LS1 powered S14 with motorplates and modded GTO pan

[SicBastard]

I've been obsessed with getting the engine and t56 as low and far back as possible. To that end I raised the floor of the GTO oil pan as high as I could and still clear at least a 4.125" stroke. Then I cut the ENTIRE front cross support in the middle of the cross member out, something that I havn't seen done before. This required first, reinforcing the bottom of the entire crossmember with 3/16th" plate and then two pieces of 1x1 steel tube between the steering rack mounts. Then I cut out the step at the back of the GTO pan sump so that the back of the sump could go right up against the steering rack.

Modded Crossmember
http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i7...d/IMG_0733.jpg


Milled pan sitting in engine bay
http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i7...d/DSC00124.jpg


To give you an idea of how effective all this work is in setting back the engine and trans, here are two pictures of other LS1/S14s:

http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i7...LUP1010269.jpg


and mine:
http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i7...d/DSC02097.jpg


My new problem is that the engine sits so low that my GTO oil sump now sits 0.75" below my crossmember. And that's not accounting for the 3/16" that I added to the bottom of the original crossmember!

I did not lower the crossmember relative to the car, and do not plan on doing so. Now I don't know what direction to go with the oil system. I only have a junk LS6 block and havn't started the engine build so I can still go any direction that I want. I'd like to stay away from the weight, complexity, and $$$ of a true dry sump system. I have a used accusump system and originally planned on just staying wet sump, and using the accumulator for a little insurance. But the sump is sittling so low that now I'm worried about ground clearance.

I'm torn between leaving it as it is, modifying the pan to use the LS7 twin pump system, or taking 3/4" out of the bottom of the sump, maybe adding wings and baffles and staying wet sump.

I noticed that the guys with project silvia at SCC had their anti-sway bar hanging below their crossmember after installing the front whiteline bar. Maybe I should just install a whiteline bar and call it a tubular oil-pan guard?

What Dave at SCC had to say,

"The front bar hangs down slightly farther than the stock bar, but there have been no problems with bottoming out. We like to think of it as a 27-mm tubular oil-pan guard.

...we hit one of those asphalt waves that get slowly kicked up when thousands of overweight trucks stop in the same place. The ridge of asphalt was high enough to hit the front anti-roll bar, lifting the car off the ground, bending the bar's pivot bushings and slamming the bar into the oil pan. The stock steel pan escaped only slightly dented, but we fear an aluminum pan would crack under a similar impact. If you're going to be sloppy, haphazard drivers like us, steel may be the way to go."

My engine sits further back than an SR so I think I'll be alright in that regard, I dunno?

note the blue bar hangin' low

http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i7...ilvia_01_z.jpg



http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i7...silvia10_z.jpg


What do you guys think?