LS Engine Swap & Conversions Guide & Tips - LSX Innovations.1991 Lexus LS400 - manual swapped - £7000 Sheffield

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Lexus LS - manual swapped - £ Sheffield | Retro Rides.INTRODUCTION

 

We offer this adapter in our carb conversion section of our store. Check out the flexplate section below for more information on this. We highly recommend the GM 4L60E transmission over a traditional 3 speed automatic. The 4L60E transmission provides an ideal driving experience to match the price point. Usually they are not needed unless you have a built engine.

For those of you who want to bang through the gears for an exciting driving experience, we recommend the T56 or TR transmissions. With the correct flywheel and clutch sourced from the donor vehicle of your transmission , either of these transmissions can easily bolt up to any LS engine you are using.

To get around this, just swap the old bellhousing out for the GM bellhousing. This particular flywheel is. Adapter brackets are available from Street and Performance and Detroit Speed for mounting the hydraulic master cylinder to the firewall behind the brake booster. Or, with a drill press and some simple tools, you can always check out YouTube, get adventurous and make your own.

There are a lot of different ways to go about setting up your hydraulic clutch system, but some examples below will get you started in the right direction:. Hydraulic master cylinder adapter bracket.

Flex plates may or may not be a concern when making your LS swap. You can simply use an LS flexplate. If you are trying to mate an older transmission, such as the TH or TH, etc.

We offer this spacer in the carb conversion section of our store. The flexplate spacer will work to provide support for your torque converter hub, and align it with the crank. You will need to do some additional research about your specific LS swap application with your specific needs and what will fit. There are three basic accessory drive spacing layouts.

We offer a variety of accessories drives to get your LS swap going. Check out our LS brackets section to see them all. A variety of companies sell factory and aftermarket solutions to these accessory drives. The engine wiring harness is an important component of your LS swap. It can be intimidating to some, but it really is pretty straightforward and simple. When doing an LS swap, you have three options in integrating the engine wiring harness successfully.

You can buy a stand-alone harness, have a new harness custom built or rewire the harness that came with your LS engine. In most cases, people end up having the harness that came with their LS engine rewired. This option is cost effective and can be done easily by a professional who has experience with these harnesses. Though doing the wiring for the harness yourself might be tempting as it can save money, we strongly recommend having the rewire service done by a professional, unless you already have experience in proper wiring techniques.

If you are still determined to tackle this task on your own be sure to do your homework. You can find some helpful videos on YouTube to help get you through the process. Easy EFI Solutions is a great company to work with when working on your engine wiring harness. One desirable service they offer is in taking out all of the unnecessary wiring from your current harness and converting it into a three-wire hookup for the power lead, fuel pump lead and ignition lead.

They also provide drop-in engine packages and PCM flashing to help you get your project going. Because the clearance beneath is different for cars and trucks, different oil pan applications are required. For car applications, there are many options out there, but at LSX Innovations there is only one we prefer.

We highly recommend going with the Moroso oil pan kit. In our experience, other oil pans tend to be hit or miss in quality and fitment. This one does not compromise on either. Truck oil pans are a bit easier, as most stock truck oil pans typically fit well into classic truck applications.

They do however, tend to hang a little lower than the factory SBC pan, but this can be worked around. If you are looking for a specific recommendation, we prefer the Hummer H3 oil pan, as in our experience it works well on all truck applications. Steam tubes are the tubes at the top of the heads in the engine. They keep the heads from overheating by allowing hot spots to clear and escape.

They are essential, so do not cap them off unless you have completely bled off all the air in the coolant system. Capping them off will cause problems down the road, creating hot spots around the top of cylinder 1 and cylinder 2 if there is any air left in the system.

When doing your LS swap, you want to make sure that the tubes connect somewhere that the air can escape safely. Some people connect the steam tubes to the water pump spacers or the water pump housing and some connect them to the radiator. If you are using water pump spacers you can run your line right into them. You can run a line into the top radiator hose, or you can drill into the high point in the radiator and connect there.

Your gauges provide you with valuable information about what is happening inside the car, so when doing an LS swap you want to choose carefully and install them correctly. The temperature gauge mechanical senders can be installed directly into the LS engine block with an adapter fittings from LSX Innovations. The adapter fitting is inserted right into the LS engine head. We have a bunch of different styles of adapters to all gauge probe types.

Visit our store for your mechanical oil pressure or oil temp gauges. If you are using an older transmission you can use a factory speedometer. If your transmission is modern, then you will need a gear housing that will accept a mechanical speedometer. Advanced Adapters is a company that makes a great gear housing. Another option when ensuring speedometer compatibility is to use a Cable X to run a mechanical speedometer cable to the transmission.

If you want new electronic gauges, there are several aftermarket manufacturers, such as Auto Meter, VDO and Dakota Digital, that make electronic gauges and senders. These electronic gauges and senders can be wired into your LS wiring harness. For the fuel system when doing an LS swap, the most common approach is to use a C5 Corvette fuel pressure regulator along with an electric fuel pump that has adequate flow, such as the Walbro People also typically use Russel fitting adapters with this combo.

In a fuel inject setup the system needs consistent pressure to operate. If there is no baffle in your tank and the fuel moves away from the pickup tube when you are cornering, your engine will die. Just something so I could feel satisfied that I actually did some kind of progress that day and to prepare for the clutch pedal assembly. Current state of the engine bay.

To start the day off, stuff came in the mail. Got everything ready to start figuring out how to install the clutch pedal, and today is also the day when the realization of how much this is actually going to suck finally kicked in. Started by pulling the emergency brake pedal assembly. This guy did a 5spd swap into an early GS He had the same problem with the firewall being angled so he rigged up something pretty neat.

That is a MKIV Supra clutch pedal assembly that has been welded to a plate spaced out with some box tubing and bolted to the side of the footwell. Been slaving away at VW the last week. Long hours suck, but I got my first sale! Anyway, my brother came through big as I cannot weld whatsoever and helped me almost finish what is the most difficult part of this swap. Here's how today went. Held up the pedal, made a few marks, ran back to his house and welded in a few spacers. I'd like to have more consistent updates but I've been slaving away at the new job and between training, getting use to the long hours and the freak apocalyptic snow storm we had here in CT I haven't been able to get any time until now to make progress, though I have good news.

What I've been told is the hardest part of this build is over. Snow hit up hard here. We're use to this amount of snow as the TOTAL accumulation for the entire season, not a 20 hour time span. That lump of mirror and roof is my Mini. My parents have a guy that does out yard work and plows the driveway when it snows.

Guy decided to not come until Sunday pm. It snowed Thursday night into Friday. Thanks guy. Started like this,. Motor and trans are out! Between that, and having almost no motivation or energy left after getting out of work the progress has crawled to a minimum on the Lexus.

Good news, I quit my job! I'm going back to working part time at my parents business until I finish the car, and I also may be pursuing a job opportunity in Miami so this car NEEDS to get done. I have registered for a drift event at Lime Rock on June 22nd.

Time to go balls to the wall! So since the last update, next to nothing has really been done on the car. Also sort of solved my parking brake situation. Found a somewhat easy way to use half the parking cable from the SC, and the handle with the LS stock parking brake cables. Hopefully it works out :thumbup:. Said block off plates, don't hate I've never really fabricated anything before, and the table grinder kind of sucked. Now I had questions.

Hoping the tech savvy people could chime in. My intake manifold is disgusting. It has a solid layer of grime inside the upper plenum that I can see. Am I better of just taking it to a shop to get hot tanked, instead of investing the time to clean the individual runners?

Should I even bother cleaning it, and just Seafoam the car instead?! I checked and the diff bushings are open style bushings to allow for flex.

I am assuming the subframe's are as well. I have filled motor mounts before with windowweld with great results, I imagine that doing the same would only benefit the car to help the rear end not slop around everywhere? First the ASD handbrake came in. Christ is this thing beautiful.

Test fit it to see if I could find a place for it that I liked. Looks like I'm going to be losing the cup holder, center console vent ducting, and the arm rest since my elbow hits it when I pull the brake.

Also realized I hadn't done anything for the parking brake, so I got to work to see what I could figure out. Turns out it was rather easy. I purchased the handle, and parking brake cables from some guys on ebay. I used the SC handbrake lever, and the front half of the SC parking brake cable to get this to work.

First I drilled some holes into the tranny tunnel after mocking up the height I wanted it to be at. Then I picked up some hardware to install it. Final result is this. Guess I'll have to get a darker handle cover from the pick and pull sometime. As for how I rigged it to the stock assembly, I routed the SC cable through the factory hole in the floor, and put it through where the stock one would go.

Since the SC has a flat long piece at the end of the cable I put a bolt, lock washer and nut at the end so it wont back out.

Couldn't fit the bolt from the top otherwise I would of put it that way, but it won't be backing out ever. Love that loctite! Simple solution and it works great. Used the ebrake today to undo the bolts on the axles.

After that I got to doing the rear main finally. Gross and dirty. Got it done and reinstalled, and moved onto the radiator. I needed to find some kind of bushing to put at the bottom of the dowels to prop the rad up slightly so it would rest on rubber and not metal to metal. First thing was to get rid of the factory rad resting plates. After trying to drill out the spot welds I got tired and just grabbed the tiger saw.

So once that was done I needed to find some kind of bushing to have it rest on. Yup, thats the factory exhaust hanger, and sleeve that goes on the metal hangers on the chassis. I cut the very end off one side since it had a stepped lip to make it easier to put the hanger over it.

They prop the radiator up just enough so the factory stay's grab it almost like it was meant to be in this car. Just the right amount of height. So far, reused factory exhaust hangers, a sx clutch pedal assembly, Honda Ruckus crankcase bolt. What else can we recycle?

Snapped a photo of the small assortment of AN fittings they had. They were the only place in CT that could get an M10x1. So I got talking to the guy, and he told me they make lines on the spot. I'll pay the 9 bucks for instant gratification. Guy making said lines. I now have everything I need to run all the brake lines, so I can get the motor back in hopefully next week.

Later I had a couple of my buddies stopped by to hang out, and see the progress. Ended up lending a hand. Helped me figure out where exactly the hydrobrake is going, and how exactly to make a platform for it. Then they were a huge help pulling the rear diff out so I can get it welded. And that's where today ends.

Hope to have more updates soon, but my brother has a race he's leaving for on Wednesday in northern PA so I'll be helping him get the car ready. We'll see what happens! So in the last week and a half I've gotten a bunch done. First and foremost, here are some terrible photos of the meh brake lines I promised.

Again, I didn't have a pipe bender until the last 2 bends, and I know they're ugly, but they're functional. That's all I care about. Ended up having some bad flares on the same line, so I had to get creative afterwards since I had already flared the longer one.

Its not the "right way", but it works. I'll fix it some day. Was able to reuse one of the factory unions that has a little bracket on it. Bolted the line to an threaded stud for the plastic brake line holder that was there. Now onto the stuff I got done since the last update. My welder finally came in! Went to Tech-Air, got a 80cf tank, then to Harbor Freight for a welding cart and some gloves, and finally Lowe's for a Lincoln Electric mask.

Even got to give it a shot laying some beads down. Explain later why. Thank GOD. Never want to do that again, at least not alone. Next I tended to the trans crossmember. I got it from a Odyssey Parts Shop thanks again Cashflo! Gave it a quick spray with truck bedliner before tossing it on. Fit like a glove btw. After that, I noticed the shifter didn't line up with the hole like the swap kit builder speculated it would, though it was close.

Quick use my new favorite tool and it was no longer an issue. Next I decided to install the rad to try and figure out the hose situation. Stock hose isn't going to work Fixed it!!! Seriously though, I hacked the stock one up to have something to take with me to Pep Boys.. So after a quick glance and realizing I'd be there forever, I did some quick googling at the SC upper hoses and it looked like the radiator flange was closer to the center much like the MK4 supra radiator, so I found one off the shelf and bingo, that's gonna work.

I then took a break from that since I had to wait for the Radiator temp. Back to Fluid Dynamics! And this is the final product. The giant grommet is from a B13 Sentra engine harness. Was almost the perfect size, but I put a little bit of window silicone just to fill the little gap. Tilton reservoir mounted nicely out of the way too.

Then the only other thing I got done was test fitted the shifter to see what kind of shift lever modifications I'm going to need. Definitely going to have to cut and reweld this to get it to come out centered. I did also end up ordering the driveshaft this past Monday, though of course it would be my luck that this ass took his sweet time so when I called to give Driveshaft Shop the measurements they informed me all of this week June July they're on vacation. It most likely wont get shipped out for another week after they get back.

Oh well, more time to finish tidying everything up. More to come soon! Spinnetti Member. Messages Location KY. Nice Job Some similarities I corner weighted it, but can't find my notes. I stuck with the auto though. Spinnetti said:. Click to expand Its almost road worthy.

Well for starters, I got the reverse lights working with the KA trans! Found a website that sells Nissan harness pigtails for dirt cheap.

Ordered one for the speed sensor and the reverse lights.