2013 FRS | Documented LS2 Swap | How to DIY + Parts List + CANBUS

[spitsnaugle]

Hi all.

Starting this thread to document the swap of my 2013 FRS. I have updated this first post with the full parts list involved with the swap, and include notes and tips learned throughout the swap.

Formerly had a LS swapped 240z that was my autocross car. This swap is more cramped than the Z car, but its a much less rusty chassis to work on.


The car:

Now:






Was:





FA20 Engine had 28k miles when pulled.
LS2 has 68k miles.

Original weight: 2765lb
LS swap weight:
2835lb with half tank of fuel,
2790 with stripped trunk and 1/4 tank.
2909 with roll bar and accusump in trunk, 7/8 full tank.
56/44 weight distribution

Dyno: 453hp 426ft lbs torque (at the wheels)

The car and its modifications:

Body/Aero/Aesthetic/Safety Mods:

• 2013 FRS, 6speed, Purchased May 2018 with 27k miles.
• Trackspec Hood Vents
• BRZ Leather/Alcantara heated seat and console swap
• 2017 BRZ tail lights
• 2013 BRZ headlights
• [s]Varis Arising Adjustable GT Wing[/s]
• Verus Front Splitter
• Verus Rear Diffuser
• Verus UCW Carbon Wing
• AutoPower Roll Bar, painted Steel-It.
• Sparco 6pt FIA Harness for Hans
• Sparco Grid QRT lightweight seat

Wheels:
Street / AutoX / Light Trackday

• 18x9.5 Titan7 5x100 +40
• 275/35r18 Falken RT660

AutoX & Track:

• 17x9 Apex ARC-8 5x100 +42
• 245/40-17 Hoosier A7 Front
• 275/35-17 Hoosier A7 Rear

Suspension:

• CSG Spec'd Tein Flex A Coilovers
• SPC adjustable LCA's
• RacerX adjustable upper control arms (rear)
• Alignment:
  3.5* Camber front
  2.1* Camber rear
  0.0 toe front and rear

Brakes:

• Brembo front Brakes (near identical to performance package)
• 2014 STI Brembo rear brakes (keeps brake bias in check with front upgrade)
• street / autocross pads: winmax w3 front + w4 rear
• track pads: CounterSpaceGarage C2 front + Project Mu Club Racer Rear

The LS engine
LS2, T56 m12 trans (GTO), GTO throttle pedal, e40 PCM (I recommend e38 if possible). Added the following:

• k1 forged 3.622 crank
• wiseco pistons
• callies compstar rods
• Brian Tooley Racing Cam (custom road race grind for my application)
• Katech C5R valvetrain - spintron tested
• C5R timing chain.
• LS7 Lifters
• KATECH ported 243 heads
• Melling 10295 oil pump.
• monster twin disc LT1-S clutch
• new oem slave cylinder and remote bleed
• sikky short throw shifter
• FAST Intake
• FAST fuel rails
• D514 coils
• Meziere electric water pump.
• Lokar Flexible Dipstick
• ATI super damper for corvette
• Holley AC Mount #20-159
• Sanden SD7B10 compressor
• East Coast Auto Electric mini alternator
• Custom Alternator mount for corvette spacing.
• Oil Cooler, temp and pressure gauges
• ImprovedRacing Baffle
• Accusump with automatic solenoid

Swap Parts: (as total and accurate as I could be, added parts as I've gone along)

• CX Racing Mounts - ESK-TM-LS-BRZ
• SIKKY Headers
  Then Ceramic Coated by SWAINTECH for insulation, titanium wrapped in places too.
• Custom Y Pipe (one of the latest posts at the end of this thread)
• GTO Oil Pan -- Specifically part #12581209
  (mildly modified - cut tabs for sway bar)
• Tilton 75 Series Master Cylinder
  (I used 7/8" for a stiffer pedal, 13/16 would be ok too)
• Clevis for Tilton 75 MC = Pegasus Racing $7 -- Part# OBP-CB005
• Custom CNC'd clutch master cylinder recess plate/adapter. (PM me for one!)
• Ram fittings 78310 GM clutch quick disconnect to 3AN adapter
• 16" Russell 3an stainless line for clutch master cylinder part no: 655242
• Motorcraft SW5857 Backup Light Switch
• Prothane 7-1604 Red 6 and 8 Cylinder Transmission Mount
• Reverse Solenoid Delete
• CAGS Delete
• Driveshaft - Custom by a local shop (length roughly 49.3" using second bolt hole of cx mounts) Driveshaft yoke: Strange Engineering Chromoly 1350 two piece (overkill but I already had it)
• WiringSpecialties stand alone DBW LS2 harness
• GTO pedal + GTO e40 ecu (both came with my engine)
• MRS Electronics Canbus adapter
• Two 3/8 barb to -6an fittings, then all -6an fittings and ptfe -6an AN line for fuel lines.
• Mishimoto Radiator and Fans -- might suggest FullBlown radiator and higher capacity fans upgrade
• Perrin 3" Catback Exhaust -- this bolts right up with CX racings LS headers/y-pipe
• Misc 1.25" and 1.5" silicone couplers and hard lines for radiator lines.
• Random silicone coupler and bent 3.5" or 4" intake tube, K&N RG-1001RD filter.
• AirRaid Intake, cut length down: AIR255-230
• Inline A/C sensor
  
  

The order I did my swap:

• OEM Engine Removal
• Tran Tunnel Prep/Bracket Removal (trans crossmember and behind shifter)
• Removed engine cross member (inserting LS engine in from below, fits even with headers)
• Fit cross member on LS engine, cut oil pan supports.
• Installed new radiator, shroud, fans.
• Made modifications to fuel lines, wiring, heater lines, bent A/C lines up, minor move of brake lines for exhaust.
• more and more wiring work. traced most no-longer-used wires from original engine to fuse panel and OEM ECU, coiled them up in the interior- to be de-pinned/removed later after validated unnecessary.
• Installed "stand-alone" wiring harness, integrating some minor points with OEM harness.
• Test fit engine, cut extra tabs off transmission for clearance, minor hammering to trans tunnel.
• Removed interior trim to access trans tunnel area. Changed reverse switches on trans, deleted CAGS and reverse lockout.
• Cut Shifter Opening to fit GTO shifter.
• Cut firewall and inserted custom CNC'd clutch master Cylinder mount.
• Dropped the body onto the engine/trans+crossmember.
• used digital angle finder to match trans angle to differential flange, then drilled/bolted in rear trans bracket.
• Measured for driveshaft. Had local shop make it. Installed driveshaft
• Installed remaining exhaust.
• Wiring troubleshoot, bypassed fuel pump pressure controller. Below passenger rear window: Green wire to Red wire. (hindsight: run the GM fuel pump wire to this area and cut control from OEM ecu)
• Removed OEM pedal, reused top left stud, cut a plate and drilled a second hole for the pedal's other bolt.
• Installed GTO pedal, connected to PNP stand alone harness.
• Connected GM ecu to HPtuners, removed VATS, minor tweaks to disable CAGS, etc.
• First start.
• Minor problem solving for little issues here and there, (headers melting spark plug wires, increased size of clutch MC, etc)
• Got sorted, now ridiculously fun to drive.

Swap mount engine forward/backward location, measured from firewall to head:
Vorshlag: 100mm (estimated)
CX racing per mount hole: 110mm, 90mm, 70mm
Sikky: 70mm
tssfab.us: 75mm to 48mm (slotted mounts)


GM LS CANBUS integration with the FRS BRZ 86 Chassis:
Right now there are four solutions for CANBUS (gauges, power steering, abs, etc). Some of these solutions support cruise control and AC (triggered over canbus on some PCMs)

WiringSpecialties
Has at least e38 and e40 support. Full canbus support of gauges, PS, ABS, AC and cruise if I am not mistaken. Some functions are limited on the less popupar e40 ecu. You can get the module itself (without the harness, but you'll need to be clever on splicing the harnesses together, I'd just suggest buying the full harness)
https://www.wiringspecialties.com/toyota-86-frs/

MRS Electronics (Dayton Ohio)
Is a canbus specialist for commercial vehicles. They make a canbus module that is relatively simple, provides gauges, abs, and power steering. No AC or Cruise control. Requires splicing into four or five wires between the OEM and LS harness. Works with multiple ECU/PCMs. No online store- made to order, you'll need to call them and tell them your PCM and Chassis.
https://www.mrs-electronics.com/ (937) 522-0800

AGT engineering (in Australia)
Has probably the most advanced canbus module, has bluetooth support to modify your settings, BUT does not support the E40 PCM/ECU as of right now. E38 is recommended.
https://www.agtengineering.com.au/

FT86 Club Member: Gerald makes several canbus products, and if your setup is unique and has a hard to trigger AC system, he even has a manual AC trigger module:
https://www.geraldjustprojects.com/p...y/cars/canbus/


Some things to note: - Lessons learned, and research:
Install a remote clutch slave bleeder. Tick QITPSBL01 Looks like a good option to not separate the trans, though I'd shorten the hose.

Axles are definitely necessary after swapping, CV joints are the weak point, so far the diff is holding up.

Alternative Mount setups:
Within one year my CX racing kit bushing went bad. Also their headers required modifications to fit- they hit the spark plugs.
A better mount setup would be SIKKY's full kit.

Oil pans:
Personally I would recommend a Dry Sump, Moroso, or SIKKY oil pan, but if not there are two different OEM oil pans for GTOs (diagram below). If you have a GTO pan- get an improved racing GTO baffle if you plan on driving hard AT ALL.
Here are the differences in the GTO pans- one will interfere with the sway bar. I have documented each in the photo below included a red dotted line to where the pan will need trimmed.


Clutch Master Cylinders:
There are several "compact" MC's I recommend the Tilton 75 series as its the shortest, even with a banjo bolt it should still be 6mm/.22" shorter than the Wilwood GS Integral version.


ECM Wiring Notes:
Some rather important ECM / ECU pin outs below:

IF you're no longer using the factory harness for the engine. You need to reconnect three grounds to the ECM, highlighted in light blue below. (I did NOT note actual wire colors). Without these you will have no start, or fuel pressure.

For hardwired Canbus module integration its A33 18/19 (highlighted in yellow).

ECM Ignition / Power at key is A33--27
Start should be A35--26 (highlighted in red). I have not personally tested this one as I used the OEM starter relay.




Our rear diffs are 4.11 Torsen LSD. First gear is worthless with the t56 gearing. Second gear runs redline too much in autocross.
New gears: 3.73 or 3.58 + New 29 spline Flange (ours is 60x60mm)

You can also directly/bolt in swap a full rear end: a "M85" 3.73 LSD from a 1998-2005 Lexus IS300 *WITH MANUAL TRANSMISSION* Note: the 3.7 LSD only came with the manual trans.

Here are some MPH-per-gear calculations I made for M6 and M12 t56 transmissions, at 6500rpm (though I redline at 7k), and three different rear gear ratios for each:




Other good references:
Vorshlag Photo Dump
LS3 swap by ILLSMOQ

[Banana Head]

Good luck with the project! Can't wait to see it progress!

[MRS-Colin]

I'll be looking for you around town

[spitsnaugle]

7-2-18 Pulled the engine. Will drop the trans in the next few days.

[spitsnaugle]

Started removing the trans supports. Had to stop to get a right-angle drill adapter from home depot to finish drilling the upper sides, got too tight for my drill.











Not pictured: THERE IS ONE MORE BRACKET/SUPPORT IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE SHIFTER TO TRIM. Driveshaft will be in contact with it if its ignored.

[spitsnaugle]

Got all of the OEM trans bracket removed. 2k Epoxy primer and paint on the way to seal up where the spot welds were.


Got bits of the interior removed, getting ready to drill and mounting trans brackets:



Need to get a tubing bender to bend the AC lines closer to the firewall:

[spitsnaugle]

I dropped the crossmember out.

• One Plastic rivet each side at rear of crossmember
• One nut/bold to each to the LCA.
• Disconnected steering outer tie rods from hubs (at Castellated nut)
• Disconnected steering column, marked lines on column and rack to re-align splines. Do not spin steering wheel while disconnected-it breaks the clockspring.
• Disconnected sway bar from struts.
• Two bolts each side at rear of sway bar bracket.
• Two bolts each side of crossmember above LCA mount.

UPDATE: After test fitting -- I ground off a little material from the top casting line on the steering rack, just enough to make it a smooth round surface

Took many more measurements, the engine+trans and WITH HEADERS, can be put into the engine bay from below, as long as the water pump is removed.

I plan to remove the engine from my test rack/trailer tonight, get it bolted to the crossmember, then continue with prepping the engine bay.

Items still needed to be completed:

• Custom clutch master clyinder bracket - I 3d printed a prototype hoping to get it cut next week.
• Trim heater lines - made a tool to recreate bead
• Bend AC lines
• Install mishimoto radiator
• Wiring

I relocated the rear brake lines for exhaust room. The lines took some persuasion to get moved. The bolt used from frame rail (pointing with finger in photo below) worked perfect to the higher spot. I plan to wrap these and the fuel lines with foil wrapped fiberglass.

[spitsnaugle]

Review/Update:


Mishimoto Raditor + Dual Fans / Shroud

Ordered Mishimoto Radiator from MAPerformance.
Part number: MMRAD-BRZ-13 (rad) MMFS-BRZ-13P (shroud)

Radiator arrived with a terribly warped core, but zero shipping damage or dings anywhere:


MAPerformance was quick to overnight a replacement, but their vendor sent the radiator shroud instead of the radiator. Got both returned, waiting on the actual radiator as of right now. No major rush here, I wont be doing the actual swap for probably a month.



UPDATING THIS POST:
Installed Mishimoto Radiator 8/2/18
Took about 1.5 hours.




^Not quite the best fit there, but they supplied some foam to seal between the radiator and the shroud there, which was nice. I reused the OEM foam to seal around the body to the radiator.



I cut off the horizontal support, didn't necessarily need to, but I plan to run hood pins and ditch the front latch there sooner than later.

[spitsnaugle]

6/18/18
Got the CX racing headers and mounts.
Mounts look pretty straight forward, havent done any test fittings.
Shorty headers and Y pipe - definitely are not the quality I am used to, the support rod between the exhaust flange and the collector was welded in the wrong spot and is directly in the way of the spark plug. I contacted CX racing and removed this support rod.


Bought some DEI spark plug shields and managed to get the wires around the tight spaces on the headers:








Just having some fun with the new headers:

With original exhaust:
[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_p3ul3C8V4[/ame]

with CX shorty headers, no o2 sensors connected:
[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFQ_eb59DN8[/ame]

(I have an entire GTO dash and harness on a trailer in my garage, makes and testing parts and moving the engine around a breeze)

[Sportsguy83]

Originally Posted by spitsnaugle

Mcleod 139160 GM clutch quick disconnect to AN addapter

did that Mcleod kit come with two adapters or one?

[spitsnaugle]

Got the engine off my rack, and onto the cross member.
Had to clearance the mounts a bit, but it looks like with cutting the two supports on the oil pan- the sway bar can stay.

Update, at this point it was on the third hole of the CX mounts. I ended up using the second hole and trimmed the excess mounts.











Took the engine back off the cross member, trimmed the aluminum CX mounts. Trimmed the oil pan:

Testing sway bar clearance with CX racing mounts on second hole to forward most location, I have about 3/8" clearance with the swaybar moving up and down. Slightly more clearance with the third hole- and as long as I dont have too much trans tunnel issues, will remain there.

[Sportsguy83]

Originally Posted by spitsnaugle

Just this, haven't tried it yet. Wish it was -3an, would be perfect with the banjo bolt.

Yea it works. I actually bought a full clutch line kit from them and the line they include is longggggg. You are going for a way cleaner solution.

[gtpvette]

Originally Posted by spitsnaugle

Just this, haven't tried it yet. Wish it was -3an, would be perfect with the banjo bolt.

Dont know if this is the right one for yours,,, looks like it'll work on mine.

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/ram-78310

[spitsnaugle]

Originally Posted by Sportsguy83

Yea it works. I actually bought a full clutch line kit from them and the line they include is longggggg. You are going for a way cleaner solution.

Originally Posted by gtpvette

Dont know if this is the right one for yours,,, looks like it'll work on mine.

Sportsguy - I assume them is Vorshlag? If so, I was curious about your master cyl firewall adapter, and that answers that. I plan to drill and put a plate with studs on the inside of the firewall. I have taller valve covers than OEM, so I am quite nervous about that clearance.

gtpvette - If I didnt already have that adapter I would give it a shot, I just plan to use a 90* -3an female to -4an female fitting to join it.