Anyone ever think about the 4.2 liter inline 6 vortec swap?

[chevybuilder18]

i was just reading up on this engine, havent heard of anyone doing the swap, it looks like a winner with the DOHC set up chevrolet added to it. would be an awsome swap to see, iv heard alot of praise from my elders from the old days were inline sixes were also sorta monstrous and could do burn outs and all sorts. anyone ever tryed it? the 4.2 vortec puts out 275 hp, my LM7 does the same, i wonder if it gets better milege....

[INSIDIOUS '86]

The atlas engine?

[chevybuilder18]

Originally Posted by INSIDIOUS '86

The atlas engine?

yes. the newer atlas inline six..

[83GMCK2500]

I have seen one or two swaps somewhere, I will try to find them. A friend of mine and I were looking at the I-5 & 5-speed for his S-10 but we got lazy and went Vortec 350.

[chevybuilder18]

Originally Posted by 83GMCK2500

I have seen one or two swaps somewhere, I will try to find them. A friend of mine and I were looking at the I-5 & 5-speed for his S-10 but we got lazy and went Vortec 350.

id like to grab the s10 and do the vortec 4.2 liter with a 5 speed... that would be something.. vortec 350, i cant imagine how wild it is. what i aim for in something like this is high performance and fuel economy... i was looking around, saw someone put a 4.2 vortec or atlas in there camaro, so they had more room for a turbo charger set up...

[meatwagon83]

there is a vega wagon that runs at my local strip that has one in it, stock 6 with intake and headers runs low 12s

[bnoon]

There are several 4200 Vortec inline swaps out there running tubos in many different vehicles. Sounds wussy by the sound it puts out, but can be a monster!!!

[csdineley]

My wife had a 05 envoy with the 4.2 in it. Motor blow up at about 45,000 miles. Had it replaced at the dealership with a brand new one. That one only lasted about a year. Less then 50,000 miles. All maintenanc done at the dealership. After the second engine we traded it in. Also only got 17 mpg avg. I'd say stay away.

[rs74]

My wife has a trailblazer with a 4.2 and had another one before that. They rev but make no bottom end power. I am not really impressed with that part of it.

[Ziegelsteinfaust]

Thought about the Atlas, but it has a few serious issues to overcome.

It is real tall, and requires a few minor moves.

Its oil pan is front sump. So you either need a conversion pan or modify your cross member for clearance. The pan is about $700 shipped new. If your good with a tig or torch you can mod you own. I watched a guy mod a cast pan with aluminum rod, and a hvac torch set up.

Tuning is the same a LS V8's, as is the fuel system.

MPG's would likely be a touch worse on the LM7 as it has a longer stroke, and unless you change the gear ratio no mpg will be found. The 4l80 is not going to help either so any thoughts of better mpg will require a redo of your trucks concept.

I had a bid in for a wrecked TB with 60k miles for $800 in a auction, and lost in the last few seconds for $825. So if you look it can be a cheap alternative to a LS V8 or a SBC for mpg purposes with out killing its usefulness as a truck. From my research TB's got there best mpg with 3.73's on stock tires. With roughly equates to 3.55's with 255/60/15's in a square body. Plus with the weight loss a little less gear may work too, but no one builds for mpgs to much.

[chevybuilder18]

Originally Posted by Ziegelsteinfaust

Thought about the Atlas, but it has a few serious issues to overcome.

It is real tall, and requires a few minor moves.

Its oil pan is front sump. So you either need a conversion pan or modify your cross member for clearance. The pan is about $700 shipped new. If your good with a tig or torch you can mod you own. I watched a guy mod a cast pan with aluminum rod, and a hvac torch set up.

Tuning is the same a LS V8's, as is the fuel system.

MPG's would likely be a touch worse on the LM7 as it has a longer stroke, and unless you change the gear ratio no mpg will be found. The 4l80 is not going to help either so any thoughts of better mpg will require a redo of your trucks concept.

I had a bid in for a wrecked TB with 60k miles for $800 in a auction, and lost in the last few seconds for $825. So if you look it can be a cheap alternative to a LS V8 or a SBC for mpg purposes with out killing its usefulness as a truck. From my research TB's got there best mpg with 3.73's on stock tires. With roughly equates to 3.55's with 255/60/15's in a square body. Plus with the weight loss a little less gear may work too, but no one builds for mpgs to much.

Oh no... i was just thinking if anyones ever done the swap. i never said i was gonna do it with my C10, im keeping the V8 . but i was thinking bout the 60 degree 3.4 liter V6 swap vs this 4.2 liter inline six swap in a 2WD S10.. it would be different... i believe we have heard how unreliable they are at 50,000 miles, from someone who has owned one... if i ever do it, i know the stroke is about 4 inchs, so a hd 5 or 6 speed behind it would be idea.. just thinking of things. i didnt know if anyone ever thought of doing it in a half ton or 4X4, which the engines do come in 4X4s, and dont know why..,.

[chevybuilder18]

Originally Posted by rs74

My wife has a trailblazer with a 4.2 and had another one before that. They rev but make no bottom end power. I am not really impressed with that part of it.

does it have a timing chain or belt??

[csdineley]

I can't say for all but in 05 they had a timing chain. Which is what happened to our first engine. Timing gear broke, which allowed a valve to hit the piston. Which broke both of them. Made a great v-day gift for the wife.

[woodwright]

I think the biggest flaw with this engine swap is that it is not a standard GM bellhousing pattern. They came with 4l60s behind them, but they never came with a manual. The 5 cylinders came with a 5 speed that will bolt up to the 6, but you have to run a custom flywheel. And the computer will not work outside of the original vehicle without a major reflash. Theres a lot of info about it on inliners.org, and vortec4200.com. I thought about doing this swap in my 64 chevy II.

[rs74]

I don't remember what year it was but had seen on CL that someone had taken an older truck body and put it on a trailblazer chassis. They way they had done it was not my taste at all. It just didn't look right.

[chevybuilder18]

Originally Posted by csdineley

I can't say for all but in 05 they had a timing chain. Which is what happened to our first engine. Timing gear broke, which allowed a valve to hit the piston. Which broke both of them. Made a great v-day gift for the wife.

wow... thats worse then fords wooden gear set in the fuel injected 300 inlines..
idk what kinda crap they put in the engine but it looks like you gotta swap the thing every 30000 like a timing belt.. its pretty bumming but i guess if its worth it to any one i would suggest the idea of every 30000 miles of swapping gears or belts just like the other OHC vehicles.

Originally Posted by woodwright

I think the biggest flaw with this engine swap is that it is not a standard GM bellhousing pattern. They came with 4l60s behind them, but they never came with a manual. The 5 cylinders came with a 5 speed that will bolt up to the 6, but you have to run a custom flywheel. And the computer will not work outside of the original vehicle without a major reflash. Theres a lot of info about it on inliners.org, and vortec4200.com. I thought about doing this swap in my 64 chevy II.

thats what i was thinking, the 5 cylinder came with a 5 speed, its almost like bolting a 4L80E up to a LS1, needing special equipment like a spacer or something

[67RS/SSx2]

I have owned one of these in an Envoy since 2003. Before buying it I thought it would be a good little towing engine (275 hp/275 ft lb). Have changed my mind since then.

I told my wife the other day (it is her DD) that it didn't have enough power to get out of its own way. She asked, "when?". I said "any time after you start it!"

I would not waste time on it.

[ofnaman]

From my experience as a GM tech I'll throw in my two cents. The inline 6's are ok engines and that's about it. They are ok in the vehicles they are designed for, and they are relatively reliable if taken care of, they are not great on gas, and they are not powerhouses. Like CSDINELEY stated, engine failures can and do happen. Personally, I think the problems associated with these engines is a material quality issue, not neccessarily a design issue. Most of the vehicles I've seen with engine failures have been really beat up, with a ton of miles on them, and have not been maintained, although, I have seen two of these engines fail that have been very well maintained and the vehicles have been taken care of. The 4 and 5 cylinder variants of this engine I personally think are complete junk. The sad thing is I've done more 5 cylinder heads and complete engines than any other engine GM makes. Mileage and maintanence does not seem to make any difference on the 5 cylinders. On top of that, they are annoyingly loud, and are very underpowered. My general thought on these engines is that GM should have just offered the 4 cylinder ecotec, and 4.3 V6 in the colorado's (and variant models) and the 4.3 v6 and 5.3 v8 in the trailblazers (and variant models), and never used these inline engines.

I'm all for running inline 6's. I've seen some really cool ones built. I just think GM missed the mark on these.

[79Betty]

If you like warped blocks and heads go for it. Do 5 out of our 15 motors a day of these and of those 5, 4 are usually warped. We straighten them but it adds about 4 hours worth of work so they aren't friendly. My friend does have one bought it new and 7 years later it's fine. The intake ports LOVE to gum up with carbon so watch that.

[pearsonhoss]

leave the 4.2 alone im a gm man but you cant chrome plate a turd and expect flies not to come to it

[flamingbig10]

The shop I used to work at a customer had a trail blazer with a 4.2 with 400,000, with just the normal maintenance stuff

[nekkidhillbilly]

well ive delt with them alot. they dont make the power of a v8 but are worse on gas. my best friends envoy would pull 15 mpg on a good day when my 4.8 truck which was heavier would pull 19 but still had alot more power. if i was going to swap something that wouldnt get 16 mpg theres just better options. gm offered the 5.3 for the same reasons in the tb.

[dieseldawg142]

i think it all boils down to how it's driven, & how it's maintained. we bought the wife's XUV (funny how there always the wife's) new in '04. i have done strict syn. oil changes, filters, plugs,etc-followed the service manual to a T. it just turned 100,000kms couple weeks ago (approx. 60,000 miles). motor has been flawless, not one single thing. did have a computer glitch in the tranny, fixed in 30 secs under warranty, steering started groaning, replaced rack & pinion under warr., & last year the DIC took a crap, i ended up replacing the gauge cluster myself.
i agree it is totally soft on the bottom end, but pulls not bad when you get it up around 4-5 g, you have to really keep the revs up when towing too.
fuel mileage isn't what i expected from a six, but i'm used to driving 5-12 mpg trucks, so it don't bother me, considering it's 275 hp hauling a 5000 lb suv around
for some reason, her four-two seems to eat thermostats. i have changed it twice, both stuck open, i will be nice to the engineers, they are HARD to get at!


may have fuel mileage & power issues, but reliability has never been a problem for us, 10 yrs old with a 100 thousand kms & never been cracked open or touched (just maintaince items)
(plus i hardly drive it)

[nekkidhillbilly]

well im not saying there the worst engine out there but when you can get a v8 that gets better mpg, makes more power, just as cheap, easy to find, and is probably more reliable (many ls engines with 200k easy) why would you go for the 4.2? also a ext envoy should only weigh just under 4800 lbs with a v6. which is the same weight as the 4.8 4wd truck im talking about.

[dieseldawg142]

Originally Posted by nekkidhillbilly

well im not saying there the worst engine out there but when you can get a v8 that gets better mpg, makes more power, just as cheap, easy to find, and is probably more reliable (many ls engines with 200k easy) why would you go for the 4.2? also a ext envoy should only weigh just under 4800 lbs with a v6. which is the same weight as the 4.8 4wd truck im talking about.

i'm not saying there the worst or best out there either. myself, i dont buy new vehicles. WIFE,WIFE,WIFE, she liked, she wanted it-you know the saying, happy wife, blah, blah...
all's i,m saying is it has been trouble free for us (thank christ!), if she still has it when it ever hits 200k, i'll let you know how it was.
i myself like old school v8's, cubic inches, gas guzzling dam the mpg's
and her envoy xuv doesn't weigh 5000lbs, according to the paperwork we got with it, it weighs 5208 lbs.
the xuv has a sliding roof, power midgate window, the midgate, power 2 way tailgate, all those electric motors & assorted crap make them heavier than an ext.