EBAY 3.1 TURBO, good deal?

[torq455]

check this: http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1991-...55705768QQrdZ1 would it be worth it?

[RedBird]

probabaly not if it burned oil @ 90k miles. They did not come with forged pistons and they had the same cam as N/A 3.1's. only different things as far as i remember are injectors, crossover, rear exhaust manifold and the UIM. and the crossover needs work to clear the tranny mount in a J-body. plus that turbo is on the small side, stock, IIRC

[torq455]

i saw the forged pistons and different cam and said yeah right. just so rare to see one, just wondered if it was worth it.

[TurboSedan]

you could just turbocharge a regular NA 3.1 with TGP parts. that's what i did.

from what i have seen for myself, the only difference between the LH0 and LG5 shortblocks is that the LG5 came with a Melling HV oil pump. i've had an LG5 piston out and it's definately a cast Mahle piston but i haven't been able to compare it to an LH0 piston yet. i think the crank and block and probably the pistons are the same between the two. the rods are the same. the slight CR difference is in the heads. i think the '89 LH0 actually has the same heads as the '89/'90 LG5.

of course, the downside it finding all of the parts you need seperately through ebay, forums, junkyarding etc. it can be done (i've done it) but it might take awhile to get everything needed ecspecially if you're looking for a good deal. i just parted out my old Turbo STE. i still have the good running LG5 sitting in the corner of my garage but already sold all of the turbo specific stuff off of it (it's just a spare engine for my Cutlass if (when) i need it).

but IMO, that engine auction isn't worth it. it's at $222 right now and consideirng what shipping would be to Nebraska it's already way more than i would pay. it sounds like the engine needs to be rebuilt and he doesn't say anything about the condition of the transmission. it's also missing the crossover pipe, and getting a TGP crossover pipe rebuilt can be expensive, and you'd have to find a core anyway. it's also missing the downpipe bracket and probably more things you'll need. whoever removed the engine from the car cut the TGP specific fuel lines :? fwiw it was actually rated at 205hp/225tq not 200hp/260tq.

[torq455]

i corrected the guy about his statements and his responce is: "Thats awsome, I'll end the auction now on the basis of my stupidity." hahahaha

[Guest]

Wrong the CR wasn't different because of the heads. It was different because of hte CH of the piston. The Mahle piston had a slightly shorter CH which knocked the CR down by .1 to 8.8:1

All the heads were the same.

[onefastV6]

Sold for $620 what a steal, lol

[mfewtrail]

Wrong the CR wasn't different because of the heads. It was different because of hte CH of the piston. The Mahle piston had a slightly shorter CH which knocked the CR down by .1 to 8.8:1

All the heads were the same.

The TGP heads are slightly different. Here's an old quote from the w-body board(and it's been posted here before).

"VIN T Engines used from 1988-1990 stock head casting numbers: 10048651, 10048696, 14089834
VIN T W/O/SEFI Engines used from 1991-1994 stock head casting number: 10087511
VIN T W/SEFI Engines used from 1993-1994 stock head casting number: 10087511
VIN M Enhanced Engines used from 1993-1995 D-Port stock head casting number: 10154743
VIN M Enhanced Engines used from 1996-1999 D-Port stock head casting number: 24503769
VIN J Special Emissions Spec used in 1999-? stock head casting number: 102181170

VIN V Engine (cast with a ?T? on the block) used in 1989-1990 TGP and TSTE had stock head casting number: 10087511

The stock/NA VIN T engines of 1988-1990 used the 3 different casting heads that all had the smaller designed/more pronounced heart shaped combustion chamber, which was replaced with the 10087511 in 1991-1994 with its more open/less defined heart shaped combustion chamber, then back again for VIN M 1993-1995 and VIN M 1996-1999 with the smaller chamber and more pronounced heart shaped combustion chamber (shuffling the deck a lot!). Changing the piston?s dish volume allowed working with these different heads/combustion chamber volumes, and the 2 different head gasket thicknesses of .040? and .060? to achieve design compression rations for the engine

So, for the 1989-1990 TGP and TSTE, they used the yet unreleased at that time, head casting 10087511 and its larger, less defined heart shaped combustion chamber, with the deep dished 28cc/ml (what Mahle quoted me and I cc?d out of it too) piston top to achieve the .1 drop in compression ratio to 8.8 (or 8.78 depending on what you read)"


Just out of curiosity though, what is the Vin T/NA pistons compression height and what's the supposed figure you've seen for the Vin V's?

[TurboSedan]

The TGP heads are slightly different. Here's an old quote from the w-body board(and it's been posted here before).

"VIN T Engines used from 1988-1990 stock head casting numbers: 10048651, 10048696, 14089834
VIN T W/O/SEFI Engines used from 1991-1994 stock head casting number: 10087511
VIN T W/SEFI Engines used from 1993-1994 stock head casting number: 10087511
VIN V Engine (cast with a ?T? on the block) used in 1989-1990 TGP and TSTE had stock head casting number: 10087511

The stock/NA VIN T engines of 1988-1990 used the 3 different casting heads that all had the smaller designed/more pronounced heart shaped combustion chamber, which was replaced with the 10087511 in 1991-1994 with its more open/less defined heart shaped combustion chamber, then back again for VIN M 1993-1995 and VIN M 1996-1999 with the smaller chamber and more pronounced heart shaped combustion chamber (shuffling the deck a lot!). Changing the piston?s dish volume allowed working with these different heads/combustion chamber volumes, and the 2 different head gasket thicknesses of .040? and .060? to achieve design compression rations for the engine

So, for the 1989-1990 TGP and TSTE, they used the yet unreleased at that time, head casting 10087511 and its larger, less defined heart shaped combustion chamber, with the deep dished 28cc/ml (what Mahle quoted me and I cc?d out of it too) piston top to achieve the .1 drop in compression ratio to 8.8 (or 8.78 depending on what you read)"

some of that info is definatley wrong Matt. i've never heard of a VIN 'T' that had SFI? i've also never heard of the TGP pistons having a different dish.

both sets of my TGP heads have head casting #10087511 like the above info implies though. i'm 99.9% sure the old '91 VIN 'T' LH0 heads i had were casting #10048696 (i threw them away a long time ago so can't double check). regardless, they definatley weren't the #10087511 casting # that the TGP heads have.

i was basing my statement that the TGP had lower compression due to these pics i took:

original '91 VIN 'T' LH0 heads:

http://www.turbosedan.com/cutlass/DSC01414.JPG

they have a much more defined heart shape combustion chamber and the 'tab' near the spark plug hole looks a little bigger than the TGP heads:

http://www.turbosedan.com/cutlass/engine/DSC01483.JPG

http://www.turbosedan.com/cutlass/engine/DSC01478.JPG

the dish on the VIN 'V' 'LG5' pistons and VIN 'T' 'LH0' pistons 'looked' exactly the same to me so i figured the slight drop from 8.9:1 to 8.8:1 must be due to the different combustion chamber shape/volume. i didn't actually cc them or anything. i still think LG5 pistons and LH0 pistons are probably exactly the same.

[TurboSedan]

"VIN T Engines used from 1988-1990 stock head casting numbers: 10048651, 10048696, 14089834

since the VIN 'T' wasn't available in '88, i am thinking some of those casting #s could be for a 2.8. Shawn Lin once mentioned the '89 VIN 'T' LH0 was rated at a slightly lower hp (130hp?). and he also thought the '89 VIN 'T' LH0 had the same heads as the TGP. if that's true then the '89 LH0 was probably rated at a lower hp because of the lower CR. it seems to me that the VIN 'T' head casting #10048696 wasn't released until '90 or '91.

VIN T W/O/SEFI Engines used from 1991-1994 stock head casting number: 10087511

yeah....my '91 VIN 'T' heads were casting #10048696, not #10087511.

[mfewtrail]

the dish on the VIN 'V' 'LG5' pistons and VIN 'T' 'LH0' pistons 'looked' exactly the same to me so i figured the slight drop from 8.9:1 to 8.8:1 must be due to the different combustion chamber shape/volume.

Jeff M. typed the information above that I posted. I don't think he meant the piston dish was different, he was just stating that the piston style was "dished" and he used "deep" to describe the dish.


EDIT: Made a correction...that info was actually typed by Jeff. Jud did type some comparison info in an older post where he cc'd NA and Vin V heads and found that the Vin V's had slightly larger combustion chambers and attributed to the compression difference to that.

EDIT #2: Refer to this post...page 2 specifically.

http://www.w-body.com/forum/index.php/topic,7028.30.html