E88 LSx

[Petro135]

I know there are more and more of these swapped bmw's on the road now. Its nothing new really but I wanted to do an in depth thread about everything I do to this car. I like to go back and see what I did and when.
All I've done so far is collect parts, motor is done being built, get my e88 ready and do some preliminary work. I've already collected a ton of pics and I'd like to delete some. So here we go. A couple things I have no idea about yet like exhaust and my driveshaft and diff and how I'm gonna get this turbo in without cutting a hole in my hood(im definitely cutting a hole in my hood lol)

Start with my car as it sits now and my motor.
Started as a gen4 LY2 a 4.8l out of a wrecked truck w 70k miles. Comes with 799 cathedral heads. The cam bearings were iffy when I went to change the cam out. So I decided since I'm taking it apart I might as well do everything inside now.
Since 4.8l and 5.3l use same block. I got the longer 5.3l forged rods and oversized forged pistons, and got a 5.3l crank. Sent it all off to machine shop. They bored it .030 over so now it's a 5.7l . They put new cam bearings and steam cleaned the heads and block and balanced everything also decked the mating surfaces on heads and block.
Scat rods
Summit pro LS pistons and rings
King main and rod bearings
Btr stg 2 turbo cam
Btr rocker trunnion kit
Btr springs and titanium retainers
Oem ls7 lifters
Trick flow push rods
Rollmaster timing chain
Melling oil pump
Also did arp cap bolts and since arp headstuds were backordered I went with arp bolts

Transmission is a 4l80 a Circle D 3000-3200 torque converter and a shift kit upgrade. Trans only had 50k miles on it but was totally covered in mud. So I washed it pretty good, didn't go crazy. Didn't paint the heads or the tranny but I did put a couple coats of black on the block.
Did a full valve job but kept oem valves

[Petro135]

Sorry about the sideways and upside down pics. Not sure why.
Next I got a bunch of parts from lse9x.com
And watched all his videos... a few times
Motor Mounts
Accessories bracket
Shifter adapter to make my oem shifter work with the 4l80
Can box to make my speedo and rpm's work and also changes the oil temp gauge into a coolant temp gauge
The holley terminator x max ecu
Also had to take apart and adjust the holley harness to run some different wires and make a Deutch plug for the drive by wires and to the can box to make everything work together

[Petro135]

Next I'm doing flex fuel. And I'm trying something I'm not sure will work. I got 2 pumps in my lpfp bucket and 450 and 525. Also using an ekp bypass. The 2nd pump I was running off a Hobbs switch I will change so the holley will run it and it's easier to change if need be.
So the 2 pumps will run to this upgraded and adjustable regulator in the other side of tank. To an 8an hose upto a 12" 10 micron filter and ethanol.sensor with an bypass to not have a bottleneck. Then I will run an inline high pressure pump to fuel rails. There is no plan for a fuel return but that may change

[Petro135]

Bought an ebay turbo manifold that I know fits and a Summit intercooler and a 3"ic piping kit. See if it works
Also picked up an enormous turbo. Lol a t4 85mm vsr I believe it's an 8588 and 1.25 ar. It seems that it will stick up about 4" through the hood. I can cut down the manifold some and try to make it fit but if I gotta cut a hole anyway ill probably just leave it as is.
Got a sheet metal intake manifold w 102mm Throttlebody and the got some 2200cc flow matched bosch injectors
Should make this all go nice.
That's where I'm at.
Next up I gotta cut out a couple small spots in my tunnel for the trans cooler lines and main trans harness plug to fit in there. And drop engine and trans in, so I can measure for the driveshaft, get the holley harness installed and figure out a downpipe and exhaust and get the accessories and pulleys on. I will take more pics

[jkirk454]

This is such a cool project

[Petro135]

So after a long wait I'm finally starting this project up again. I finally got some lift time, all I needed was 1 afternoon but my buddy was catching up with lots of other projects. Anyway its time.
So I had cut out part of my tunnel a 1ft section on the passenger side and a 4in section on my driverside. To fit the 4l80 in. I also got a trans plug relocation ring from lse90 and had to weld it into the trans pan. It would not fit in the oem pan so I had to scramble to get a steel pan and found this shiny one for just $110 on jegs. Cheap and works fine. And lowering the trans plug it fit perfectly. Got the flex plate on and mounts ready and had major issues with the banjo fittings for the trans cooler. Bought 4 different kinds and none threaded properly. So I got an aluminum straight -an fitting and was ready to weld it to trans but I remembered I had a vibrant banjo I never tried had better thicker threads on it. It fit perfect. So I got the fittings on and the -an hoses connected before dropping it in to make it much easier. Now its ready to drop in

[Petro135]

No idea why some of my pics come upside down. I'm holding my phone straight up when I take them. Pisses me off.
Anyway also had to weld on a turbo oil drain in my oil pan. That is a poormans performance low profile pan. And I left it with a friend to weld, because I'm afraid of welding aluminum and he welded it on the wrong side. Lol. It's ok though I'll figure it out.
The engine/trans went in in like 20 min. It was so easy and with the adjustable mounts I just slid them back over the bolts and dropped it down. The lse9x stuff fits perfectly. That's it for now. Motor in and bolted down. The car is coming back to my house tomorrow to start putting the holley on and the manifolds and all the goodies. Can't wait. I hope to be real.close by the end of next weekend. My time constraints I only have 1 day a week to work on this, hope next weekend I get 2 days

[Petro135]

So another day I had a few hours to get something done. Anything is progress.
Got holley terminator x max wired today. Pretty easy, I had it to plug bmw side and LS side into a Deutch plug, but that plug was so annoying I cut all the pins off the wires and just soldered and shrinked them together. You can see my of bmw vs ls connections I needed to make. Since I'm automatic I had the drive by wires to connect. This all came off the Grey bmw connector plug. 2 browns, 2 yellows get tied together. 2 white wires are individual. They go to the 4 dbw from the holley trans harness.which I had to cut the plug off. Others are fan wire, key on power, brake pedal, flex fuel and something else I'm forgetting.
The smaller white plug in the dme had brake signal and the bigger black wire is the starter wire.
Flex fuel harness plugs into the holley power tap. Then goes around to alternator control. I will reuse the bmw power.cable and flip it over and go from alternator to starter to power post under the hood.
I still have several wires to put ring connectors on and run to the under the hood power and ground as well.
The rest is test fitting manifold and turbo. The driver side need to be dented pretty good to clear the steering knuckle. The turbo side works but.that huge turbo sticks up too far and interferes with my heater hoses and lower radiator hose. I can make it work and cut a big hole in the hood. But I think I might be able to cut and reweld the neck of the manifold to make it fit better. Could definitely come down a few inches and out a few more as well. Now I got it all in and to fit, I will take it all off and organize the holley wires better and do any refitting and resizing.
Next is driver side, accessories, fuel system, intake, sensors and initial plumbing

[Petro135]

Another day to get some work done.
Today I changed the alternator pulley to a 3".
Accessories bracket is done, uses bmw power steering pump, the 220v alternator, an idler, the water pump and the tensioner is up on the top passenger side. I'll measure for belt tomorrow.
Also ran the holley plugs to the lower knock sensors, cam sensor under the waterpump, crank sensor, coolant temp sensor, and I need to buy an adapter to got from 1 bar to 3 bar map sensor.
The speed sensors on the trans are not accessible now. I'm gonna have to lower the trans to get them plugged in.
Did the intake, ran a 1/8" to the Hobbs switch, and a 1/4" from underneath to go to a vacuum block.
I set up the throttlebody but I'm taking it back off to drill in a couple meth nozzles.
The coolant hoses for the heaters are run across the subframe and connect with the hoses coming out of firewall on drivers side. The steam ports I planned to run to the overflow on the oem coolant tank but I can't fit either the oem, or the 335d tank I have. So I'm going to do something else smaller and wait until I see if I have enough room and where. I also pulled out the a/c lines. I'm not doing a/c it's too much with the big turbo and the front crossover I want to do. Plus I have a vert, I rarely used it and it runs pretty weakly anyway.
Next up is fuel system, I'm waiting on the proper quick disconnect, I bought the wrong one. Gotta put in the starter.
Biggest setback is I'm not happy with the manifold I have for turbo. I'm going to cut and weld the truck manifolds that came with my engine. Which I'm ordering all the stuff for that this week.
Still have not secured a proper driveshaft.
That's it for now. Gotta reorganize everything. I started very organized and now everything is all over the place. Spend too much time looking for stuff.
And I ha e to put the front clip together so I can finish the coolant system and see where I'm putting that turbo

[4JawChuck]

Nice work, I seriously considered this option but I would miss the six speed and couldn’t not put in the 6.0L which I’m sure would lunch that little rear pumpkin.

Looking forward to seeing it running and laying rubber!

[blue135]

Good luck. Impressive build - especially the 220v alternator. Probably will fry a battery or two along the way.

[Petro135]

Originally Posted by 4JawChuck

Nice work, I seriously considered this option but I would miss the six speed and couldn’t not put in the 6.0L which I’m sure would lunch that little rear pumpkin.

Looking forward to seeing it running and laying rubber!

Thanks, I'm seeing my rebuilt diff w the racing diffs lsd is moist, I'm guessing I screwed up some seal or something. A Ford 8.8 is cheap aside from the axles. Get new lsd, gears, bmw conversion bracket and a used pumpkin for under $700. But the only axles for it are $2200, yikes!!!

[houtan]

I had no idea you had started a thread on this conversion. Nice job! Looking forward to seeing your progress.

[Petro135]

Originally Posted by houtan

I had no idea you had started a thread on this conversion. Nice job! Looking forward to seeing your progress.

Hey Houtan yea it's happening. Glad to see your still around. I'm getting closer and closer to first start!!

[A97syclone]

Nice!
which wire kits did you get for this from LSE90?
I'm kinda confused which ones to get with flex fuel.
1. CAN adapter
2. DME breakout
3. Terminator X harness post 03/07
4. Flex/alt combo harness
5. EKP bypass harness
all of these needed?

[Petro135]

Originally Posted by A97syclone

Nice!
which wire kits did you get for this from LSE90?
I'm kinda confused which ones to get with flex fuel.
1. CAN adapter
2. DME breakout
3. Terminator X harness post 03/07
4. Flex/alt combo harness
5. EKP bypass harness
all of these needed?

I didnt use the dme breakout, I just spliced into the Grey dme plug and 2 wires off the white smaller plug. The ekp bypass is not necessary, I bought it because I didn't realized I won't be over taxing my epk3. I'm running 1 pump off the car like normal, 1 off a Hobbs switch and the inline pump will run off the holley. But I bought it so I'm going to use it.
One of the 4 input wires on the holley harness is for the sloppy mechanics flex harness which is good because that also connects the alternator to the holley. The can adapter you need if going oem cluster to make the rpm's work and also changes the oil temp gauge to a coolant temp gauge.
The holley harness has everything on it for injectors and coils and map and sensors. It's a good setup. I'm auto 4l80 trans so I had to get the one with the trans harness as well the x max

[Petro135]

I been slacking on this. Every job but 1 or 2 is waiting for me to get the manifolds in and turbo fitted so I can make sure everything has a space to squeeze through.
So I own a good tig welder, can't weld for shit though lol. So I'm teaching myself and practicing on other metal as I go.
So since these manifolds go on any way, upsidedown on opposite sides any where. I ended up fitting 2 passenger side manifolds. Found another on ebay for $40 shipped. Turbo side will be flipped upside down, the driver side will be passenger side but backwards.lmao!!! That puts my vband for the xover pipe right under the accessories brackets and I had to tap the 45 fitting on the power steering pump to point up a bit. Lucky that moves. There is a pic of where it comes out. I also cut off the heat shields and bolt and e Tra metal where they screwed in. They were hanging up on everything and wouldn't have cleared steering column either. I welded on a 2.25" vband(don't laugh at my welds). I tacked on the 3"vband for the t4 elbow adapter. But I have to cut some fill in metal around the sides and weld it all up, and because again i cant weld for shit im gonna have to do some grinding but that's where she goes. I think it's an 88/96 turbo and if I put the in the right spot I will get the hood to close, but the compressor will be touching my hood, and i already pulled the insulation down. Say goodbye to my hood wrap.

[Petro135]

This is some new stuff I got.
I'm going 3" downpipe to straight 3" pipe to a 3" magnaflow muffler and to keep the oem appearance I got this 2-2.50" tips. But I'm putting a vband just before the muffler so I can easily drop it off and run open.

[Petro135]

So it's been awhile since I updated. I scratched the cornea in my eye and 5 weeks later I still can see real well. My biggest job is welding and I tried last week and my eye burned for the whole night. So I'm putting the xover on the back burner it's 1/2 done. But the eye is good enough now I can do other stuff so back at it. My buddy may come and finish the welding for me next weekend.
I have the oem bmw shifter in place so I got the bracket for that to a 4l80 from lse9x.com, where I got most everything else. Then I got a shorter lever piece for it this will allow me to get into 3rd and OD really the only 2 gears I need since the holley allows me to adjust what rpm each gear shifts at.

All the stuff for the ford 8.8 is here.
Slg gforce axles arrived today, still haven't unpacked them, pricey $2200
8.8 I got for $240 delivered
Ford tracklock lsd was $250
New bearings and seals $80
Lse9x 8.8 mount kit $290
Aluminum driveshaft made locally for $550
Pieced together it's $2k less than sounds legit garage kit and it has a stronger diff mount than they offer.
I also bought solid bushings but I'm not using them since the ones in the diff look brand new.
The fuel system is in place. I just have to wait until I drop the diff so I can drop the fuel tank down a bit to run the hoses.
450and 525 in lpfp pumps to driverside. 8an runs to filter and inline pump and eth sensor and bypass, up to intake, past the low doller pressure sensor. Into the rail.which goes to other rail, then 8an hose all the way back to lpfp which I added and 8an bulkhead fitting to.
Should work, hopefully no leaks. Also a1/4" vacuum line runs from regulator back up to the vacuum block I'm adding.
All these jobs are 1/2 done. Lol my few hours a week I get in the garage needs to be more productive

[houtan]

any updates?