It's been awhile I know, a lot of things have been going on and I haven't had much time to work with the car. I do have a couple of updates to post though, and I promise this build is still very much alive. First, while I had everything apart, I decided the factory intake manifold was too boring so cleaned it up, taped it up, and painted it up.

before:



And after:





Better don't ya think?
As always sorry for the image quality, still shooting with my phone, lol.

The oil pan has been a bit of a head ache, as the crank position sensor is located in a goofy place on the Beams' stock pan. I had picked up a 5S-FE pan awhile ago knowing I would have to modify it so this is where I am currently.

The first thing I had to do was created a template for the indentation for the CPS:



To make this peice of super advanced cardboard technology, I just coated the Beams pan with oil, laid on the cardboard and cut it out accordingly. placing this over the 5S pan showed what needed to be done:



I took some measurements to see how far down I needed to drop for the CAS and decided to build a "shelf" on the pan to accomidate the sensor:





I know this will never win any awards for pretty fabrication, but the goal was to make damn sure it didn't leak. Besides, this will be hidden away behind the CPS at the bottom of the motor. This is as far as I have gotten on the pan currently. I still have to make a pick up tube, rework the Beams oil baffle to fit this pan and graft in a dip stick, so more on this to come for sure.

Lastly, I got something started to day that I am pretty excited about: the motor mounts. Mounting has been another major issue since the beginning of this. Our previous plans kept falling through as we ran into more and more complications and fab time kept increasing. So finally, last week I decide i had had enough. I hit up summit and got a set of Universal Small Block Chevy mounts. These are hinged so with some modifications to the faces, these will bolt up and weld in, plus they are not solid.




The second plates you see behind them will be welded on and provide the rest of the mounting needed.

With these set up to be welded this week, hopefully the motor will be in soon, which will be a huge weight off of my shoulders. That is, until we start to straighten out the steering rack location, lol.

Until next time!