i figured as much. . . .

 

i love detailing the inside of my car. lol, since the exterior is far from perfect and the interior is almost 99 % perfect it looks much better

 

Chuckled a little when I read that, thinking about something I saw today. I was just looking at a few year old PAS magazine today (I save all my back copies to flip through the cars again later)- and they had a feature on a GM Racing Sunfire with a "1100+" horsepower Ecotec still FWD. In the article they boasted about how great the 4t65e was, and how it has been 100% reliable thus far and is more than 80% stock.

That made me laugh pretty hard. I know they're not lying- I've got a copy of the build/parts guide for their trans, and I know the stupid low race weight and other track-only parts help out tremendously- however, it does make me think about priorities. They put all kinds of money into building/helping build this crazy drag car to make it so reliable and fast, yet they can't manage to build a daily driver 4t65 that can support a measly 300 horsepower from an LS4 for 50k miles of street use? (just throwing that number out there- mostly commenting about all the failures people have well under 100k miles). If you're going to brag about it being so similar, then why not funnel some of the testing/failure knowledge from the race team down into parts that would make the stock trans actually last 100k miles behind a stock engine.... Also, they need to stop hiding behind the 'abuse' clause to try and side-step warranty replacements- its a performance car, of course it is going to be run at WOT- if the people buying it didn't want all the power, they would've bought a base model engine. If nothing else, I'd think they'd plan for the performance models to be abused a good deal more than their base model counterparts. /rant

 

Since I was in this thread browsing anyways, I figured I may as well add something constructive, even though most people on here have probably heard all of this 1000 times.


My monte is a 96 LS that my parents bought brand new off the showroom floor. I got it when I turned 16, and it had about 30k miles or so on it. I got started into modding, and did all the usual 16 year old kid stuff- blue vinyl racing stripes, a huge blue vinyl bowtie on the side of the car, hot air intake cone filter, glasspack exhaust, big 4" chrome tip, 16" chrome wheels (back when 16"s were cool since the stock ones were 15"s), tint, and a minor sound system (started with 2 10" pioneers suspended below the rear deck 6x9 holes).- eventually even moving to adding a big aluminum fast & furious wing (probably the one mod I wish I had never done since now I still have to repair the 4x drilled holes and denting in the trunk lid).

Got a little older, and a little wiser, and got rid of some of the kiddy stuff, and made a little more progress with the sound system- eventually ending up with a Directed 1100d running a pair of 12" Earthquakes in a nice ported box, with a matching Directed 250 4 channel on a real slick, neon lit amp rack behind the flip down seats- running Hifonics 6x9's out back and some Pioneer Rev series 6.5" front speakers, custom mounted.

I went off to college, and my wife (girlfriend at the time), ended up using it as her DD for a year (since she had an old 90 Ford Probe, and I knew the monte would be more reliable for making the hour or so drive down to college to hang out on weekends and such. My wife moved down to college the year after, and that is when I got my 00 Impala so we each had a car (didn't have to drive much anyways being in walking distance of school and having the great local bus system).

Got a little more into sound systems, especially working at a sound shop during the summer- and ended up replacing the sub amp with an Earthquake D2 (then eventually to a D3)- and replaced the subs with Hurricane Powerstrokes (and eventually to Atomic ELE's). Upgraded the main amp to an Earthquake 2200.4, and started replacing the main speakers with Massive 6.5" coaxial/component sets (carbon fiber/kevlar woofer and full external crossover box). Also got into fiberglass work at the sound shop, and started doing some custom work- like glassing in a TV in the center console, glassing the doors, and doing a custom rear deck. Also briefly built a rear seat replacement sub box that positioned the subs right behind your head in the seats- but sold it maybe a year or so later (I had built it more for looks than sound performance). Also added the BK body kit as well (installed the front/rear in our apartment parking lot, and the side skirts at Circuit City where I had started working- also ended up painting the front/rear at Circuit City too, lol. Pic from that time frame:



In college, I started to get more into performance and decided on swapping in an L67 (supercharged 3800). It seemed like the perfect fit- 99% bolt in/plug in- WAY more aftermarket than the old 3100 (she had almost 100k miles by that point anyways), relatively inexpensive, etc. Decided I wanted to do a pretty serious build before the swap, and started working on the engine on a stand in our apartment. The last 6 months of college, our lease was up and we couldn't renew (they only did year leases)- so we decided to move in with friends. I figured that I could not possibly move my engine/building area across town easily, so I decided that the swap needed to happen ASAP, even though I wasn't quite done with the build. Since we had to move shortly after finals (May-June), I decided the largest bulk of free time would be during Christmas break, before the semester started. So I borrowed a friend's truck, and another friend's garage- and did the swap. Ended up running into tons of issues, but it was an experience that I will NEVER forget.



When we moved in with our friends the next semester- I did a few more things- basic relocating items, and redid the rear suspension- powder coated rear frame member, disk brake conversion, coilovers, BMR bars, Z34 sways, etc- this is what it looked like back then:





After college, we moved back home with our parents- and I wasn't really driving the monte much anymore, except for fun every now and then. I did the whipple supercharger swap, but since I didn't have a garage, I couldn't get much done on her. Unfortunately, when I went out to PA for training for work, someone broke into the monte, and stole the whole sound system except for the main speakers (since they really couldn't undo all those screws much less get to the crossovers). I ended up being forced to stick her in a very secure storage unit clear across town, and only took her out once in a great while. (the bad thing is, I never really enjoyed the sound system, because I virtually never turned it on since I was afraid of it getting stolen)

We ended up moving across country (IN to AZ)- and she sat in storage back there for about 10 months, and I just moved her out here this past Thanksgiving once we got our own house. Honestly, I haven't had time to do much of anything to her since that point other than collect parts- too many projects going on with buying a house, and getting the garage 'ready'. Already collecting some parts for the next phases of the build- an oil filter relocation kit with adjustable pressure, 14" front brakes with 4 piston brembo calipers, an AC delete/alternator relocation bracket, a new whipple adapter with a built in IC (still working on getting a MUCH thicker core before I swap it in), also picked up an 01 camaro as well.

Where she sits now:




As for the future- the next major step will be the RWD conversion (using the aforementioned camaro ala John Moss monte conversion from GM)- the plan is using the huge IC core like the JonBob's/PRJ's whipple setup, switching to a larger custom cam, some T&D shaft rockers, aluminum valve covers, custom inlet adapter using a 90mm + TB as well as one of those cartridge style MAF sensors in a large tube, direct port nitrous up from the bottom of the LIM, bigger injectors (strongly considering E85 since there are now a few stations popping up around here), built T56 6 speed (currently researching adapter methods), and some new wheels with nice wide 300+mm tires out back. After that, the plan is to get the interior fixed up again, and go total custom- fiberglass/CF everything inside- all new dash, all new console, etc etc. Not sure if I'll stick a system back in due to past experiences or not. The last step will be moving to the exterior, and doing some custom body mods- slightly reshaping the front end body kit (considering doing a lightweight 1 piece front end, or maybe just a one piece fenders/front bumper assembly with a lift off hood)- and completely redoing the side skirts/rear bumper. Some fresh paint, and she should be good to go

thats a lot of talking about my monte....

 

very cool bumpin. and very detailed ive watched your videos of the monte running. i like lol. one question tho. is that hood custom?

 

No, there are places online that sell them for 5th gens both in bolt on, stock replacement style- and pin on style. I got mine used from a mymonte member in Chicago years ago.

 

your monte has come a long way cant wait to see it when its finished....wait, its a car, its NEVER finished

 

holy ****!!

that right there is nice
must've been really fun getting to that point

 

it isss purdy aint it XD but for real, nice work bumpin