Thread: One Way To Build A '32 Hyboy

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Looking back at your pictures it does not look like you have the same thermostat housing that the LS1 has, but this may work. I got this tip from one of the LS1-LS6 build books, I can find it when I get home tonight. Original Gen III motors had the thermostat build into the housing and had a wax motor that open and closed it. You can easiliy take it a part and place a spacer in the mechanism that will cause it to open sooner. It does not hold it open. On the one I messed with, I used an 1/8" ferrell from a compression fitting and sanded it down to the recommended thickness (it's in the book I will find tonight) and this was supposed to have the thermostat open at about 170 degrees. I ended up not using it because the housing routed my lower house in a way I could not use. I found a different housing that actually uses standard Chevy thermostats and stuck a 180 in there and that works perfect. Enough rambling, I just wanted you to know that these thermostats can be manipulated. Also I believe in the later Gen IV motors they changed the design to have a more easily changed stat.

Pat

Ken that shock absorber incident could have been much worse. Glad to hear you came out of it unscathed. Creative solutions to the heating! Still working on engine install, it fit alot better with the wrong mounts and angle!

Ken, really sorry to hear about your problem but glad it didn't turn out worse. In a strange kinda way it is good that you have posted this though, because it points out that no matter how we engineer our rods, things can happen. That is why I post all the good stuff that happens to me when building a car and also some of the bad things that rear their ugly heads from time to time. It is all part of the game, and those who are just starting in this hobby need to understand that and not get discouraged...................you fix them and move on.

Let's face it, we take a bunch of parts that were never designed to work together and mate them into a running, driving creation, and we do it without the benefit of engineering degrees (well, some of us anyway ) and without millions of dollars worth of equipment and years of R and D time. The fact any of them go down the road is pretty amazing.

Thanks for posting that story. I bet you have helped more people than you know.

Don

Ken, I'm glad nothing happened to you and only a minor amount of damage to the car. It just reminds me that I need to give mine one or two more passes with a handful of wrenches before I finally start driving it in another month or so. Just today, I found that my battery box hold down thru frame bolts had no nuts and my electric radiator fan was connected to a dead terminal on my AAW module - so there are probably more gotchas.