92 firebird, want to swap 90-92 heads & etc onto it-need

[no_doz]

ok guys, after a lot of serious deliberation, i think ive about had it with the setup that my firebird has stock. it weighs less than my old 91 lumina euro, but gets half the gas mileage and has half the power. every earlier 90s lumina 3.1 that ive owned i have loved & im curious if i can start giving the same respect to my firebird. what i want to do is swap the whole topend (heads, intake manifolds, etc), & im curious as to what all i will need & how hard it will be to do? can someone PLEASE make a list of the things i will need & let me know how hard the swap is going to be? also would it be possible to take the motor out of a 90-92 lumina 3.1 & just swap it in?

any help would be extremely appreciated guys, i love the way the car looks, but it is nothing at all like my old luminas in means of power & gas mileage (i spend $10 running the firebird nicely whereas i spent $5 running the shit out of the luminas, & got a lot more response out of the lumis). Thanks, Js.

[geoffinbc]

Search man. It has been covered. You start new topics every day on stuff that has been beaten to death.

[no_doz]

i search but all i find is bits & pieces that dont help me because i dont know how they all work together, im still looking...

[Doubt_Incarnate]

there are a lot fo diference in the fwd and rwd setups. for starters you'll have to replace pistons to use the aluminum heads, or have a really high 11:1 CR. maybe you want that, i dunno. you'll also need to figure out how to get the new stuff to fit with a distributor if your car has one. best way it looks like to do a hybrid in a f-body is to use the newer 3x00 heads and intakes. you will have to swap the upper/lower manifolds around to get the thermostat housing in the right general area, and the throttle body to. you need to talk to the_raven, he has a cool rwd hybrid setup, but it is in a jimmy tho. he'll know more what has to be done.

[no_doz]

good to know, man-ill give him a hollar. what i want to do is to swap all of the electronics to basically have the same setup i had in my old lumis except with a rwd tranny on it. also, the high compression doesnt bother me one bit as long as it will run properly on 93 octane gas, which ive heard anything up to 11.5:1 will work.

[no_doz]

just looked & his is a 3.2l into a jimmy, which i dont see how that impacts my head swap?

[Doubt_Incarnate]

you have to swap over the entire top end. not just the heads. just about all the things he had to work out you will to.

i belive his started as a 2.8 jimmy. bored out 1mm, and then add a 3.1 crank and pistons and you get 3.2L. he had to fabricate a timing setup to work with the DIS since he couldnt use a distributor with the newer heads and intake. granted his is turbo, but you'll still need to put an effort into it.

you need: the heads from the donor, AND everything else above them. new gaskets for the entire top end swap unless some are the reusable type. you'll probly need the distributor hole plug since a distributor (if the car has one stock) won't fit (or be prepared to not pump oil), since you might be going from dstributor to dis, you'll need the ecm/pcm, wireing harness (or mod yours with the needed wires). or out on a limb you could try to make a mount to drive the oem distributor like an acesory, but that isnt a good idea since belts slip.

i dont even know about accesories.

my build in the garage has iron head pistons with aluminum heads. the ratio with felpro gaskets is upwards of 11:1, im trying to think of how to get it under 11., thinking of trying oem head gaskets for a 3400. gaskets for iron heads will get you over 11.5:1 and oem aluminum head gaskets for 2.8/3.1 will get you just under 11:1

[no_doz]

Re: 92 firebird, want to swap 90-92 heads & etc onto it-

...im curious if i can start giving the same respect to my firebird. what i want to do is swap the whole topend (heads, intake manifolds, etc), & im curious as to what all i will need & how hard it will be to do?...

[bszopi]

You aren't going to find EXACTLY what you are looking for, so you will HAVE TO piece stuff together to get where you want to be. With that said, check these 2 threads:

http://60degreev6.com/discussion/viewtopic.php?t=650

http://60degreev6.com/discussion/viewtopic.php?t=1043

Basically talks about swapping a 3x00 top end onto a 3.4L Camaro, but it should be pretty close to the same for a 3.1L. Why you'd want to use GenII stuff instead of GenIII stuff is beyond me...

I'm not really sure why you are thinking the Lumina had more power than your Firebird. If they are around the same year, then the power output will basically be the same. Perhaps you just need to do a tune-up on the engine before you try to do anything else.

And I hate to tell you, but nobody is going to spoon-feed you this information. Put forth some effort yourself. No one on this site got to where they are at by being spoonfed every little detail. Unfortunately for us and this engine, this is more of a grassroots community, so things are only figured out by trial and error and alot of research.

[no_doz]

k, i just had figured that someone here had done it & would know what would be needed. it may just be that i need to do a tune up, but right now a lumina 3.1 automatic (any model) would kill it, even including the same & earlier years. i know because i owned both, plus the gas mileage of the firebird in its current state is a maximum of about 14 mpg which is horrible when compared to all of my luminas that got 24-26 on a regular basis with a lot of hard running in between. would a simple tune up make THAT much of a difference? im curious because if i got & drop 1-200 into a tune up & only gain 2 mpg and virtually no noticeable power that would be kind of pointless. i still think the problem resides in the type of injection, that or the motor may just be tired & in that case i might just be better off buying a whole lumina & swapping motors.

[no_doz]

if i was wanting to know what electronic stuff i would need to take off the lumi, would i just look at what is hooked up to the top end or ?

[RacerX11]

yes.

[CJROTHY]

Allright - it's official: SOMETHING IS WRONG WITH YOUR ENGINE - Fix it first. How can I say this without even looking under your hood? My 2.8 '86 automatic Firechicken with 308,000mi is still getting 23hwy/18city. Don't get me wrong - I ain't passing any Luminas driven by manic soccer-moms, but if your mileage is anything less than 15mpg, then you setup has serious maintenance issues.

Much cheaper to run a compression check, clean your plugs, injectors, change filters, _PLUG WIRES_, sensors (MAF hot wire sensors are notorious for failure), and check TB and both intake manifolds for leaks.

Somewhere in that little list you will most likely find a large performance boat-anchor. If not, then you chip is shot and you have been driving around in limp-home-mode.

If your compression is even and good, then it will be far cheaper and faster to fix it than mod it - unless you want to rod it.

[geoffinbc]

No kidding man. Shit my truck gets over 20MPG with the 3.4L in it and there is nothing I can do to make it worse. I drive hard and always pass people. I can't stand being in the back of a lineup. So with my driving style getting me 20MPG you should not be having problems with a car which is lighter and an MPFI system which is better than TBI.

[Guest]

Doubt is right, everything I did will apply to your swap, mine just happens to be in a truck instead on an F-body.

I'd recommend starting with a 3.4 from a camaro though, not just for the displacment, but also because it has a spot in the side of the block for the crank trigger, which will eliminate the need to build one like I did.

I think most of the rest has been covered, except for exhaust...

Regardless of going turbo or N/A you will need to fabricate exhaust manifolds or headers, due to the different exhaust bolt spacing, and if you go with the genIII top end (HIGHLY recommended), the port shape will also be different.

You know, I've posted in depth info on this swap at least 5 times now, probably more. Search "hybrid" and search for me as an author, you'll find very specific threads on this subject.