shortblocks

Mattstrike

Random Crazy Custom Car guy
Feb 13, 2014
542
1,139
Trying to decide...

Need a shortblock for my winter car, '97 LeSabre L67 swap. Bottom end has an issue, and with blocks for $80 at the u-pull I'm thinking fuck it, spend the $80 and move on. It looks like they have only a couple supercharged cars, one a 2004 GP, and a bunch of series 2/3 N/A cars.

Winter beater currently has an NIC cam and a 3.4 & 3.2 modular pulley (the 3.8 is on it right now), headers, intake stuff, 105# springs, so nothing too spectacular.

I was thinking about grabbing the newest/lowest mileage vehicle I can find, is there a good reason that a series 3 NA shortblock won't work? There are two that look promising, one has a fleet vehicle history (makes me think regular oil changes and failed transmission) and another is in a Lacross that's been wrecked pretty good. The reason I ask is it sounds like the L26 bottom end is not as strong as the L36, but it's not like I'm trying to cram 25psi into it either.

No other mods have been done or will be done on this engine. I'll be driving the car until it rots out then moving the drivetrain on into the next one. Basically all I care about is that it doesn't die again again again again (because this is the third time this year I've had to pull the engine/trans).
 

v6buicks

TCG Elite Member
TCG Premium
Oct 22, 2018
6,267
15,469
Franklin, IN
Real Name
Jon
I've had issues finding good ones. Even a really clean looking one I found with under 130k on the clock turned out to be junk. The piston rings were shot which resulted in a hard misfire on one cylinder. They weren't broken. They were just so weak that I could put the piston back in the cylinder without a ring compressor.

There are tons of perfectly good engines in the yard, but the gamble is getting riskier as these 3800s get older and older.
 
Old Thread: Hello . There have been no replies in this thread for 90 days.
Content in this thread may no longer be relevant. Consider starting a new thread to get fresh replies.

Thread Info