Chevrolet Caprice Wagon-385ci-400+hp

Chevrolet Caprice 1994 Description

Well kept 1994 Chevrolet Caprice Wagon with a 385ci, 6.3L LT1 engine. Before we go into the details I will point out that this vehicle is not a show car so keep that in mind when you judge it. Even thought it has been in my family since 1997, and it's been pampered its whole life with us, like any other used 22 year old car, it has some flaws that I will point out as I go into the details. I have own it since 2006, and when I got it as a gift from my father in law it had 123k miles as it is reflected on the title. The original odometer died long time ago as it is common on these cars. The current odometer reads 130k but the chassis has 180k. It has always been my weekend car and I used to drive it to North Carolina twice a year on vacation time. So let's start with the fun part.
Engine:Rebuild in 2011 by Steve at Progressive Racing Engines(build sheet included), it is a 1994 LT1 2 main block(.40 over), 10.2:1 compression, Mahle flat forged pistons, scat 3.750 stroker crank, scat 5.7 rods, stock ported casting heads, LT4 Hot cam .525 lift, Crane Gold 1.6 rockers, LS7 lifters, Isky springs(good up to .550 lift), ported intake, 30 lbs injectors, 52mm TB, K&N filter, Mesiere water pump, BBK short headers, adjustable fuel pressure regulator, oil catch can, Canton oil pan, HV oil pump, 3.5 Z28 MAF, ARP bolts everywhere.
Transmission:4L60E Rebuild in 2009 by Tranny Tek, refreshed in 2016 due to a failed converter. It has the red alto clutches, Colene steels, HD 2nd band, extra 3-4 clutches, 5 gears front and back planetaries, Transgo shift kit, The Beast shell, 2200 rpm converter. It shifts very hard, and 1-2 shift will make the tail go sideways. Also I have it tune with a fast reaction time between shifts. I can make them softer if the next person wants.
Suspension and Brakes:Stock springs, Police 3-way adjustable front shocks, Bilstein rear shocks, Maaco lower control arms, Impala SS rear sway bar, Energy Suspension body and upper rear arms bushings, SSBC Rear drum to disc brakes conversion kit, GM 3.23 gears, Energy Suspension tranny mount, Motor mounts changed back in 2011 with the new engine. Steering gear box changed recently. Ball joints, sway bar liks, idler arm, all changed since I have owned the car.
Exhaust:BBK shorty headers, No cats, X pipe, 2.5" all the way back, Dynomax Mufflers. Nice mellow tone, not loud.
Wheels:Impala SS rims. Hankook tires. Fronts 255/50 R17, and rear 255/60 R17. At one point they were all Ventus ST, but one of the rears went bad and at that time for some reason the 255/60s were no longer available on the ST model so I had to settle for a Ventus SA.
PCM:CATS tunner program. Originally tune by Solomon but I use Datamaster to log in the runs and I modified some parameters. Right now it is tune to run on 91 octane. I haven't take a long trip in a while but on the city it can make between 225 to 280 miles,(depending on traffic and how hard I drive it) with a 18-19 gallons fill up.Since 2006, among other things, I have changed the headliner, the floor carpet, repaired the driver seat, added the leather on the second row seat, windshield( old one had too many scratches), and most recently I changed the steering gear box.
INTERIOR:Leather seats, aftermarket carpet, LED dash lights, RPM gauge, Sony stereo, Bose front speakers, Dual 4-way rear speakers.
CONS:-Of curse this car have some. The paint is a 7. It has scratches and clear coat runs on few spots.-I have lost the page I had with the engine parts cost.(crank $400, Pistons $400, Heads $200, Water pump $280, piston rings kit, HV oil pump, Timing gears, Canton oil pan $300, Headers $400, Hot cam $250,etc. I know it was at the end like $2500+). Machine work alone was $2800.-It has some interior rattle noises mainly from the door panels that we all know they loose and brake the tabs.-On the driver side one of the valve cover bolts broke at the base.-The hood and grill have only a base paint. I haven't decide what to do there so I'll let the next person do it.( I like the current look but maybe you don't)-The front bumper would need repaint to look nice. The paint is peeling on many spots.-Last time I took the lower dash out I cracked the center piece on the left top corner, above the a/c controls.
SOME OTHER FACTS.-I weighted the car one time and it was 4220 lbs without me inside.-It was raced one time at a local 1/8 mile. I did 3 passes and The best It did was 8.575 spinning the tires all the way(I have slip somewhere). I had no disc brakes on the rear at that time, they were the drums and were sticking badly.-It turns 1800-1900 rpm at 70 MPH.-It makes around 14 MPG on the city. I haven't tested the current tune on the HWY but I am sure it would be around 20.-The rims were painted by me as an experiment to see how it would look with the hood. It was not a professional job so sorry about that guys. It is a 10 from the distance. A 6 up close :).
Car was repainted with factory color about 2 years ago. The job was not up to my standards but it was from a former friend of mine that for that reason is not a friend anymore. It has scratches from careless people at parking lots, and one time not even one month after having it repainted, a metal piece came flying on the HWY and left a big scratch on the driver side. There are no dents anywhere though. I am including in this auction a 1/4 gallon of the paint that was used. I am also including many spare parts( original block, original crank and heads, trim pieces, cluster, electric fans(3), etc). I am not including my Dell laptop computer with both CATS, and Datamaster programs but the winning bidder will have the choice of buying them from me. On that laptop I have the files to tune for other configurations like bigger injectors( I am including a set of 36lbs injectors), or if you add nitrous or supercharger. Even if in the future you want to swap the engine to a Camaro or a Firebird, you can use the same PCM, engine and transmission. I will be adding more information through out the week because I know I am forgetting some things. All the pictures were taken with my ipad but if anyone needs more pictures or see the car run I can send a video too. All I can say is that this car is not for a novice driver. It has a lot of torque and it will seat you back if you floor it and will keep going and going. I've been around LT1s for a long time and I know how to work on these engines, so any technical question you may have I'll provably have an answer for it. You'll smoke 80% of the cars out there for sure. It is a car you don't see everyday in this kind of shape. Even with all its flaws I would rate it a 7. For any questions you may have, send me an email and I will answer ASAP. I have many invoices and records of almost everything I have done to this car. I think I even have the sales receipt from 1997. If you look for the ownership records it should be only 3 names since 1997. Anthony Cecil(my wife's uncle), Julio Cabal( wife's father), and me Antonio Cordero. Whoever wins the auction will be allowed to drive test the car, and is not obligated to buy the car if at the end is not happy with it( believe me I won't complaint). Honestly the only reason I am selling the car is because my son turns 18 years old in November and I want to buy him a car with whatever I get from this one. I can accept all kind of payments but personal checks, sorry.
I didn't mention on my description that I will give a warranty for a two weeks, for everything on the car, but engine and tires. The only reason I won't warrant those two items is because I can not control how the next person is gonna drive this car. The tires still have plenty of life left, and the engine don't have more than 45K miles. For anything else that may go bad like any other used car I will pay for the parts. It will include transmission w/ torque converter(still under warranty from tranny tech) suspension, alternator, a/c compressor, sensors, wheel bearings, ball joints, fuel pump, water pump, injectors, distributor, power steering pump & gear box, radiator, cooling hoses, thermostat, rear gears ring and pinion, radio, cluster. I think I'm not forgetting anything but is pretty much anything but engine, and tires.I went to the only dyno available late at night because I finish work at 7:00pm. This particular dyno is called: Dyno Dynamics Dynamometer, better known as "HEARTBREAKER" because is a dyno better known for tuning purposes than to give high numbers. The own tech informed me that there was a 1.12 corrector factor( 12%) in comparison to a dynojet that is the American standard for HP figures.
I you go to google and YouTube you'll see all the comments regarding this issue. You can see videos of a 2012 Audi R8 V8, rated at 430 hp from factory making only 241.2 WHP, and 230 WHP.A BMW M235i making 268.8 hp, 275.7 tq.A 300ZX Turbo, at 17 psi making only 355hp, 309 tqIf you go to LS1 tech web site you'll see many people also commenting on the issue. Many people talk about the 12-18% difference in hp numbers when dynoing the car the very same day from a dyno dynamics to a dynojet.
MY NUMBERS WERE:286.1 WHP X 1.12(12% factor)= 320.43WHP. On auto cars a 20% drivetrain loss means a hair over 400 FHP.315 WTQ X 1.12(12% factor)= 352.8 WTQ. 20% drivetrain loss and it comes to 440 FTQ.He rev it all the way to 6300 and the car was going 162 MPH at that point. I can show the picture.Not bad for a streetable, small cam car. I could't make another run with a leaner AFR at the peak power because he was about to close shop. My AFR was between 12.0 to 12.9 which is not bad but there is some room for improvement. I would've brought it up closer to 13.4 and see if would pick up some hp but is ok. It did what I was expecting and we all know that the LT4 hot cam even though is big on a 350 is not so much on a 385, but I always wanted the car to be street friendly. I also took a video when the car was on the dyno so you can hear it running. Anyone can text me at: three o five eight nine zero three one two two. Thank you.