8tb VY SS Ute

Howdy folks,
Thought I'd chuck up some info and pics of my '03 VY SS Ute. Have had the car since January '07, and slowly been making it look the part, coming together alright so far, hopefully things stay that way and I don't make the wrong choice and make it look Woopsie. Here's the specs so far:

2003 VY SS Ute 5.7L 6 speed manual

PAINT:
-Phantom Black on the bottom
-Tiger Green on the top
-Marble effects pinstripe

ENGINE:
-CompCams 228/230@112 LSA camshaft
-PAC valve springs
-Powerbond 25% underdrive pulley
-Higgins CNC ported and shaved 241 heads
-ARP head studs
-8tb intake manifold (50mm)
-Bosch 36lb injectors

DRIVELINE:
-Textralia Z Grip clutch
-Textralia lightweight billet flywheel
-braided clutch line
-3.9:1 diff gears
-Harrop diff cover

EXHAUST:
-ceramic coated X-Force 1 3/4" 4-1 extractors
-Ballistic 100cpi cats
-twin 2 1/2" exhaust

INTERIOR:
-custom made seats (whole thing was made by hand from scratch, seat frame included) sitting on standard seat rails so i still
have the electrically adjustable driver's seat stuff
-seats, outer ring of steering wheel, centre console lid, part of the doors are wrapped in caramel coloured leather
-spokes of steering wheel, top section of center dash, armrest on doors, roof lining and sun visors are wrapped in beige
suede
-gear stick boot is black leather, cream stitching.
-centre dash surround, instrument cluster surround, windsreen demister vents, a/c vents are painted in a creme colour(can't
remember the name of it)

STEREO:
-Alpine AVA-D310E 7.5" DVD screen (single din)
-Rockford Fosgate P325.2 amp
-Alpine MRP-M650 amp
-Rockford Fosgate 'Power' 6.5" splits
-2x Rockford Fosgate Punch P3 8" subs
-Stinger 1 Farad capacitor
-QED Silver cabling
-Stinger Roadkill sound deadening on the doors, back wall of cab and the floor

WHEELS:
-20 x 8.5" Intro Vista II billets with the 'suede' finish spokes (just a heap of 'V's' cut into the centre of them)
-Kumho Ecsta SPT 225/35 for the front, 245/35 for the back

BRAKES:
-genuine VT HSV Clubsport discs and calipers.
-discs are 330mm slotted on the front, 305ish (i think) slotted on the back
-2 piston front caliper's, single piston rear

Have had the ute on a dyno for a tune and ended up with 438hp and 407.4 ft lbs at the wheels

Future mods are as follows:
-Re-route wiring including the moving of ABS, fuse box, computer, and battery to somewhere out of sight
-General smooth of all unsightly areas, box in the rear of headlights etc
-Engine bay respray
-Engine out for some more cubes and a pretty up
-Do something with the rear wall of the cab on the inside

That's about all i think, here are some pics. Hope you enjoy.

Danny































And I'll have to get some others up later on when the computer chooses to agree with me

Hey Danny,

I see a lot of nice work there. Big bucks also!
I know because I doing similar things.

Looking forward to more pictures and progress reports.

Regards, Smooth  

Very tidy indeed.  

Seen this in the flesh.
VERY tidy indeed!!!

Cheers for the kind words.
Time for a few more happy snaps. My apologies for the lack of build photos, ended up losing all the older ones when the last computer kicked the bucket.

Power steer bottle holder, was rather ugly so I got rid of the unnecessary bits and rounded a few spots


Cleaned up with a billet power steer bottle in place


Power steering pump was leaking, so it was stripped down to modify the intake port to run braided line


Made a jig and got drilling after removing the factory pipe sleeve. Drilled 11/16", chamfer for ORB fitting (AN fitting with o-ring seal), tapped 3/4" UNF (-


Just ran a hose barb for the time being as this years summernats was fast approaching


Pump freshly rebuild with new seals front and rear


Shiney bottle bracket


Alternator received some love while I had room to get it out














After the Canberra trip I got a power steer cooler (280x200x19) and an engine oil cooler (280x189x37) from PWR, all powder coated black. Made some brackets and fitted them up. Only plumbed up the ps cooler at present, will do the engine oil later


Whilst cutting and shutting the original lines I plumbed up a drain point under the engine to make fluid changes mess free


There was a minor detour from the original braided hose plan. Didn't matter what combination of fittings I tried, I couldn't find anything that I thought looked ok.
So I bought a flaring tool and made up some 3/8" and 1/2" aluminium hard lines instead




Few bits sitting on the bench to go on yet. Billet clutch bottle


1 of these billet coolant overflow bottles


Billet rocker covers








Meziere electric billet water pump. Fitted it with a billet belt tensioner












Billet engine oil cooler adaptor and thermostat


Some random shots of the ute with my old man's '79 Trans Am












Slowly easing myself into the task of re-wiring the engine bay so everything is hidden, bit of a daunting task though but hopefully all goes well

Some interesting things amongst your post there Danny.
I've recently added a ASE billet power steer and LCW billet clutch reservoir to my collection along with a few other goodies.

Love the injection all polished up. Are you doing your own polishing or outsourcing?
It's a lot to stay on top of once your out and about driving the car. Although true of any shiny stuff!

Good luck with your wiring, big job but do-able.

Regards, Smooth

i think everyone already knows about it but my paint guy suggested i polish my alloy and spray por15 crystal clear over it to keep the shine,cheers

Thanks Smooth, I do all my own polishing, I'll attack the heads when the motor comes out for some extra cubes, should've done them while they were off but nevermind, things were also never to get this far, was originally just to be CAI, exhaust and mafless tune....... and here we are hahaha.
It's not too big of a job to keep on top of really, it doesn't get driven all that often. By far the worst though, is the wheels, they are terrible to keep up to scratch. I take them off for every wash to do inside them properly, there is a flat hollow section on the inside that the water sits in and when there's brake dust in there too, the water will start oxidising the alloy. Definitely wouldn't recommend them for even a once a fortnight car unless your real particular.

Serendipity, this clear coat you speak of, is it a proven and trusted product? Everything I've ever seen polished -or even natural finish aluminium- and clear coated ends up with a yellow tinge to it. Had a set of wheels once that were machine finished and cleared, water ended up behind the clear through imperfections (light stone ships) and sent oxidisation marks everywhere that couldn't be polished out due to the clear being in the way. In the end I stripped the wheels with paint stripper just to clean them up, and didn't bother with clear afterwards.

That is one incredible looking ute mate, you are doing an amazing job, well done!

Love all the bling, it looks amazing!

Keep up the good work, I will be watching your build with interest.

Cheers,
Karl.

time for a minor update. around this time last year I decided I'd do a quick easy job of moving my coil packs, fitting the new rocker covers and keep cruising. idea's changed, started heading down the full wiring hide job in the engine bay, discovered quickly I hate wiring, lost interest, and didn't touch it for a good 10 months. suddenly found some motivation a the past few weeks and have been plodding along with finishing what was started.

first up was removing the coil packs and brackets




made these brackets over a weekend once I'd sussed out a new piece of real estate for them



tucked alongside the gearbox





to secure them I made these little plates up, welded the countersunk M6 screws in and they sit under the carpet so I have 2 studs poking through on the other side



passenger side first, undone every plug on the wiring going through the passenger side hole in the firewall(a/c, O2 sensors, numerous gearbox gadgets, both injector harnesses etc), can see here the wiring coming from the back and running forward of the motor



and ended up with this little mess



got side tracked and changed over some fuel fittings I haven't been happy with since putting them on

got all the passenger side wiring inside



attacked the computer with a grinder so it fits nicely inside the passenger kick panel





rocker covers didn't have breather holes so they got drilled and tapped into the rear of them



welded in some baffles to try stop the oil getting out







oil fill point is now at the back on the passenger side

Some neat work there, looking much cleaner. Well done.

Regards, Smooth  

Great work Danny.

Looks a million bucks.

 

Love your Work and your Ride Danny!   

I can't believe I didn't see this thread sooner.   

cheers for the kind words.

here's 2 little video's from a while back   :

so a bit of progress has been made. got these gauges:



had Eastside trim the pod in the same suede used in the interior



stripped back the supplied water neck that came on the pump



cut down accordingly so the top radiator hose ran parallel with the radiator, machined a little locator so all was straight as possible when shoved inside for tacking -20 fitting on





welded that together, machined smooth and polished



the start of the new piece to replace original thermostat housing:



welded another -20 onto that



followed by some more machining



o-ring fitted



entire engine loom got the chop and lengthened by approx. 1.2 metres plus a few bits and pieces. it now runs from the computer mounted in the kick panel, around the passenger foot well, through the trans tunnel and forward to the back of the engine. this removes that foot or so of wiring from the firewall that Woopsie me to tears



made an aluminium catch can, sits under the tail shaft mounted via a bit of steel bolted to the modified gearbox-cat converter bracket

got myself a custom radiator, core is a pwr 55mm 16FPI unit, -20 main hose fittings, billet water neck 14" skew blade SPAL fans, custom shroud

mounted and plumbed up engine oil thermostat



made a bracket to mount the overflow bottle up through the standard hole the vz's use for their bottle, all mounting hardware is underneath out of sight. this will change to something a bit better when the time comes







wasn't 100% happy with some things on the radiator so a bit of cutting and welding ended with 1/4" hardlines for overflow and steam bleed. the steam bleed is underneath the filler neck obviously





steam bleed on engine, back one's are now hooked up also



coolant hoses done, just realised there's no shots of the new 'thermostat housing' finished, will sound that out later



plenty of other little things have gone on but none really worth mentioning

Sweet work there!
Looking awesome, keep at it.

Regards, Smooth