Ive spent more then 30 hours this weekend...

on Long Tube and cam install and still havent even got a header on...

5 hours on the harmonic balancer... 5 ton gear puller and harmonic balancer puller broke both of them...

I Cant get the car up high enough safely to get the driver side header on and that was sopposed to be the easy one....

got the harmonic balancer off... and what do you know.. Autozone,Kmart,walmart ,mejiers, and home depot didnt have the microscopic star socket to take the opti junk off...

So... still got 3 bolts on the passenger side manifold

Intake manifold is all off sitting inplace, rocker arms pushrods out, harmonic balancer is off. and one exhaust manifold all for 300 hundred dollars worth of loner tools from autozone, no more skin on my nuckles.. And not being in contact with a human being all weekend uness they worked at a auto store...

Wheres the people that do the cam and headers swaps in four hours

 

Lol they all own LS1's. I've never heard of anyone doing it in an LT1 in under 10 hours for a cam and headers. I got pretty quick at it but its still a weekend project.

To ge the car up high enough you have to get creative. With boards. Get some pieces of 2x10 and put them under the jackstands, under the jack, etc, and just keep stacking and you will work your way up. Autozone sucks BTW, find an Advance auto if you can, I've found that the help is quicker and more intelligent, and they have a better parts selection.

 

dang, sounds like you had a terrible time, i though mine was bad!

hmm, i guess on got lucky on the torx bit, sometimes i use allen wrenches.
hopefully you finish it and decide it was well worth it.

good luck!
mike

 

There arent star sockets holding the opti on. There are bolts.
You are looking at the screws holding the cap and rotor together.

 

do u still have that truck for sale?

 

trucks gone.. how do I get the opti off... Before I call Binford

 

there are 3 tabs on the sides of the opti with bolts on em. take them out, pull off opti

 

Sounds like you're having a real fun time. Hang in there.

Here's a personal horror story if it helps to know you're not the only one that has had a problem.

My friend ordered a cam kit from a well known shop in Las Vegas because I recommended them. Not the brightest move on my part. He should have just bought the stuff from Summit like he was going to before I opened my big mouth. Live and learn.

We did the cam swap, installed the lifters, pushrods and rockers they supplied us with their kit.

We assembled everything and the valvetrain geometry didn't seem quite right but hey... it was their package so it should have been right, right?

We fired up the car and the valve train was excessively noisy. We did a rocker adjustment with the car running and things were still not right. We pulled a pushrod and it was an ls1 pushrod. 7.4" rather than 7.2".

We call the shop and they said that they would "Next day" another set. Meanwhile we notice that the locks were messed up from only catching on a few threads. We called back and let them know.

A week later and several calls to Nevada we get the stuff that was supposed to have been next dayed. We put it together and still can't get the valvetrain quiet. We suspected the lifters were shot from running the car with the other pushrods.

About this time we spring a major oil leak. It's the water pump seal on the timing cover. Everything comes back apart and the leak is fixed. We try to get the valvetrain quieted down but it's still too noisy.

We pull out the lifters and put the stock lifters back in and everything is cool. Then we notice that the shop sold us Comp R lifters. These were way overkill for a mild cam and notorious for being noisy.

After doing the job 3 times and putting in the stock lifters it finally got done. It took over 100 hours labor due to the shop sending the wrong stuff (combined with our inexperience).

On the lighter side, we did the lifter swap and rocker setup in less than 4 hours Sunday afternoon lol.

I can look back and laugh now but it wasn't much fun then.

 

Bob, call me if you need help. Also I emailed you last week and cleared stuff up with ben already.

989-429-0152

I do opti's and headers in my sleep. j/k But I know I can help you out. The bolts you are looking at are for the opti cover. Look farther back and you'll find the ones to take the opti off. The are just standard sockets.

Joe