I'll try not to write too long of a book

So I'm trying to get this 97 formula into shape as a daily driver. I got it cheap and it needs some TLC I bought it knowing it needed a head gasket. I saw some milkshake on the stick and he said it would need water to get the quarter mile home. In retrospect stupid but I felt sorry for the car and it was pretty cheap..

So I've done motor swaps and heads and cams on these cars. Mostly LS1 stuff, last 4th gen was an LSX 454 car with all the supporting mods did most of the work myself. Now I have a 73 Firebird that is my toy and an 06 TBSS that is my summer daily. I got this to be my winter daily and just because I love 4th gens and even though I know an LS1 is better in alot of ways love the LT1. My 93 is still going strong and is owned by Fastbird on this board.

Anyways fast forward to getting home. Car runs ok home consider there was no intake in front of the MAF and the intake elbow has a gapping hole in it. But I figure I should drain the water and keep it dry and change the oil before I put it on ramps in the garage for the head gaskets...well no water comes out and the oil ends up like this:



On top of that there is obvious gasket material in there. So I guess that lessons the chance of a cracked head or block causing it

I have a video of me starting it up and pulling it into the garage but I'm a little embarrassed to post it, it is mostly of my thumb and my dirty garage but it does show its not smoking at startup although running like crap with unmetered air and a massive head gasket leak...

So my question is, I really don't want to drop a lot of money into this car right now, until I get it going and know what I have. I have a couple of options:

1- Swap the gaskets, I'd at least have a shop check the heads, after all parts and fluids, buying 1704's and ARP's I'd be under a 500 bucks. Run a few oil changes in the first 30-40 miles and some seafoam to clean the motor out and take my chances.

2- Drop the motor and rebuild it. This one is hard because I know me and buy the time I'm done I'll probably have 3k into which is stupid at this point.

3- I found this on craigslist. Supposed to be a 97 LT1 with a six speed, and has all accessories and wiring harness ( a plus because if I kept the car I'd do a 6 speed swap I've done like 7 of them.) Supposed to have 65k and the car was totalled. Gave me a total BS power number but supposed of had head work and a cam but who knows. Who does head work and a cam with steel rockers and manifolds? I think I can get it for 450-525.







What do you guys think. I'm leaning towards the head gaskets, and get the CAI and 1LE elbow on there and see how she runs...but I've never had a head gasket go this bad before.

Thanks for reading my novel!!! Looking forward to driving this thing I really miss the 4th gens. My 73 is crazy but its just not the same...

Bobby

 

If you did the least you had to do to it, you would only be out a little money and labor. You might be surprised that it is still in some sort of reasonable shape and may go many miles. If it does not last, then you did not waste much on it. Just depends on which way you want to gamble.

 

That's kind of the direction I'm thinking of going in. Just do the gaskets and see what it does. If the mains are junk I am out the cost of gaskets and fluids.....

 

If nothing else shove a bore scope down into the pan and see how the mains look before you rip it apart.

If it doesn't pan out you could always buy an aftermarket K member and a 5.3 truck engine/trans/computer and toss that in for less than a rebuild on the LT1.

 

I could do that but what am I looking for. Engine had decent oil pressure when it was parked.

At this point I think I'm just going to change the gaskets and hope for the best. I mean worse case is I have cleaned up heads and wasted a 130 + fluids on gaskets and a bunch of time. Best case I get another 10-15k out of the motor.

I hear you on the 5.3. One of my very good friends has a 97 z28 that has been converted to LS and I actually picked up a very nice 2001 harness and will look for other deals in case it goes that way. I hope not though I was kinda looking forward to having an LT1 car.

 

Rust would be the most obvious thing to look for. Hard to tell if the bearings are cooked without cracking the caps. If the oil pressure was good once you got it home then cross your fingers and roll the dice as it were.

Whenever I've had water in a crank case I always bought enough oil to do 3 changes. 10 quarts of auto parts store brand 30 weight and 5 quarts of my oil of choice (Mobile 1 usually). Fix the issue and fill it up with brand x. Let the car idle long enough to get up to operating temp and let it run for 10-15 minutes with the oil cap off to cook out the remaining water; you should see it steaming out of the opening. Change the oil after it stops steaming. Shove a rag into the oil fill hole and go for an easy ride to get it up to temp and that should remove any residual traces of water. Change the oil the last time and use the good stuff.

 

Good stuff Chris! I will follow your advice and see what happens Thanks!

 

So I figured I'd see a nasty gasket blown, but I have really nice plug coloring on the drivers side. And really clean pistons for 104k miles and everything else filthy. What do you guys think? Did they just let water with no coolant sit too long?

Also the bolts on the lower part of the head were really easy to break while the center ones were a workout. Time to give up on this motor?







The head:

 

It does not look terribly bad from the pics. No way to know how the lower end is, but I'd clean it up and give it a go if the cylinder wall are even halfway decent. There should be some life left in it.

 

The cylinder walls look good except a little "washed" out I've never seen that before. THanks for the feedback I really just need to have the heads redone and put em back on and go from there. Thanks for the encouragement.

Although I'm Seriously considering pushing the car around and dropping the motor for the install. It needs the timing cover leak fixed too I might just go through it a bit and clean everything up with the motor out.

 

Make sure you wipe the cylinders down with motor oil and do your best to cover it up with plastic while the heads are off to keep it somewhat clean.

 

wish i could see the pics but im willing to bet that if you took the heads and intake to a machine shop with one of those chemical tanks and had the gunk cleaned off and out, then had the heads and exhaust manifolds planed to be sure they are true flat, regasketed the entire top end, then do the bit of oil and coolant flushing, you might be surprised how much life is actually left in the old mill yet. i just spray wd40 in the cylinders while its apart to keep rust away

 

i got an lt1 running last year like that which had been sitting for about 3 years with water in the cylinders. i took some mild sand paper and worked lightly on the rusty spots in the bore put it together like i said above and it runs like a top now. i suggest going around the curvature of the cylinder side to side with the sandpaper if you have to do that. i wouldnt sand in the direction of piston travel up and down. and dont overdo it, once its smooth stop there

 

Thank you for the feedback and I appreciate it. I didn't realize that I deleted those photo's, I must have got a little click happy while cleaning up photobucket with my phone.

That is really good advice and probably would have worked out fine like you said. I ended up getting an OK deal on a LS1 pull out and front suspension so I'm going that route. Car probably isn't worth it but oh well not the first time I dumped a bunch of money into a car that wasn't worth it

It came down to time, I was serious thinking of getting one of those drill hone things and try to get at the cylinder with it, but if it wouldn't have worked out it would have been alot of time wasted. If the cylinders had looked good I would have have chanced the bearings would be OK.

Thanks again for all the help and suggestions.