So here's the deal:
Saturday...wake up, go to parts store. Buy $100 worth of fluids for car. Put oil in. Put coolant radiator. Put coolant in motor through top hose. Coolant promptly exits motor from bottom. Crap.
Bad water pump.
Go back to parts store. Buy water pump and new thermostat.
Install.
Refill.
Run out of time due to other stupid non-car related items.

Sunday...wake up, fill transmission with fluid. Fill clutch reservoir with fluid. Realize there is no way I'm getting to bleeder bolt on slave, and that I should have take Ag for Life's recommendation to get speed bleeder.
Go back to parts store. Buy a mity-vac.
Bleed clutch with mity-vac.
Install fuses in fuse block.
Wonder what i'm forgetting.
Hook up battery to cables.
Watch for sparks and flames.
...none.

Cross fingers and turn on ignition.
Dash lights come on and fuel pump primes!!

At this point I crank motor with coils unhooked in attempt to get oil pressure.
After cranking quite a bit, I never get pressure. I check wires, pull off the plate where it attaches to the block and crank, no oil comes out.

I do some research and it seems that a bone dry oil pump wont prime with the speed of just cranking.
So I decide to plug in the coils and see if it will kick off and make pressure in the first 2-3 of running.

No dice. I've got a no spark, no fuel condition it seems.
My multimeter crapped out so I wasn't able to check anywhere to see if I've got power. But I know the computer is turning on my fuel pump, so it must be getting power.

I also noticed I'm not reading any RPMs on the tach, so could be a bad Crank Sensor, which supposedly will cause a no spark no fuel condition.

Any LS experts have opinions?

I will try again tonight. I must say I was pretty excited when I hit that ignition and things came alive.

In the mean time, here is everyone's consolation prize:
Video

Sounds like a frustrating weekend, but it's coming together great. No doubt you'll iron out the wrinkles in short order.

I did some more research on the oil pressure and have a very sickening feeling.

One cause of no readable oil pressure is this little barbell plug that goes in the rear of the block. Or rather, if it is not there.




I don't remember seeing or noticing it, so unless it's there and I just missed it?
If I have to pull this motor.....dear God.

On the other hand, I tore it down and I wouldn't have taken it out and not put it back.
I just plain don't remember seeing it.

I'm going insane right now.

You're running a return less fuel rail correct? PCM has at least a bench tune on it?

I can bring over a multimeter if you wish

Really, I'm not too familiar with having issues related to the LS engines.

I was pretty damn lucky that mine fired up once I realized I had the return and feed fuel lines bassackwards.

You're likely on the right track for the sensor

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Guess what??

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HELL YEAH!

Success! Looking good.

Congrats!

AWESOME!

Nice !

Here is a small update with a few different items.

Motor still was/is running pretty rough, and I happened to notice that one or two header primaries on the driver side were cool to the touch after running as compared to the others.

I confirmed I had spark and injector pulse, so my next thought was injectors.
My brother and I swapped the suspect injectors with known working ones, and sure enough the cool primaries followed. After pricing new injectors at $100/each, we decided to pull them and give them a good seafoam soak. After re-installation, the primaries seemed to be just as hot as the others. However, the rough idle still remains....so at this point I'm assuming it is in need of a major tune.

We also started installing the brake booster and master cylinder in an effort to get this thing drive-able soon!

Here is an interesting item...I found a guy local who had some TSW Nurburgring wheels for sale. They were 18 x 8 with a 245/40 tire. I managed to convince him to bring one over to the house to see how it fits.

Here is a rendering MFBarnes whipped up for me:


Here is actual fit up pic:

Sadly, they didn't fit. The biggest barrier was the center hole diameter on the rim was too small, and the wheel wouldn't fully seat on the hub. Also the backspacing wasn't quite right....there was quite a bit of wasted space between outer face of wheel and the inner lip of fender.

The moral of the story I think is that I will have to be pretty picky about what size of wheel I end up with.
The second part of said story is those wheels are pretty bada$$ looking.

Here was the inspiration photo I found that convinced me to call the guy in the first place:


Any thoughts on these wheels?

great work and you did a great job on the color.

The cam is not compensated for at all in the current tune?

I do like those wheels though, shame they don't fit.

Baby Moons always look good

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great work and you did a great job on the color.

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Thanks! Plenty more work to go...

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The cam is not compensated for at all in the current tune?

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No, whatever info I got from Nelson performance when I called them was limited....they basically had record of reworking the harness and I guess deleting the VATS and EGR stuff i guess.

Of course all that work they did was when the setup belonged to the guy I bought it from.

I may call around some speed shops in the area and talk to a few guys.

Have heard good things about Bobby at Clear Lake Speed.

Will be getting in contact with him when I need a retune after my upgrades

No doubt. I'm still wishing I would've done mini-tubs and bags......guess it's never too late.

Are those side mirrors suction cupped to the vent windows?

Look awfully funny...

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I'll try to get something up this afternoon....I have quite a few

While technically any time after 1200 hours could be considered "afternoon", this is bull****.

OK sorry about the wait!
I've been focusing on getting it driveable, with the brakes, and steering being priority. Although I had another fairly major item pop-up that needed to be addressed.
My steering column rebuild is progressing well, only one part left to replace, the lower bearing, which is on back order.
Old:

All new internals:

Decided to go the 98-02 F-body rear disc brake swap route. I read a good article about how they basically bolt right up, and there are plenty of donor cars around. Picked the whole rear end up from a salvage yard near work:




Old drum backing plate:



Here are the F-body rear calipers compared to my existing front calipers:



Pulled the rear cover on my 10-bolt to remove the axles and I was greeted with a milky mix of water and gear oil:

Axles were not in much better shape. Lots of corrosion:

Soooo, looks like we are going for the rear end rebuild.
I'm sending it out, so I don't have to mess with backlash, preload, special tools etc.
Once I got the rear end out, I decided to get the tubes welded to the center carrier housing for a little extra strength:


In the mean time, my stainless brake line kit showed up:

Did a little touch up on the front assembly.
Before:

After:


I had to order some caliper hoses from Kore3 with the right fittings on them for the rear, so the hardlines mount up to the F-body set up, those should come in tomorrow. That will be last of the brake line work, at least until rear end is ready to go back in. Still need to bleed everything, obviously.
Next item will be a driveshaft....

No brakes needed, just yank wheel and hammer down to spin 180 degrees

Are those lines pre-bent for the mustang or did you bend them yourself? What brand kit did you go with?

The lines I bought used the stock routing and were pre-bent. The disc upgrade kit I bought way back when came with the low-frills, weld on tab mount, so I basically welded it on where the hard line ended, and routed the flexible from that mount to the caliper.

By biggest concern on the location of the tab mount was wheel clearance at full lock, but I think with the tire/wheel diameter I plan on running, it shouldn't interfere.