88-98 350 into an 86

[chemsearch]

A friend of mine is getting rid of an 88-98 truck (don't know the exact year),with a 350,and i want to put the engine in my 86 k10, currently with a 305 and (i think) a th350 trans. What am i going to need to do to make this work? Should I keep the trans thats in it now, or take whatever's in the friends truck (700r4 i guess... tell me if i could be wrong)? Am i gonna run into any problems doing this swap? Thanks for any info you guys have, i just wanna get an opinion on this before i dive into it.

[kevinr1970]

If yours is a "K" (4x4) then the tranny won't work. I believe on the newer trucks the transfer case drops on the driver side.
The engine won't have a provision for a mechanical fuel pump either so plan on coming up with something for that. Which isn't even considering the newer engine will be be TBI (88-95/96) or MPFI(?) (96/97-00) and yours is carb'd.

I have a friend that put a newer passenger car engine in his Suburban and he pulled it not long after he installed it. He said he found out later that that the torque curve of the passenger car engines isn't the best for a truck. But if your getting a truck engine you should be fine.

I am only about 80% sure of this so you might check other sources before taking my word for it.

[Pyrotechnic]

We need more info here. There were a lot of changes through 88-98 so we need to know the exact year. Is the donor truck 4x4 ? Are you planning on staying with fuel injection or converting to a carb ?

[vintagesteel]

Originally Posted by kevinr1970

If yours is a "K" (4x4) then the tranny won't work. I believe on the newer trucks the transfer case drops on the driver side.
The engine won't have a provision for a mechanical fuel pump either so plan on coming up with something for that. Which isn't even considering the newer engine will be be TBI (88-95/96) or MPFI(?) (96/97-00) and yours is carb'd.

I have a friend that put a newer passenger car engine in his Suburban and he pulled it not long after he installed it. He said he found out later that that the torque curve of the passenger car engines isn't the best for a truck. But if your getting a truck engine you should be fine.

I am only about 80% sure of this so you might check other sources before taking my word for it.

wouldn't it have been easier to swap the cam than to pull motor back out? maybe swap gears to get the torque where it needed to be?

[chemsearch]

the donor truck is 4x4, and i'd like to keep the fuel injection system on the donor engine. still trying to harass my friend into finding out the year for me, i'll find out and post as soon as i can. thanks for the help.

- Tom