Just picked up my 1994 Red Z28 yesterday, and am excited to once again have a car that I can have some fun with. The car has 90,000 miles on it, but the previous owner had a brand new GM LT1 crate motor put in about 20k ago. It has a K&N cold air induction kit, flowmaster muffler, and MSD 6AL ignition, but otherwise is stock. Automatic transmission was rebuilt a few months ago as well.

I was wondering what you guys would consider the biggest problems to watch out for; this will be my daily driver, so reliability is a must, and I'd like to catch any problems before they leave me stranded.

Also, if anyone knows a good supplier of leather seat cover replacements, I'd appreciate that info as well. I'm in Houston, Texas if anyone is local. Thanks for your help.

 

The biggest problem to look out for is Optisparks. Also intake leaks are pretty common with LT1 cars. You will deal with more issues the more and more you mod your car. Have fun with your car and welcome aboard.

 

Welcome to the addiction!

First things first-

You optispark(located in the front of the motor behind the waterpump) is very sensetive to damage from moisture. DO NOT wash your engine bay with running water. If you want to detail it, do it by hand.

Pay attention to your fluids and keep them changed regularly. Don't forget the rear end fluid and limited slip additive. Also the auto trannies in these cars aren't the strongest, keep her alive with fresh fluid. I recommend valvoline maxxlife changed every 20k. Might want to add an aftermarket tranny cooler as well.

My car acts up with anything lower than premium gas, yours may react diferently, but some people on here say that their car runs fine with midgrade or regular, but in my case I disagree.

If you need any install guides for just about ANYTHING on your car, consult this site-
http://www.bfranker.badz28.com/

John

 

Your distributor(OPTISPARK) is the biggest PITA. They are known to go out alot, especially if you have the non-vented one(Vented optis started in 95). You can search for that if you wanna learn more about it. Its discussed everyday

Also you said you had the tranny rebuilt(or he did)...hopefully he put a cooler on there, that will help extend the life of it by a lot(if you live in hot weather, as I see you do). If he didnt put one on there, I think that should be your first mod. Heat kills these trannys.

Plugs and wires are a bitach to change in the car, I hear the first time it takes like ~6 hours or so. Get some Over the valve wires(like from Taylor) to prevent your wires from burning and make it easier next time.

And finally, enjoy the car! Its fun when it runs

 

My car has been awesome the 6 months or so I've owned it. No problems at all. My dad put 154k on his LT1 never replaced an opti same for his roadmaster it had 75k when he died. The opti is definately a pain when it does go out, and its only a matter of time, but that time could be 150+k miles so I wouldn't sweat that so much. Why did he rebuild with a GM crate motor and not rebuild with the original block?

 

Thanks for the info.

The optispark was replaced when the engine was swapped, so hopefully this one will still have some life left in it. I know some mechanics that will put a tranny cooler on anything with an automatic for reliability, so that will probably be my #1 mod.

 

IROC-

the guy had designs on building a seperate high performance motor out of the original block, he offered to sell it to me too, but I don't have a garage right now, so I had to pass

 

You lucky bastage. I have had my car for a year, and with all the problems, it has been running for maybe 2 months of that year. And I had an opti go out after <1k miles