DV2000NJ's 6.0 swap - Official build thread - COMPLETED.

The truck:


The engine:


The cam:


The Pushrods:


The Valve Springs:


The converter:


The Transmission:


The plan: Put it all in my truck, and drive the piss out of it.

So what are all those things pictured, you ask?

Well, the truck's a 2000 Silverado 4x4, with the 4.8L. As of 12/16/2009, the truck has a bit over 188,000 miles on it. Original engine and trans. It's slow. "16.25-in-the-quarter-mile" slow. I'm young and dumb, so I'm going to try to make it faster.

So I bought an LQ4 6.0L out of a 2006 Yukon Denali XL. Back half of the truck burned up with 25,000 miles on it, so I got the engine. The engine hails from Virginia, but it tells me it likes it much better above the Mason-Dixon line.

The cam I will be running was spec'd for my setup by Patrick Guerra.
Specs: 216/224 .561”/.568” 114LSA +4.
I'll be running the Comp 918 valve springs, and hardened pushrods. As of 12/16/09, I'm waiting for all of these goodies to arrive.
EDIT: I will actually be running the PAC 1518s, and selling the 918s. I just feel more comfortable with them, plus they give me some room should I ever go with a bigger cam.

To accompany that cam, I will be running the Yank TT3000 torque converter. Obviously, it's got a 3000 rpm stall speed. I bought it with around 7,000 miles on it.

To handle all that, I'm going to run a built 4L60/65E, probably from either Performabuilt or Finish Line Transmissions. This won't be arriving until right before everything goes in the truck.

The timeline:
The cam/pushrods/valve springs will all go in by the time I go back to school on January 25th, and I'm aiming to get everything in the truck over my spring break (third week in March).

This thread will be stickied and closed, to keep it to only progress updates.

Anything you want to say about the swap (or pretty much anything else, for that matter) can be said HERE.

Hope you enjoy, I know I will.

Step one: Teardown. Sort of. Ok, not really.

I guess you could say I got started tonight. Got the engine up on the stand (which I don't fully trust yet it's a bit more flexible than I'm comfortable with, that's why it's being spooned by the hoist for backup).





Then I pulled off the drive-by-wire throttle body, which I won't be using (look for it in the for-sale section soon).


Then I pulled off the water pump (in preparation for the cam swap). Then I got cold, and called it a night. Here's where I'm at now.


Now that the semester's over, I'll finally start pulling the drive-by-wire harness, and the coils off in preparation for the cam swap. Hopefully I'll get that done tomorrow.

Pulled off the harness and coils today. Not a whole lot else to do until the cam and everything get here.

Pretty boring stuff.

From this:


To this:




To this:




Spaghetti?

Oh snap!


Still waiting on the cam...

So I had these:


So I took off the valve covers and it looked like this:


So I took off the rockers and it looked like this:


And then I used this:


PAC 1518s on the left.


Old springs.


Ooh, pretty.




Overall, it went better than I expected. Took a little less than three hours to do everything. The Crane tool is a freaking lifesaver, literally almost half the work of a normal tool.

I now have a cammed 6.0 sitting in my garage.

Timing cover off


Cam gear off, cam retainer plate visible


Old cam halfway out


Old cam


Old cam in the background, new up front


And... Then I forgot to keep taking pictures.

The pushrods are in, rockers torqued back down, harmonic balancer installed. Coils and water pump will probably go back on tonight or tomorrow, and then, we wait.

Tru-Cool 40k came in on Friday.



This bitch is HUGE (foot present for size reference ).

I made the thread for the headers, but never updated this.

Instead of using the OEM manifold bolts which are notorious for having the bolt heads pop off, and for snapping during removal, I decided to get some GM manifold/header studs. I think they're an OEM part on some V6, but I'm not sure.

The part numbers:
11589154 for the studs (come in packs of 5, we need 12 total)
11609746 for the locking nuts (come in packs of 4, again, we need 12).

The studs:




You can kind of see the triangle shape of the threads in that second picture, that's how the nuts lock.

Manifold off.


Studs in.


I re-used my stock gaskets, since they were still in good shape. Another big advantage to the studs, is how easy it is to align everything when installing.

Manifold on right, LT on left (duh). One's a little bigger, I think...














AWWWWW YEEEEAAAHH!

Just realized I never updated this thread. Bear with me here guys, I'm just moving everything into here so it'll be complete.

Got coolant and oil drained, coolant hoses all disconnected, fan and shroud off, TB off, probably some other things, but I'm in too much of a rush to think of them.

Custom trans fluid drain.