300 hp V6s are all the rage!

In reply to kanaric:

The 6g that was recommended in earlier is the 6g75 from the last gen eclipse. Yeah, it would require a very rare Kia Sorento trans or the even more rare Pajero transmission. No thanks to both!

The 4g54b isnt all that great of a motor. You can do everything right and spend boatloads of money (like 2jz money) and it still will stab you in the back somehow! LoL. I actually have a mpi/megasquirt setup for my 4g54b right now. That could possibly support up to 600hp with the right turbo and if I used a t56 transmission behind the 4g54. But, I dont want to use it after some thinking.

I want something NA v6 or v8. An LS is too much cutting for my taste, sbf no thanks, 1uz probably (again), nissan vh41/45 maybe kinda tall, bmw m60? hmmm. I dont want to do any inline 4 turbo's though they'd be easy. Inline6's, well other than the jz and rb's all turbo, there's bmw motors which I havent even looked into. I really want to do an NA v6, no one does them for reasons expressed in this thread but it's what I want to do. There are no off the shelf swap mounts for any engine for the starion except 4g series if you mix and match might max/d50 stuffs.

The LFX sounds like it could be a sweet alternative to a lot of things. I'm still researching. I just think it would be cool to have an all aluminum NA v6 conquest to do some racing in and cruising. The J series honda motors are pretty cool when I see vids of them and they sound great! But, transmission options seem limited very limited I dont know enough about the 1/2grfe or Ford 3.7 v6 but they seem like cool options as well.

This time around, I dont want a lot of power or speed just something fun and unique for my beloved lifelong project Conquest .

When you talk about cutting, are you talking for length? Because I suspect that the OHV 90 degree LS is both narrower and not as tall than the typical 60 degree DOHV modern V6. This is not a "dude, you should only use an LS" post, but a heads up. Might be worth getting your hands on some dimensions. Those "big, heavy" LS engines are really not very big or very heavy, don't assume that a V6 is any more compact just because it's a V6. This is important is space is a concern.

What he said. DOHC on a V engine adds a lot of width and height.

The only problem with LS engines is that they're no longer very cheap. The iron block truck engines are inexpensive, but they're also very heavy.

DOHC on anything adds quite a bit of size. Take a look at a fully dressed Miata engine (accessories, manifolds, etc.) and then compare the size of that to a fully dressed pushrod small-block V8. The V8 is still bigger, but not by a whole lot in most dimensions. And that's for having 3 - 4 times the displacement...

I dont think the LS is big or heavy, in my opinion. I'm not anti-LS swap. I'm just not willing to cut up this particular car for an LS swap. Thats all.

The cutting is to the firewall and basically a new trans tunnel. My biggest gripe with an LS in a Starion/Conquest is the T56 (the only transmission I would like to use with an LS in this particular car). LS1+T56=firewall and trans tunnel reworking, cutting, etc. I could put a T56 behind a 4g and not have to cut anything. It's been documented on the forums heavily. I've read every LS swap build thread multiple times because I was going to LS swap a parts car I have. I didnt do it because a buddy starion got hit and he needed a shell so I gave him my parts car. In other cars I wouldnt mind an LS at all. I've had a 1uz in my car and that engine is indeed wider than the LS but I used a sr20 5speed manual which is pretty small in size yet strong. The fit was perfect with that combo. Unfortunatly, we dont have such a fit for the LS+T56.

I just want something 'different' that is NA and not an LS for this car.

If it's the bellhousing, look into the QuickTime unit. It's more compact than the stock GM alloy unit - and scatterproof too. This is probably true of a lot of applications.

No, the whole T56 is too big. Same with the z33 6speed transmission I was going to put behind the 1uz. Only reason it works with a 4g is becasue how far forward the engine mounted in the car. There's about 15 years of threads for this swap, the way it works out is simply not the way I'd want to deal with it. I'm sure there's alternatives out there for other transmission, but like I said in my previous post "I just want something 'different' that is NA and not an LS for this car."

How about a Muncie four-speed tranny?

How about I'm not going to put an LS in this car?

No matter how much I or we try to talk about v6's in this thread. Someone blindly states, "but the LS....". This isnt what this thread is about guys. Goodness!

Keith Tanner wrote: If it's the bellhousing, look into the QuickTime unit. It's more compact than the stock GM alloy unit - and scatterproof too. This is probably true of a lot of applications.

The downside is, I haven't seen a QT bell that didn't need work, like having one or both faces machined flat/parallel, or holes redrilled. I got one that not only had the locating dowel holes in the wrong place but the starter mounts were in the wrong spot. And since the threads are in the bell, I had to modify the starter. Modifying "wear items" makes me queasy.

This is the difference between low-volume mostly handbuilt parts, and mass produced assembly line parts. You get better machining accuracy when you are set up to make a hundred thousand at a time. I'm not bagging on QT at all, it's just the reality of low volume parts.

yupididit wrote: No matter how much I or we try to talk about v6's in this thread. Someone blindly states, "but the LS....". This isnt what this thread is about guys. Goodness!

Hey, I hear ya. And you should see what hackery I had to do to the floor of a largish car to make a T56 fit in there. The Chevy bellhousing pattern is LARGE to fit large clutches, which makes it a PITA sometimes, and the go-to T56 is very much not a small transmission.

yupididit wrote: No matter how much I or we try to talk about v6's in this thread. Someone blindly states, "but the LS....". This isnt what this thread is about guys. Goodness!

Which is why I mentioned that QT bells in general are smaller than their alloy equivalents. That's based on LS experience because that's what I have. But it should apply to V6 applications as well. You've got information about your extremely specific application that those of us on the outside don't, such as the fact that the T56 ends up in a different place with whatever a 4g is. It's quite likely a V6 will end up in a similar location to an LS (as noted) which will give you the same problem. So a Muncie 4 speed may be a good option with a random V6 due to engine location.

That's why I'm asking about these v6's as options. The transmissions don't look anywhere near as big as the T56 or CD00#. The transmission behind the lfx looks about r154 size or smaller.

Came across this. Was interesting and learned some things. LFX Miata build thread

So, ironically my best friend and i were talking about the new 300 horsepower v6s tonight as a swap candidate for his 1980 b2000.

Hes thinking about the ford 3.7 from the base mustang witb a 5 speed. How bad are they to retrofit?

I know that the lfx can be done. No mopar, but honda j series was discussed as well due to the miata guys.

Keith Tanner wrote: I actually had a guy really upset at me on the phone because I didn't have a kit for an engine swap that had never been done, when he wanted that engine specifically because it hadn't been done yet.

I swear, you attract these kinds of customers. It's a strange curse.

yupididit wrote: No matter how much I or we try to talk about v6's in this thread. Someone blindly states, "but the LS....". This isnt what this thread is about guys. Goodness!

It's a Law of the Universe. If you swap anything but an LS into anything, everybody who hears about it will say "why didn't you do the LS?"

If God wanted men to swap LS motors into track cars, He wouldn't have created the Corvette.

Here's another Law of the Universe: Whatever the cheapest new BMW is, BMW will say it's the true heir to the 2002.

And another: If you buy an old BMW, everybody will say "why didn't you get the 2002?" The answer to which is, "because I've driven one . . . . "

Hey, I might have some relevant info for this thread!

Granted, my specific V6 is not 300hp, there are variants that are around 250hp.

I swapped a GM LA1 (3400 60 deg v6) into my RX7 chumpcar.

It is either the same amount of work or more than swapping in pretty much any V8.

There are at least kits and people have done most of the v8 swaps. For this one, I was on my own!

Lots of custom work that at the end of the day would have been WAY easier to push the LS or SBC or even 1UZ button.

If anybody has specific questions about what it takes to swap one of the transverse GM 60 deg V6 into something RWD, ask away!

The 1uz only fit in my car because you can get small transmissions behind them.