FWD Pentastar swap

I'm tossing around engine ideas in my head for my early Dodge minivan. I keep hearing good stuff about the pentastar engine, but it's hard to find information on people swapping them into FWD applications.

Does anyone know what bellhousing pattern it uses or have a picture of it? I've got a stout A604 in my van now that I rebuilt a couple years ago with kevlar clutches, shift kit, diff pin retainers, etc. and I would like to keep it if I could. It would be awesome if the pentastar used the same bellhousing as the 3.3/3.8 pushrod engnines.

I also have access to a wrecked PT cruiser turbo that I could snatch the powertrain out of, but I like the pentastar idea more.

Planned usage is daily driver that does occasional long trips and embarrasses other cars at stoplights from time to time.

The PT Cruiser Turbo will make more power and get better mileage, it's a MOPAR so rock it!

Fits nicely into the Caravan, keep all your accys and less hacking.

I would go with the 2.4 power train as there are people that have done all the hard work, check out turbo-mopar.com

The Pentastar engine I do not believe uses the same bolt pattern as the 41TE, but I do like the ideal.

I THINK it is the same bellhousing as the old 3.3/3.8 and 2.7/3.2/3.5/4.0. A few minutes googling didnt turn up anything conclusive but i did find an ebay listing for a 3.6 61te trans showing a pic and the bellhousing LOOKS like the same old v6 pattern.

I am for this idea but sadly you will not be able to find much help on it. The good thing is that, assuming the bellhousing is the same, everything from the trans bellhousing out to the tires will be the same as what you already have (Assuming you have a 3.3? You said 1st gen and 1st gens only got 3.3 for one year in 1990).

I have a 1989 van with an SRT4 setup in it. I bought it that way but i would not have built it myself. I actually plan to swap it out eventually for a mitsu 6g72 3.0 setup. 1st gen caravans can take a ton of different motors. Is there anything pushing you away from the older 3.5? I had one (actually STILL have the engine..) in my old modded 97 intrepid and it was pretty sweet. We're talking 230-250 hp to start and go up from there. One of the cool things about the 3.5 is that it works on the same inputs as the 3.3 as far as reference sensors and stuff. In the old 1g intrepids you could actually run a 3.3 on a 3.5 computer and vice versa. What that means for you is that if you decided to try a 3.5 (or even a 4.0 shortblock with an older 3.5 top end) you would just need a 3.3 harness/ecu and do some harness mods to get it to fire up. From there you would have to tune it, but there is SOME ability to change things in the 3.3 SBEC computer just based on the code's similarity to other SBECs which have been more fully hacked for the 3.0 and 2.2/2.5 turbo motors.

My approach for my 3.8-swapped 1990 Dynasty is to try and have the rev limiter, speed limiter, and base timing in the stock 3.3 cal bumped up, and then do everything else with an AEM FIC (which is in the trunk but not wired in...).

If you are rebuilding your own transmissions im 100% sure you can pull off a cool engine swap so i hope you'll keep the the ideas flowing! I know a lot about these FWD dodges and id be super happy to help on a 1g caravan engine v6 swap that's never been done before!

I'm still leaning towards a pentastar swap (I've got an omni here that needs that PT cruiser motor anyway). I like the idea of roughly doubling my 3.3 HP and probably gaining fuel economy at the same time. My van is a 92, not the earliest of minivans, but close. I'd done some research a while back into using the 4.0 crank and some other mix -n match parts along with some serious head porting and a reground cam, but I'd be overly optimistic to think I could get 300 HP for anywhere near the price of a junkyard motor and a megasquirt.

And even if it is a different bellhousing pattern that's what adaptor plates are for. I'd like to not have to run the factory computers, network and modules without a very good reason.

Well, i think it would be easier to get a 3.5 van running and up to 300 hp than it would be to swap in a 3.6, but that's assuming the bellhousing is different.

If it's the same bellhousing the pentastar may be the slightly easier route to an n/a 300hp v6. The 3.5 would require something beyond basic bolt ons to hit 300hp (reground cams is probably the biggie).

BUT. One of the things you have to consider is that you have to retain enough of the oem ecu/harness setup to keep the TCM happy (exactly how much that is, im not sure). The 604 basically cant be controlled by anything but stock controls and anything that doesnt play nice with the stock tcm setup will require you to come up with another transmission. One of the good things about the 3.5 swap is you dont have to rig anything to keep the trans working since you'd be using factory engine controls with a modified tune.

Another 300hp n/a v6 option that has less ifs than pentastar is to swap your trans guts into a 3.0 case and run a mivec 6g75.

When you say you dont want to be stuck with factory modules, are you talking about the stock stuff you have, or the stuff that comes with a pentastar? The 2g vans like what you have have a lot of interior stuff working off a bcm that requires certain things from the engine harness so if you want to avoid rewiring your entire interior you may want to look into that before assuming you are going to rip out the factory engine harness. I helped a local friend swap an older 2.5 turbo and 5spd setup into a 95 van and we had to spend some time making the BCM happy to get gauges and lights and all that to work on the interior. I can put you in touch with him if you have questions about that part of it.

I have a 3.6 in a 2012 Avenger R/T. Fabulous engine. Go for it. I have thought the same thing. In fact I tried to get a wrecked avenger just to use the drivetrain in the 89 van I have. Take the 6 speed trans and use that also! The 3.6 is in the new FWD big van mopar is selling right now by the way. A very good choice. 300 hp right out of the box with no mods is sweet!

JohnnyBquick wrote: I have a 3.6 in a 2012 Avenger R/T. Fabulous engine. Go for it. I have thought the same thing. In fact I tried to get a wrecked avenger just to use the drivetrain in the 89 van I have. Take the 6 speed trans and use that also! The 3.6 is in the new FWD big van mopar is selling right now by the way. A very good choice. 300 hp right out of the box with no mods is sweet!

And that 4500lb 'minivan' with just shy of 300hp engine will net 26mpg or slightly better on the highway. We average about 23mpg.

I think Johnny is actually talking about the ProMaster.

And for the record, an empty promaster with a 3.6 runs 16s in the 1/4 mile. Wasnt long ago that was pretty good for a family car, let alone a commercial cargo van!!

I wasn't wanting to run the modules and network out of the newer van unless I have to. I'd prefer staying with a actual dodge motor and not a 3.0. I just don't have any fond memories of mitsu V-6's other than being able to identify which vans had them at stoplights by the amount of smoke they produced :)

The 3.3 is still running strong right now though and so there's no need to pull it out now. This is queued up after the body work on the dart and the omni motor swap. Still I may need to hurry up the demise of the 3.3 and may see how much nitrous it likes.

Vigo wrote: I think Johnny is actually talking about the ProMaster. And for the record, an empty promaster with a 3.6 runs 16s in the 1/4 mile. Wasnt long ago that was pretty good for a family car, let alone a commercial cargo van!!

I think my fastest car (tie between Miata & auto Saturn) runs a low 16 :(

I wasn't wanting to run the modules and network out of the newer van unless I have to. I'd prefer staying with a actual dodge motor and not a 3.0. I just don't have any fond memories of mitsu V-6's other than being able to identify which vans had them at stoplights by the amount of smoke they produced :) The 3.3 is still running strong right now though and so there's no need to pull it out now. This is queued up after the body work on the dart and the omni motor swap. Still I may need to hurry up the demise of the 3.3 and may see how much nitrous it likes.

If you're looking to blaze trails there's no real advantage to the mitsu engines because they've all made tons of power (over 500whp just for the old 3.0 sohc 12v let alone anything else in the 6g family which have been taken to 1000+hp). The dodge engines have similar geometry and good headflow so all they really need is someone to put in the time and actually document a real build .

If you're against forced induction you wont like this idea but i think the 2.7L is pretty ripe for a high power build. It has basically the same chamber and valvetrain as the 2.0/2.4 4cyls which have made tons and tons of power. Imagine a 700hp SRT4 engine, and now give that engine two more cyls worth of head flow (~50% more than 700hp is..) and a little more displacement. I think that engine is probably power limited by its crankshaft. Not too many engines can say that. But a lot of people have a bad opinion of that engine for reasons that are basically irrelevant to an engine swapper.

My personal opinion is that if you're capable of doing an engine swap noone has done before, you're CERTAINLY capable of having a shop press in some new valve guides for you (mitsu 3.0) or changing your damn oil so the engine doesnt sludge up (dodge 2.7) etc etc.