Inliners International Forums General Discussion Vortec 4200

Has anyone out there messed with the 4.2L I6 from GM? I aquired one to put in my 70 Chevelle. It looks like the biggest problem is going to be the trans as this motor doesn't use a std. chevy V8 bellhousing bolt pattern. I don't want to use a auto and am looking for a 5 or 6 speed to bolt up. The one out of the Chevy Colorado should fit but after turbocharging this engine should be 300-400HP and I doubt that trans will take it. Any ideas? Thanks.

toyman01

If you turboed that new L6 it should be much more then 300 for sure. Because in Stock trim it has 270 and with a few adjustments with the comp It came with was about to click That 300 mark with out much effort. But also You Need EVERYTHING that came with that motor as far as the computor goes. Unless You find another way Or a after market computor.Because it is my understanding You even needed to have all The anti lock brakeing stuff as well Because Everything Ran off the computor. Now I could be wrong But if i was you I would look into a little deeper Just my2cents hope it helps }[oooooo]

hello....well, seems we hear from here and there about those working with this engine....Glenn Self Racing has been working with this engine recently....but, they dont use the computer set up....WHAT A RELIEF TOO!!!!!-there is still HOPE!!!!!!! .....LOL....seems what i have found out they are using bare bones approach -a "good ole" 4 barrel and headers approach with cams change.....

seems there is ALOT of good discussion of turbo and Fuel Injection on all these Inline engines....why not start with proven head work and a good 4 barrel set up ? has always worked, always will....seems they are getting good results-I have always thought that would be the way to go with the new Inline 6-glad someone has already found out that is a GREAT approach -and more than likely less $$$$ input.....

I am sure many have great plans-keep it up....

Well for me it's because I'm already more comfortable with computers and EFI than I am with carburetors. I'm 19 so I grew up into an injected world, it was never something new that came along. And while I can see the advantages of carbs I'm just more inclined towards EFI.

From what I read too, EFI is really the only way to do turbo setups to their full potential. But I've never actually done a turbo setup (on my first) so.....

As for the 4200, I think it's great that there's a new generation inline for us to play with. The more research and development into it the better I say. I haven't worked on one but I'd definetely take one if it came to me.

Once you have tried EFI (yes there is a learning curve to it - but wasn't "EVERYONE" scared of elecronic ignition when it first came out) the ease of tuning 95% will give up on carbs.

Yes I've tuned holley, q-jets, thermo-quad, but efi has them all beat hands down.

hello..nice comments...have you had both Fuel and carb engines? Which do u like for raw power?

we all have our choices..i like my fuel injection vehicle, but for raw performance I prefer my drag race setup up and daily driver carb set ups-i built them for performance and carbs do that,,,for those wanting the Fuel Injection, Have you spent $$$$ on modifying your cylinder head 1st? so more air flows? TRY that 1st with a carb-i guess till u do it it doesnt seem right?...what do you think?.......seems NASCAR and MOST drag racing groups know where performance can be found...yes, Fuel Injection can be fun, but......

Lee,

My 406 SBC that is now injected started with a full head port on world products castings - they started as 190 cc intake runners and now are at 210-215 cc.
It orignally had a holley 750 DP, for raw power is was fine - but crapy fuel economy at part throttle. Once it was injected I picked up 35 ft-lbs of torque and 20 hp below 3500 rpm at the rear wheels. I have the mustang dyno runs logged.

So overall performance its hard for me to justify running a carb anymore.

Yes EFI takes more effort to install and tune but its worth it. It is frustrating at times yes, but the ease of tuning from the drivers seat is un-matched, no more pulling carb bowls off and dripping gas over a hot manifold while changing jets. It does take determination to get through the inital startup.

Take a look at www.msefi.com and see how many people have changed over. Even Car Craft ran an article on it last year.

Will there be a place for carbs - yes, if I was building a vehicle that had to be able to be fixed in the sahara desert - a carb and points ignition is hard to beat for simplicity ( and yes I still own a dwell-tach).

Just my 2 cents.

hello..Excellent point...sounds like a GREAT set-up....my comments are related to Inline 6 engines . specifically carb vs fuel injection setups.....

The reason NASCAR is still running carburetors is because the rule book for Cup cars states single 4 barrel carb only. It also states no computers.
Those two small items eliminate the use of fuel injection of any kind whether mechanical or electronic. NASCAR limits the age of the body style so fans are looking at up to date body styles but their engine rules are still stuck back in the 50's.

Under steady operating conditions like 500 miles at Daytona it probably doesn't mean a lot which type of fuel system you have but if carbs produced a perfect mixture under every possible engine condition then Formula 1 cars would still be running carbs I would think.

I'm old school and will probably always run carbs on my engines but I am also beginning to understand what computerised fuel management systems are all about and the advantages they offer over carburetors. Not exactly my type of car but I do pay attention to all those little Tuner buzz bombs that are running in the 7's and 8's at the strip. Something I have noticed is not one of them runs a carburetor yet they seem to produce an over abundance of raw horsepower.
Maybe its the ceremonial Saki toast before the races that makes them go that quick.

Mike

I personaly do not think your going to beat injection performance with a carb. It's like running side draft webbers on our L6s becuase of the nice straight air flow their hard to beat when when it comes to performance.No I don't run either I still run carbs. And for faster and better tunableity electronics is hard to beat. But evenything has it's own time and place.

It's like a turbo over a blower. The turbo to me is more reliable and doesn't take any power to run.(make power) Where as the blower needs a Belt and Takes power from the motor to make power. BUT You just can't beat the Nice blower whine and the lopy cam sound out the exhaust But it is also the Eye(candy) catching appeal & sound everyone likes to see and hear. But it also has to do with what one can afford Or not to afford to do with their Toys. You can never please everyone sometimes not even ones self. We all want Everything and the Best of everything and for as cheap as we can get it. LOL

But in a world where bigger is better This why our L6s have fallen to a very small market. But untill we can over come,this bigger is better world we'll remain the same and We'll always be different.
But as a club that we are, maybe one day things may change. As each year passes I see how the club has become bigger. But our market still remains the same very small.But who knows maybe one day this will change to??As many try to bring new things to us. }[oooooo]

Thanks just my vented 2cents

hello..great comments!!!!!! thanks!!!!!!....so, has any Inliner here gone from a performance carb set up to fuel injection ? I would love to hear what that person says specifically about Inline 6's and the plus's and minus's of this change....what I am specifically talking about is the Inline 6 we all enjoy....

Also, has anyone done a Bolt-in Lump yet and compared differences?

Not being familiar with the Colorado parts, do the manual transmissions use a separate bellhousing or is the bellhousing a non-removable portion of the the tranny? If removable it should work with the 6. If not you can always make an adapter plate, like hooking a TH350 to a 235, to connect a conventional pattern bellhousing. You will probably want to space the flywheel out a similar amount. You will definitely need to rebalance everything when you add the clutch etc to the motor.

Also, not sure on the crankshaft, but make sure you can find a flywheel that will mount up and support a clutch that will handle the power this thing will put out.

I definitely understand your wanting to use a manual trans, but in this case an automatic would make things considerably easier.

There is one point here that is being missed, an engine does not know what name is on its valve cover nor does it care where and how it get its A/F mixture from, a rag soaked in gas will run a motor for a little while.

Not does the engine care if its a 1 cylinder lawn mower engine or a 24 cylinder radial aircraft engine. All it want is to be fed, sparked, lubed and cooled.

The point being that the fact that the 6 cylinders are in a row has minimal effect on tuning, what works on a rice burner and/or a V8 will work on a straight 6. Collectively we need to "get over" the 6 in a row to go stigma and start pushing the grey matter to make the engines more tunable and efficient.

Ok more than 2 cents this time.

Personally,EFI to me is a mystery sometimes.
That's why I pay a local shop to work on my van.
But I wouldn't have it any other way for every
day use. It's smooth,efficient,miserly on fuel, so all I have to do is just point and shoot. My '55,now that's another car altogether and the most fun to drive;carbs,noise,and getting noticed.It's part of my era and I ain't interested in changing it.And,NASCAR will stick with carbs because it's the smart thing to do. It's easier to control(rule bending) and cost less $$$ then EFI. F1 has no limits on engines and computers and that's why I don't have to see a race on TV. The winner will be a German in a red car because they spend the most bucks. :p

"have you had both Fuel and carb engines? Which do u like for raw power?"

Well I've never looked into to a good carb setup to be totally honest. Well, not beyond asking price. I figure for about the same money I can build a EFI setup. I'm not really in a place to test both myself although I admit it'd be interesting. The EFI is almost certainly the better system in concept but for a L6 the carbs have a lot more R&D behind them. Could be close.

Hey toyman01, I thought that engine had a front sump oil pan and would not work in chevelle etc.?
Dano

if i remember correctly there was a write up on these motors and component interchangability in one of the car mags about two years ago. i'll see if i can dig it up. as a guess does the old2.8 v6 bell bolt pattern line up. tom
on the fuel injection debate, they both produce good power numbers with correct tuning. the fuel injection will win with it's more precise metering over a larger rpm level. sorry lee

Wow!, I finally found someone else working this swap! I'm knee deep in this also. My 4200 is going into an old Dodge Power Wagon.

The ECU is a huge problem here. It's so integrated to the host vehicle, (Trailblazer). That it may be impossible to re-program for stand alone operation. I has been done, but GM is unwilling to give up any info. I've discussed this with just about every aftermarket programer with the same results: "we can't help you with that engine".

Some other roadblocks are the variable cam phasing & the coil on plug ignition.

However, I have found some who can help:

MoTec:
Can program thier M-600 Computer to run this engine. Real high-end full race stuff. $5000.00+

http://www.motec.com

Westers Garage:
May be able to use the ECM from a 3800 Camaro or Firebird to run the IFI and Ignition. But not the cam phasing. They are also triing to hack the stock 4200 ECM to get my engine to run.

http://westers_garage.eidnet.org/scprice.htm

Dave Kelton (Dr. K.)
Has access to software & may be able to crack the stock ECM. I sent him my VIN and he's working on it now.

256-543-7165

Squire Inc:
They can clean up your harness and defeat the VATS.

479-243-9115

Speartech:
John Spears has a lot of experience with GM EFI including the 4200. His shop did some programing work on the 4200 for GM and he had them running on a test stand with the stock computer! (see photo's on his website). However, GM took all the stuff back when the project was completed. Maybe if enough of us ask, he'll do some work writing a program so our 4200s can run stand-alone.

http://www.speartech.com/

I hope this helps, I've been at it for about 6 months now, and still don't have a running engine. But I'm that much closer. Let me know how you've made out.

Have you ever looked into MegaSquirt to control that engine? I have heard a lot of good things about it. It’s a Do-It-Yourself programmable electronic fuel injection controller that is very reasonable priced. (i.e. from $200 to $500 not $5000+) It is an Extremely versatile kit for nearly any engine and can even provide ignition control with MegaSquirtnSpark. Just go to http://www.msefi.com/ It is a lot of reading but it is worth it. I plan to install a MegaSquirt on to my 250 in the future but that is yet to come. Hope this can help.

Yeah, I've been watching them closely, (I post over there under Hemiman also). Been waiting for the Ultra Megasquirt to be released. Seems they haven't been doing much with it as of late though. I'd go with the Megasquirt II, but even that's not availible yet.

Well I finally got my computer problems resolved, (I hope). Got it set to run the engine stand alone. Now I've sent my harness out to Speartech to have it trimmed out.

Now I've got to solve transmission issues. The 4200 only comes from the factory with and automatic. I'm going to use an NV4500 5 speed. So I've got to find a flywheel and bell housing.

Bell housing: The 4200 has the same bell housing bolt pattern as the GM 60deg V-6 as well as the Jeep 151 4cyl. I'm planning on going with the Jeep bell housing since Advance Adapters makes an adapter to mate the NV4500 to this bell housing.

Flywheel: The 4200 uses a 160 tooth flex plate. The Vortec I-4 and I-5 also use a 160 tooth design and they are offered with a manual trans. Unfortunatly GM has a different crank flange on these two engines. So, I've sent my Vortec 2800 I-4 flywheel out to the machine shop. Some other flywheels to consider would be Buick V-6 & V-8 flywheels, all 160 tooth, but still need the center hole & bolt pattern for the crank changed.

Oil pan: The 4200 is cast aluminum with a front sump. My 4X4 needs a rear sump. So I've been checking with fabricators to see if we can cut and weld to move the sump to the rear. Too bad GM didn't make the pan symetrical, then all I would have to do is turn it around. I still may try this approach since it is quite close.

I'll try to post some photo's when I get a chance.

To partially answer the original question, I spoke with Glenn Self on the phone about the potential for this engine when I saw the naturally aspirated one in Hot Rod that made 590 HP with a 3-2bbl setup on it. He said the engine needed extensive custom work and some custom (read: mui dinero) pieces to get it to make big power. He also said the cylinder head made it worth it. I asked him if he was trying to turbo his way to 650hp (which is the number I needed) which way would he go 4.2 or 292 and he said the 4.2 would be his choice. We didn't get into detail on computer at all, I was mostly concerned with durability. If you are serious about the swap, they have done some work on this engine and can help you out.

Talked to Glen yesterday. He's now getting over 1000HP with the boost! The car and engine are going to be featured in an upcoming issue of Hotrod.

I think your biggest challenge will be controlling the variable camshaft timing that these engines have. It is a rather complicated hydraulic dithering system that even gave the factory engineers fits. Maybe you could find a way to "lock" the cams in place. Of course that will reduce performance at certain modes; otherwise you will need the full boat factory electronics installed to get the required inputs and feedback. Good luck.

Frenchtown- I heard Glen locked the cams on the 3-2 motor to make it run.

I also heard that you cannot use sections of a 4.2 wireing harness to make the motor run is this true?

Steven

The cam on the 4200 will lock to full retard (25deg) when no signal is received from the ECU.

My harness can now be trimmed out since I've had all the unnessesary inputs turned off in the ECU. My ECU is now only looking for: Crank Position, Cam Position, Fuel, Ignition, MAP, Air Temp, Water Temp, O2 sensor, Throttle Position, Knock sensors. Basically, all the chassis info has been deleted. It's calibrated as if the engine were on a dyno.

Who did your ECU work?

yeah,
who did the computer work - looking at that engine for my 57 chevy pickup!

I know this sounds lame, but I can't tell you who did the ECU right now. I've got a contract with a magazine. My truck and it's mods are going to be featured in a series of articles, and they're a bit funny about me giving away too much info.

I can correct something I wrote before. The 4200's flywheel has 161 teeth not 160 as I noted before. The Vortec I-5 3500 flywheel is made of cast iron and wont machine easily or inexpensivly. So I sent my specs to an aftermarket manufacturer and they're making me a steel one. They'll stock it with a part number. They'll also have it available in aluminum for you racers.

I'll post more details as soon as I can.

Thanks,

Once the article is publish give us a heads up so we can look at it.

My 4200 is up and running. I plan to put it in my '41 Chevy Coupe, which we will be driving to the Denver Convention in June 2006.

I offed the cam phaser and replaced it with an intake side cam sprocket. This requires a small bushing and uses the intake cam bolt. Cams are timed straight up. In the exhaust cam position sensor hole I installed an S-10 distributor, which is now driven by the exhaust cam using a 90 degree spiral bevel gear set. I use Megasquirt EFI and have found it works well as it uses stock GM sensors. Stock injectors only flow 25 lbs/hr at 50 lbs/sq in, so HP is limited to about 300. I'd like to find some 42 lb units that would fit in the stock location.

For the oil pan I took the front half of a 5 cylinder pan and welded it to the rear half of the 6 cylinder pan. I used the 5 cylinder oil pickup tube extended 4" to the rear. On the flat surface on the rear of the oil pan I bolted a 5 quart sump. The pan now holds 7 quarts. I'm using the 5 speed trans from the Colorado with the clutch from the 5 cylinder which fits the 6 cylinder flywheel Part #24577365 Export. This should be adequate for mild street use. I have photos of all this and will be preparing an article for "The 12 Port News." (Call if you want to hear it run -- 530-795-0224, Winters, California.)

is there a link or website for the "The 12 Port News"? this sounds like a good way to go since i worry the computer reprogramming mentioned by hemiman may not be available soon. hemiman - any idea when these articles will come out for us poor suffering six-souls?

It is our intent to supply information and components so that other Inliners can successfully use this engine. The issue, of course, is that it will take time. We will keep you informed as progress is made.

Ray,
Go to the link to "newsletter". It is on the left of your screen. There you will be able to purchase a trial issue and/or join Inliners International. The 12 Port News is the official newsletter of the Inliners.
Jim

Might be of some help. Read this then pay attention to item #13.

http://www.jeeps-offroad.com/showthread.php?t=4740

Todd Kozak ( djd@acsworld.com ) has some 3500 bellhousings.

Greg

Thanks for the heads up! My bell housing is being shipped as I write this!

Be still heart.....



http://www.smithracecraft.com/gallery/gallery.html

Colorado\Canyon 3.5L\2.8L bellhousing. Bolts straight up to a Toyota Supra Turbo R154 5-speed.

[img]http://www.jeeps-offroad.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=4929[/img]

Greg

Those are some cool pics!
btw cool name too!

any more news on the 4.2 swap? wiring/cam changes?