Turbo 4.3 Vortec vs 307 SBC

So watching the latest roadkill has got me thinking about trading my 307 for a turbo 4.3 Vortec. Any thoughts and would the 4.3 bolt up to an older th350?

from a blazer forum:

some guy said: It will bolt up. A TH350 is about 2.5 inches shorter than a 4l60e at the tailshaft for a 2wd.

If somebody wants to trade you a factory turbo 4.3(or one built up like that) for a stock 307 you take it and laugh all the way home.

In reply to Kenny_McCormic: I meant like sell my 307 and all the performance parts for it and buy a 4.3 and build it to a budget turbo engine

It will bolt to the trans, but the engine mounts are different IIRC. Look at S10 V8 swaps for more info.

Sitting here discussing this idea with my crazy (in a good way) chevy friends, I remembered I have a 401 AMC with no purpose in life yet, and a set of heads to wake it up.

In reply to DCharger68:

Well then get going with it. I am now looking for one to possible put in my Comanche.

I'm strongly considering it but I can't find a transmission for one

In reply to DCharger68:

a TorqueFlite 727 is the factory tranny to the 360's and should bolt up but it has to be one that was built for amc since the bell-housing is different. the t400 came factory behind the 401 but you have to have the amc bell-housing for one. I believe the T18a is the manual trannt that came behind the 401. But you have people like advanced adapters and novak to put most trannys behind it.

some guy on pirate4x4 said: Only 401 flexplates/flywheels can be used on them. Th400s have 3 bolts, 727tf has 4 bolts.

from this thread which will prob have decent tranny selection info for you.

In reply to DCharger68:

I was always told it was an sbc with two cylinders cut off and assumed anything that would bolt to a gen 1 sbc would also bolt to a 4.3.

T5?

In reply to Opti: I was talking for the AMC 401. If I use a 4.3 it'll have a th350 or th400 behind it.

If you wanna go efi it can be tricky, the stock efi uses spider injection and cant really be upgraded. You can get a typhoon/syclone intake but they are expensive and hard to find, or use a marine intake but are also pricey, or convert acarb intake for efi and use cut down sbc fuel rails.

Also if I remember right there arent many good flowing heads for them but with boost you can just compensate with a few extra psi.

and pretty sure they keep the sbc bellhousing bolt pattern so that gives you trans options

check out syty.net for more info on boosting the 4.3

In reply to DCharger68:

Why swap the engine out? All of the same work to turbo the 4.3 can be used to turbo the 307.

An older 4.3 is essentially a SBC with 2 cylinders cut out of the middle.

wvumtnbkr wrote: In reply to DCharger68: Why swap the engine out? All of the same work to turbo the 4.3 can be used to turbo the 307. An older 4.3 is essentially a SBC with 2 cylinders cut out of the middle.

Exactly what I was thinking. At the end of the day, the ONLY reason for the 4.3L is because it should be free even if in good shape. But if you already have a 307 in there (or basically, any engine) I think the point of the article was boost cures everything.

In the grand scheme of things, it would have been MUCH easier for the roadkill guys (and probably cheaper) to make 350whp and 400wtq with any beat to E36 M3 350 sbc from any year, slap a cam and vortec heads on it and call it a day. It also would have been cheaper.

If you didn't notice, they allude a couple times to how much money it cost them to do this. This wasn't really a "bang for the buck" as much as a "how cheap can we do THIS specific crazy idea". I applaud their efforts, and it is super wicked badass and I'd love to do it, but at the end of the day, it wasn't really "worth" it.

HiTempguy wrote: If you didn't notice, they allude a couple times to how much money it cost them to do this. This wasn't really a "bang for the buck" as much as a "how cheap can we do THIS specific crazy idea". I applaud their efforts, and it is super wicked badass and I'd love to do it, but at the end of the day, it wasn't really "worth" it.

This too. The carb alone on that motor probably cost more than we tend to spend on whole engines, or cars.

A fellow that goes by UR50Slo on fullthrottlev6 has some good info on mix matching used and ebay parts to build a budget turbo setup, link below.

http://www.fullthrottlev6.com/forums/showthread.php?50198-4.3L-Vortec-Marine-Intake-Conversion-Helpfull-Hints

In reply to wvumtnbkr: Well I'm still in the process of building an engine for the car. But I think I'm just gonna use the 307 since I already have most of the parts for it. It was just a thought about using it

HiTempguy wrote:

wvumtnbkr wrote: In reply to DCharger68: Why swap the engine out? All of the same work to turbo the 4.3 can be used to turbo the 307. An older 4.3 is essentially a SBC with 2 cylinders cut out of the middle.

Exactly what I was thinking. At the end of the day, the ONLY reason for the 4.3L is because it should be free even if in good shape. But if you already have a 307 in there (or basically, any engine) I think the point of the article was boost cures everything. In the grand scheme of things, it would have been MUCH easier for the roadkill guys (and probably cheaper) to make 350whp and 400wtq with any beat to E36 M3 350 sbc from any year, slap a cam and vortec heads on it and call it a day. It also would have been cheaper. If you didn't notice, they allude a couple times to how much money it cost them to do this. This wasn't really a "bang for the buck" as much as a "how cheap can we do THIS specific crazy idea". I applaud their efforts, and it is super wicked badass and I'd love to do it, but at the end of the day, it wasn't really "worth" it.

Just curious, what does E36 M3 mean? I've seen it a bunch of times without knowing

In reply to DCharger68:

Autocorrect for the vulgar term for fecal matter.

In reply to Kenny_McCormic:Ok that clears that up.

Also berkeley means to fornicate.