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New TBSS owner, catastrophic engine failure on road trip home from purchase!

1180 Views 24 Replies 8 Participants Last post by  dfwwiz
9
Hey everyone, I just joined the TBSS club on Friday! I flew from Denver to Orlando and picked up a 1 owner 65k mile Blue 3SS! Was on day 3/3 of my 28 hour drive home to Denver, when out of nowhere I suffered catastrophic engine failure. The kind that only happens when you thrash your vehicle too hard all day at the drag strip (which of course I hadnt done, just highway cruising with a couple downshifts to get around a semi, nothing crazy, nothing over 90 mph or even close to redline).

So I was cruising at 80 MPH on the interstate and my engine suddenly lost power and the gauges all flashed. Out the rear view, I couldn't see anything (the glass was covered in oil) side mirrors revealed that I was blowing a white smoke cloud and spraying an oil slick as far as the eye could see, and then the motor cut off. I was hoping it was just a blown head gasket. But the leak was coming from the bottom of the block.

The shop here in town confirmed my suspicions this morning that its the motor.. It threw a rod through the block, and punched a hole all the way through. My SS is dead. RIP! So now I'm 2/3 of the way home broken down in Manhattan KS and trying to get the dealer I bought it from in Orlando to buy me a new crate LS2, AND pay for the labor, of course.

Thoughts on what I should do? I am not interested in accepting a rebuilt motor, it only had 65k original miles on the odometer! Should I try to source an LSX block? I see a lot of guys do an LSX swap as a mod... is that more reliable/more readily available in 2023?

I will say, until the motor blew, it was the most fun 1000 miles road trip I have ever driven. And I can't wait to get my baby back...

Nice to meet everyone!
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I'm AWD. Does that mean I don't have the oil pickup problem then, that requires the relocation? I checked the VIN locations in the driver door sill, windshield, glovebox, emissions module in front of the firewall on the left side, and the stamped vin on the left rear of the engine block, they all match... so the investigation continues as to what went wrong, when, and who knew about it before it was sold to me. I hired a lawyer to investigate vehicle fraud.
At least I know I didn't get sold a TBSS with a different engine...
All TBSS’s suffer from this flaw. You can buy the expensive new oil pickup, or an oil baffle for $30. The new pickup I gather is important at high HP levels but not on most builds. Over ~2500 baffles have been sold to date by @dfwwiz (kevin Hanson)

If you were RWD, or converted to RWD, you have better options like a MADE TO ORDER moroso pan or c6 pan.
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Unfortunately that means you are stuck with the crap oil pan and need the pick up relocation. I'm Rwd so can change pans, and will, once I rebuild my motor (changing to l92 and actually putting the ls2 in another project).
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I think the AWD may have some sort of effect on it from the extra grip, but not sure what.

I would imagine having a softer rear spring (ie air springs) makes it a bit worse too.
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Its the fact that Chevy used the same pan in both AWD & RWD which has the axle tube in the middle and thought nothing of actually stopping the free sloshing of oil to the rear on hard acceleration. Having owned mine almost 15 years, backin 09 Billyman did a mod where he cut a hold in the pn and glued in a plexi window to observe different quart levels where 7-8 was ok but 9 was too much. There is the pan splash tray AND the windage tray to stop any splashing upward as long as its 8 qts and under.
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