (TPI) systems from the top shelf of the shop. It would be a perfect match for the World Class 5-speed transmission and really improve the gas mileage while providing considerably more torque. So, I put the replacement engine on an engine stand, repainted it and mocked it up with the TPI components. Did I mention that the TPI unit looks really cool? The mock-up is important so that you can make sure everything is going to work together BEFORE you get it into the tight confines of the engine compartment.
In this case the TPI unit was from an '87 Corvette. Lots of guys will say they have a "Corvette engine" or a Corvette muffler bearing. It sounds so aggressive to say the word: Corvette, and it strikes fear and inspires awe in the listener. If one car guy describes his car and says the word Corvette in his description, the other guy has to raise his eyebrows and just shut up. Sometimes when you go to the parts store and ask for a starter motor, or a windshield wiper blade, the parts man asks you what year and model of car it's for. If you say Corvette, then the people around you stop what they're doing and look at the way you're dressed, especially your shoes and hair. You receive instant gratification. Weaker customers, without much exposure to parts store banter, will occasionally forget what they came in the store to get. Sometimes the parts man will not acknowledge that you just said Corvette. He wants you to believe that he hears the word all the time, as if he lines his bird cage with Corvettes, but if you're prepared for it you can see him blink, or at least do an eye flicker, when you utter this ultimate word of power & class. Later, as you're leaving the store, he'll steal a glance at your shoes.
There is a way to confirm that the fuel injection unit is from a Corvette as opposed to coming from a more common Camaro or Firebird. There is a pair of tubes that are the fuel inlet and outlet tubes that come from the fuel rails on top of the manifold. You can see these in the photo above. The larger is the inlet or high pressure side. Both of these tubes come forward to the front of the engine where the Corvette unit will terminate just ahead of the front edge of the manifold, but the Camaro & Firebird units will make a 90 degree turn toward the driver's side for several inches before they terminate. The Corvette unit is more difficult to use because where the fittings terminate is right where the alternator or A/C compressor or the intake bellows also want to be. The other style gets the fittings off to the side where a connection to your fuel lines is more easily made.
Since I've done these TPI installations for a few years now, I had the fittings that angled away from the engine and to each side of the car, the high pressure line on the passenger side and the return line on the driver's side. I just happened to have the angles that worked best to route the fuel lines. I'm going to assume that some readers are working on a project similar to mine and will benefit from some more inclusive information. You'll want to know that these El Caminos along with Monte Carlos, Grand Nationals and the other "G" body cars of this particular vintage, will all have steel fuel lines going to and from the gas tank already. You'll need to incorporate an electric fuel pump to provide enough fuel pressure to make the TPI system work and I found it easiest to mount it to the floor under the bed right in front of the tank, above the axle. Here's a picture of my installation:
I used fuel line manufactured for fuel injection systems. It takes more pressure and keeps you safer. This is a good time to replace old fuel lines anyway. Mine were nearly 35 years old. One line ruptured while the car was still in my driveway, under pressure from the new fuel pump!
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