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2010 Camaro SS Project Car - Lipsticking The PigDressing up the Engine Bay on Project CP/28 From the June, 2012 issue of Camaro Performers By Steven Rupp Photography by The Author
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1. Behold the bastion of modern... 1. Behold the bastion of modern technology known as the engine bay of our ’10 SS project car. Of course, the price for all that tech is miles of unsightly wires and enough black plastic to choke a goat. The only attractive areas are the blower and ADM airbox. We love the performance of LS engines, but we’re not deluded enough to think they actually look good, especially how they come packaged under the hood of the new Camaro. You see, GM is more concerned with how it works than how it looks, and the result is a mess of wires, hoses, and black plastic. But thanks to the aftermarket, there’s hope for the homely looking engine bay of our fifth-gens. In the case of CP/28, our ’10 project car, we had a trade-off. Sure, the MagnaCharger looked killer, but installing it meant ditching the top cover, which hid the coil packs and a spaghetti bowl of wires. The ADM airbox certainly helped, but the rest of the engine bay was painfully stock looking. The solution was to call up a few companies and order up their wares. The best part is that most of the dress-up items on the market today are designed for easy installation.  2. Most of the wiring mess...  2. Most of the wiring mess lies directly on the valve covers, and the time-tested way to fix this on LS engines are fuel-rail covers. Now, we’ve seen people get clever with cutting and modifying plastic versions to work, but we wanted to check out these new fabbed aluminum pieces (PN LN0447, $49) from Lingenfelter Performance Engineering. They even come in all the factory Camaro colors.  3. The coil covers are custom-made...  3. The coil covers are custom-made from 1⁄8-inch 5052 aluminum plate with MIG welded, factory-style fasteners. The edges are rolled and boxed for a very clean look, and Lingenfelter makes some to specifically to work with Magnuson superchargers.  4. Included with the coil...  4. Included with the coil covers are the necessary GM-style mounts for the valve covers.  5. The instructions had us...  5. The instructions had us zip-tie some of the PCV hoses out of the way. Moving hoses and rerouting some of the clutter is a great way to clean up the engine bay. It costs only a few bucks and a little sweat equity.  6. The coil covers required...  6. The coil covers required that the supercharger coolant reservoir tank be moved to the driver side inner fender. It was a little messy, but Lingenfelter included the necessary hose coupler, hose clamps, and tank bracket.  7. After a little work and...  7. After a little work and tweaking of the bracket, the coolant tank was located to its new home on the driver side of the engine bay.  8. The ugly, yellow GM dipstick...  8. The ugly, yellow GM dipstick is, well, ugly. If you’re on a tight budget, you can rattle can it black, but for $25 Scott Drake makes this sweet billet cover (PN CA-120001-BLK). It also comes in silver and is a nice little detail.  9. The covers made a huge...  9. The covers made a huge difference in the engine bay and really helped clean things up (or at least put the mess out of sight). But we still had a few more areas we wanted to address.  10. One of the larger pieces...  10. One of the larger pieces of black plastic is the fuse box cover. Both, Scott Drake and Show Stopper Accessories offer brushed aluminum covers for a little over $50. We wanted something a bit more custom, so Show Stopper made us an Ice Silver and carbon-fiber cover for $155. Sure, that’s more than just a few extra bucks, but the quality was top notch, and it really tied in well with the rest of our project car.
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