Minitubbed 87 LX Build Thread

slow90coupe · May 24, 2014

Well, I wasn't exactly looking for a new project, but I stumbled across this car yesterday and it was too good of a deal to pass up. So today it sits in my garage. It may look familiar to some of you, The previous owner spent a TON of time and money getting the body into the condition it is in today. The work done was all done right, and the car is very nice. I'm very pleased. The details on the car are as follows.

1987 LX, Wolfe Racecraft minitubs, Custom 8pt cage, welded full length subframes with jacking rails, QA1 rear coilovers, UPR double adjustable uppers and lowers, Moser 31 spline axles, FRPP cobra diff, FRPP 3.55 gears, brand new LX tails, brand new tinted headlights, fully smoothed engine bay, black interior, brand new black headliner And visors, 4" cowl hood, steeda pedals, custom fuel cell in cage under car, custom battery mount with battery disconnect in OEM fuel door, New door pins, new door handles, all new door moldings, new door seals, new hatch shocks, you get the picture. I am unsure of the direction I want to go with the car, but there are 2 options that I'm currently looking into heavily: Carbed LSX and 2JZGTE. I'd rather do the 2JZ but I am unsure if I have the knowledge and know-how to do that in-depth of a swap.

Here's the pics as I received it, I put my little welds on it for the time being.

MMMM no defrost lines!

The collection of parts that came with it.

That's a lot of black interior.

Aeromotive A2000 sexiness

Enough carpet to cover a small house

My favorite box. So many AN fittings. So much sex.

Some AN line

Updates to come this weekend. Progress will be slow, but I'll get it done eventually. No deadline to meet, no need to drive it, so I am going to take my time and finish this car the way it should be.

Burninriverdiver · May 25, 2014

Looks like a great find, everything is in great shape from the photos

slow90coupe · May 25, 2014

Burninriverdiver said:
Looks like a great find, everything is in great shape from the photos

It is a VERY nice car, an easy 9/10 body/paint wise, making it the nicest car I've ever owned.

Update- I just found out yesterday that my dad has a fresh TH350 transmission that I never knew he had, so it's looking like the carbed LSX is going to be the engine of choice. The car will finish way under my project budget of $10,000, counting the car.

Burninriverdiver · May 25, 2014

10k is low for all the goodies in it. You building a keeper or trying to make a profit on it? Either way it'll be worth some cash when finished

slow90coupe · May 25, 2014

Burninriverdiver said:
10k is low for all the goodies in it. You building a keeper or trying to make a profit on it? Either way it'll be worth some cash when finished

I plan to hang onto it for a while, but I'm unsure if I'll want to sell it. I might sell my Turbo SN95 instead of this, but I'm not sure yet.

Gtvert · May 25, 2014

Very nice buy, I would have loved to buy it if I had the. $$ can't wait to see it come together.

slow90coupe · May 26, 2014

Progress has started, kinda. I've been working on it a little here and there. Mainly just cleaning and brainstorming at this point.

I got all of the black interior cleaned up and prepped for dying.

Then got it all organized and put away until I decide to do something else with it.

I finished up the tail-light wiring and got it all tucked away.

I started getting wires separated and routed to the correct place, this is the wires for the dash and engine/headlight harness. Much more simple than a stock harness.

Then I pulled the fenders off to do some more cleaning painting around the inner strut towers. They don't look very good right now.

I got the rear bumper bolted up and properly aligned.

A pic of the minitubs and brakes

I love the way everything back here looks

The transmission tunnel, which is very slick as well, surprisingly.

I hope to get a bunch done on it this weekend. We will see.

Gtvert · May 26, 2014

That rear does look awesome.

g36 monkey · May 26, 2014

Dude, always good when the PO spends all the money doing the hard/expensive stuff first

Great find!

Orange 94 · May 26, 2014

Wow, definitely a great find.

slow90coupe · Jun 1, 2014

I got to work on the car a little bit this weekend.
The mess, a very nasty headlight harness with the typical inch thick grime that seems to accumulate on the bulb sockets on every foxbody out there.

After a bunch of cleaning and taping I went on and routed it, and cut the end off of the harness and hardwired it to the hotrod harness.

The only pic I took of this.

I painted a few brackets too.

Then I wired up the fuel pump, correctly wired the relay, and mounted the fuel pump, and got all of the lines hooked up.

I've pretty much made up my mind on the engine. It's going to get a 4.8 truck motor, carbureted, with a blow-through turbo setup. I'm going to be running yet another one of ON3 Performance's turbo kits on this car, with a 76mm single turbo.

g36 monkey · Jun 1, 2014

Good work, love the cleaning up

ElrodKTPQ_89 · Jun 2, 2014

Wow man nice stuff in here! Looks like you got a good deal and a fun project ahead of you for sure! The 4.8 in a notch should be a blast...my friend had an old square body Isuzu pup with a 4.8 swap. It made that light as a feather truck a monster til he sold it, and supposedly the guy with it now is twin turboing it.

slow90coupe · Jun 7, 2014

Today was a solid day. Graduated from high school in the morning and even had time to work on the fox a little.

I got my caster camber plates in today.

Started freshening up some of the interior pieces

Put the new armrest on

Started fitting the carpet to run around the cage

Put the rear trim pieces on.

And put the console in as well as some other pieces.

I modified the radio delete I had laying around for an SN95 to fit this car since I'm too lazy to wire up a radio, plus I'll never use a radio in the car once it's got a turboed and cammed, lsx in it.

g36 monkey · Jun 8, 2014

I am really loving this build

slow90coupe · Jun 13, 2014

Well this is probably the last update on this car for a few months besides the random parts I may pick up used for good deals. I'm going to focus on my SN95 and get it all sorted out before I do anything else to this car. I don't have the time/money to finish the car this year. As of now, the goal is to have the car done for Mustang Week 2015.
I did pick up a few front suspension parts for cheap
Strange 10-ways, coilover kit, and some random 13" cobra/Baer calipers. I picked up all of this for less than $300 so I really had no choice not to buy it, lol.

I pulled the rear end out of the car to put in my SN95 yesterday. This car will be getting a shortened rear end so I can have a nice deep dish wheel in the rear.

I had to mock up some wheels in the process, lol