vvv90

Well, I haven't gotten very far for for anyone who cares I'll post any info about what I have done.

So far I'm a couple hours into it and I haven't gotten too much done. Here's what I've done so far and my opinions about each step.

1. I pulled the Fuel pump fuse and ran the car until it died. No problems finding the fuse call "F.P." on the passenger door fuse panel. Then pulled the neg. battery cable.

2. I put my stock chip back in my ECM. Piece of cake.

3. Getting enough force on the tensioner is a pain but I finally was able to pry the old belt off. I'll have to find a better way get more leverage on the tensioner to get the new one on I'm sure.

4. Gladly ripped off the ol' intake/air filter off. Piece of cake

5. Installed the FMU. Totally easy. Only problem is the bracket for the FMU was too wide for the bolt hole. Nothing a grinder couldn't fix. Up till now I think the directions aren't too bad. But.....

6. ....I went to install the Aux fuel pump and I gotta say the instructions here get lazy to say the least. Once I finally figured out how to mount the F.P. bracket to the brace behind the license plate, I now have agree with what people have been saying about the cheezy-ness of these brackets from ATI. I can't believe the damn thing is held on by washers. Oh well. Once I figured it out it wasn't too bad.

That's it for today. I just ordered a new Optispark and vent kit and I have a brand new water pump waiting to go on.

Now I need to order plugs and wires.

Thanks to everyone who's helped so far! :cheers:

krivera

Well it is not that bad of an install...and yes the instructions are kind of weak but i mean come on if you cant figure it out you should not be working on your car...thats what i have told people! Yes, Vortech's instructions are good and brackets but when it is all said and done it is about the performance increase that matters...yes prochargers instructions and other stuff is not so clear but i tell you what when you put the smack down on a car the has a vortech you will understand that just because it looks pretty (vortech products) does not mean it is fast! just like my friends get chrome and stickers i am i say "does all that chrome and stickers make your car faster, because if it doesn then i want some"! So keep all that in mind when you get upset or grumpy...how much fun you will be having when you hear that sucker whinning down the street and everyone is breaking there neck looking at your car!!!!!!!

vvv90

:iagree:

krivera

Did you go with a D-1 or P1 or what model? And did you get the loud version or soft version when it comes to sound?

SPD DMN

Easiest way is to put a 5/8" wrench on it with the closed side on the tensioner and the open end up. Take a larger wrench and put the closed end onto the open end of the 5/8". Gives you twice as much leverage and makes removing that belt a breeze. Just wait till you get to putting on that blower belt for the first time ;).

I am envious you are putting on a blower...as I have always said, one of these days. Already have the wife talked into letting me get the new set of heads to lower the compression down to 9:1. ;) Just gotta get the cash for the kit after that! Maybe by this time next year. I am patient.

CT95ATLANTA

Be sure when you get it all together you look for KR signals from your Knock Sensor and if you have any at all immediately go to a dyno facility and pay a few coins for a tuning session.......factory LT1 pistons don't like detonation.

vvv90

:yesnod: :iagree: :yesnod:

The first time out of the garage I'm going to the dyno. I'm not taking chances after all the horror stories I've heard. I'm also going with the coldest plugs I can get and getting all the guages I need to keep track of my setup. Which reminds me I need to start finding the pod and guages.

vvv90

UPDATE 03/31/03

DOH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :mad :mad I'm such a Dolt! !$@#^%@

I went to connect the new fuel pump relay to the pump and I snapped off the neg. terminal post!!! I guess I don't know my own strength. I was going to solder it on but I called ATI and they're shipping me a new one by Thursday. They were SOOOO cool about it. No arguements or anything. They're not charging me anything. So far, no problems with ATI support.........so far that is. :skep:

vvv90

I went with the P1-SC. The D1 would've provided at least 10psi which is too much to start. Plus, the P1 comes with the fuel pump and fmu. The P1-SC can be upgrade to a D1-SC later.....for a G note. Oh well. What I would recommend to someone is spend that extra G up front for new heads to lower the compression, and start with the D1 instead.

1_piece_at_a_time

Sounds like things are going good for you(besides the broken terminal). I understand what you're going through, I just finished my installation a week ago and haven't been able to wipe this disgusting grin off my face since. :) It wasn't as difficult as some people had said it would be and that was a surprise because none of it belongs under the hood of my 84. It went rather smooth, all things considered. Get the wires on before the supercharger, I didn't and that was a mistake. Don't be surprised if the supercharger isn't clocked right for installation, mine wasn't and I've talked to another guy that had the same problem. It's a simple fix.

One comforting thought for you.....The product is as good as the instructions are bad. The instructions are a joke, but like KRIVERA said, if you don't have the apptitude you shouldn't be trying this. I had a blast doing it, just use the instructions as a rough guideline and figure the rest out for yourself. Have fun! Besides, if you get in a bind, there's lots of help here. This is a great group of people with a huge amount of accumulated knowledge that they're not shy about sharing. :cheers:

JIM

:flag

krivera

Jim is right...putting it together is fun and when you pop your hood for people they will be amazed you did it yourself!

vvv90

UPDATE 04/01/03

I FINISHED LAST NIGHT!! Here are some pics........April Fools!

Well, I did do a little work last night, but not exactly on the blower. I removed the waterpump slated for replacement and next the Opti. I figured since I don't care who you are, if you're going to install this blower you should replace both of these items. I'll give status on this as well.



Yech! What a mess. Replacing a waterpump is awefully messy!



Now I know why I had a coolant leak! I also now know where the damn grinding noise was coming from. When I spun the Dingus I could hear the grinding and metal shavings were coming off on fingers.



MAN! I have a lot of engine detailing to do. It's hard to believe that's with only 50k miles. I'd hate to see it at 100! Opti! Your days are numbered. Prepare for the shock and awe of my 10 pound sledge! :reddevil



FMU-momma! Woohoo! I just love the look of this Billett Beauty! You can sorta see towards the lower left near the rusty bolt that I had to grind down the bracket so the bolt hole would line up and fit closer to the relay. A grinder is perfect for this. :yesnod:



DOH! you can see where I busted off the neg. terminal. I still was able to thread the nut on a couple threads but only without the washer. I'm not taking any chances. The new one should be here tonight and I promise to put it in with a little more finesse this time! :cry



Ha! an entire 3 car garage taken up by one car. At least it's a worthy car. I take Vette'n seriously.

Until next time! I'll post pics of the venting-of-a-new-opti process!

krivera

looks good keep us posted and becareful! :party:

vvv90

O.k. I'm back. Sorry guys but this is a slow boat to China. I'm having a Memorial day BBQ and I've gotta get my basement finished! I know it sounds stupid but having a cool car is only as cool as the pad you have to bring chicks back to. ANYWAY, I've finished venting the Opti. Not that bad but it took a while because I found the C4 tech tips on this SUCKS!! It's very misleading not informative enough, AND says you need to buy a newer style cap. NOT TRUE!!! Just modify the one you have. I used a hybrid method of two different ways but in all it's pretty much common sense. The biggest tips I can give before you do a venting of an opti is make SURE you have enough clearance for the vacuum fittings before you try to make modifications. Otherwise you'll hit the hub on the crank. You might want to buy some fittings and do a practice venting on your old one. Also make sure you find a T5 torx driver AND most importantly a T15 reverse torx DEEP WELL socket. The tips I found told to use permatex to connect the fittings to the opti. BS! use JB weld, it's much stronger. Also, use a soldering iron to make a hole in the cap. From what I've been told a drill might crack the cap.

If you can see the socket on the 1/4" wrench is a regular or NON-deep well socket. I used my grinder to narrow or taper the shaft. That worked fine too. Got it at Sears by the way.



I started by removing the cap.



Then remove the rotor. This is where the T5 torx driver comes in. I had to make yet another trip to Sears once I removed to cap to discover these microscopic MotherF%#$ers!



The metal plates and disc fall right off. There's nothing else to take apart at this point. It's also practically impossible to not put the thing back together properly. (As long as you don't forget any pieces) Everything is keyed so it only goes in one way. Including the drive on the opti unit to the engine block.



I had to use a .207 drill bit. Just make sure the drill bit you use is big enough to stuff the vacuum fitting into without compromising the integrity of the aluminum case of the opti. I used JB weld to fill the remaining holes.



Here's where I messed up. I eventually had to remove this fitting, JB weld the hole, and then make a new fitting closer to the right bank of plug wire holes. The hub came almost right up to the bottom of the opti. DOH!!!



I was told to put some Permatex on the electrical fitting. I can see why. No big deal.



Well, that's it. I have a few more pics but I think I've bored you enough. The opti goes back together pretty straight foreward. Just don't overtighten the screws that hold the cap on. You'll strip the aluminum threads really easily......Not that I did that or anything. :leaving:

About the blower now. I got my replacement fuel pump from ATI and installed it. Piece of cake. (once I had the stupid bracket on anyway) I fed the power wire from the pump to the power terminal behind the battery and installed the inline fuse. Very straight foreward. It was a little difficult to feed the wire snug around the wheel well, so I had to remove the 4 screws in the wheel well to push the wire up in there. No big deal really.

I removed my coil and power steering reservoir. Pretty easy. I should mention, however, the next couple of steps were made easy because the water pump and opti are not in the car. Especially for the power steering line cut. Yet another reason to replace these 2 components when installing an ATI blower. Just make sure you loosen all the bolts that hold the reservoir on before you take off any of them. You'll figure out why the hard way if you don't. Also, there's two hoses that connect to the power streering reservoir. The "hard lined" one comes off will a little muscle. the other one which connects to the rack and pinion needs to come off by jambing a screw driver under it. In order to do this remove the reservoir from the block first and that will allow you to flip it on it's side to get the hose off. (fluid will go everywhere. You might want to wait before you detail your engine compartment until after this step.)

Lastly, I modified the "hard line" for the power streering pump reservoir. This is a long tube that goes from the passenger side (where the reservoir is) to the pump which is on the drivers side. the pipe needs to be cut. It's a piece of cake. Go to home depot and for $25 you can buy a 1/2" - 3/4" copper pipe cutter. Use it and then return it. :D

That's all for now. Sorry about the lack of pictures for the previous steps but it's really not necessary. I probably won't be back for a while, but I WILL get this damn thing done!

Later :cheers:


[Modified by vvv90, 11:52 AM 4/25/2003]


[Modified by vvv90, 11:54 AM 4/25/2003]


[Modified by vvv90, 12:11 PM 4/25/2003]

vvv90

Alright I'm back at it again. No pictures because I'm starting to get anxious and I don't even want to take the time to wash my hands and snap a few, but I will soon I promise.

O.k. Here's the latest as of last Saturday.

I relocated my Accumulator and I thought this was going to be harder than it really was.

First off I should say the instructions blooooooooooow for this step. I found if you study the picture reeeeally good you can see exactly where the accumulator is supposed to move to. Because they don't say where. They just say "drill two holes in your cross member and mount the new bracket" ..... Frickin' Duh!!!

Anyway....

Step 1. 1.5" wrench (which is the biggest I had) easily removed the fitting connecting the hose to the evaporator on the passenger side. getting the fitting off of the accumulator was a bear so I removed the fitting on the other side of the accumulator and easily took the whole thing out so I could get a better handle on it. I finally got it off. I re-installed the fitting from the compressor and installed the new line for the evaporator. Wallah!

Step 2. (This wasn't in the instructions, big surprise :rolleyes: ) I had to remove the bolt on the driver's side holding down the powersteering line from the rack to the pump on top of the cross member.



This allowed me to drill 2 holes for the new accumulator bracket. I jammed the accumulator between the crossmember and the radiator fans and the bottom of the bracket seems to rest on the sway bar :eek: I hope this isn't a problem. Oh well, the accumulator sits about 1/2" above the bottom of the bracket but it's not going ANYWHERE :D

Step 3. I removed the passenger side lower radiator hose and cut it accordingly. Piece of cake.



Step 4. INSTALLING THE BLOWER BRACKET!!! ..... sorry not yet. I WILL get pictures for this. I had to install my new Opti.

Step5. New opti. WHAT A PAIN IN THE ****! The spline only goes in one way but I found if you mount the new spile in the timing chain cover and then use the old spline from the old opti to line up the opti side you can get it in easier.

Step6. DOH! I should really replace the seals for the new waterpump and opti. Out comes the opti and I have to get seals from the General.

Step7. I started replacing the spark plugs. VERY IMPORTANT. In the front of the instructions they mention getting new COPPER plugs, BUT they don't mention the gap until the veeeeeery end of the instruction book, where you're most likely to already be done with everything. MAKE SURE YOU GAP AT .035" not .050" like the shop manual says.

That's it. I'll get pics tomorrow.


[Modified by vvv90, 11:12 AM 6/9/2003]

krivera

MATT

Sounds like you had a lot of fun...yeah the instructions are not that good but in a way i kind of like them like that give me more of a challange. i was board one day and actually read the whole manual front to back while waitng on my girl to get ready and there is alot of stuff i cant believe was done right or i dont remember? But it is a fun journey and hope to see some pics! :cheers:

vvv90

Believe it or not I actually am having fun doing this. There's a formula to it.

1. Document your steps

2. Drink BEERS! :cheers:

3. If something seems hard, it's probably because I'm not doing it right or there's a better way to do it.

Stick to that and the rest comes down to time. (things I've learned) :thumbs:

krivera

yeah maybe the guys at ATI were drunk when they wrote the directions! or maybe hung over? :U

black bart

While your at it install a MSD Digital 6 or 7 on that thing.
:yesnod: :yesnod: :yesnod:

ANUTT

You bring back many memories to my 20 hour install process. Just wait until you have to cut that hole in the radiator shroud so the intercooler can get its cool down air. I recommend a air driven cut off wheel. If you still have stock injectors you will probably experience injector lock up and may have to upgrade. I had to. Keep us posted and have fun