Yea, I heard that about the early versions. Later versions did not have the faults though. Mine is called a vortec, whatever that means. Maybe it is just a name for the newer generation of motors.

General Motors is putting straight 6's in its SUV's again. Anyone know anything about those motors. My friend is looking at buying a GMC with one.

racinghoss

 

I've seen a lot of vortecs that smoke on startup with under 60k miles on 'em, but that is a guy that doesn't take care of his vehicles.

 

Friends don't let friends drive GM products!!!!!

 

Friends don't let friends drive GM products!!!!!

Yea, but he is also looking at several other cars, 2 of which are Ford products -- Explorer and F-150 Supercab 4x4. He used to have a Ford truck with the I-6 and thinks that the GM will be as good. I was hoping that someone could help convince him otherwise.

 

Here's my 2 cents...
Fords Best: 300 I6, 351C, 400, 429,460, FE motors, Powerstroke
Fords Worst: 3.8 V6, 302
Chevys Best: 2.5 I4, 292 I6, 283, 327, 350, 454
Chevys Worst: 2.8 V6, 3.1 V6, 305, 400, 409, 6.2 and 6.5 Diesel
Dodges Best: 225 Slant 6, 318, 340, 440, 5.9 Cummins
Dodges Worst: 2.0 I4, 2.2 I4, 3.0 V6, 360, 383, 318 BB, 426 Hemi

 

My favorite ford engines are the trusty 300 or the 351mod . I bought a 82 3/4 ton beater truck for 300 dollars changed valve cover gaskets and drove the nasty tan and brown truck for over a year never ran bad I then pulled the motor sold it to a freiend who put it in a 79 half ton drove and whelled the hell out of it and then sold it to his dad that over 100 thousand miles i know about in 3 three years of hard work on a bigblock plus the the origianl owner used it to pull a 40 foot goose neck for years.

The worst ford engines are the 390 460 Fe block I witnesed a friend of mine nuy 3 or 4 blocks a junk because of free floating piston rings.

Chevy worst motors are the 2.8 and 305 both are junk. I owned the pinging 305 or the head warping always worked on 2.8


My personal favorite motor is the mazda 2.0 > my father had a base model b2000 be bought new in 84 he comuted 125 miles plus a day to work the transmisson had to rebuilt at 300 thousand miles but the motor never touched. i got the truck when i turned 17 and like most kids raged the hell out of it . But held up untill it shot water and bolied over / i pulled the motor and found the valves were so worn it was kicking water out. the motor had around 650000 thousand miles and looked good mo major piting and only three timting theeth were gone. So these year mazda rule. Same motor as the ranger that year.

 

I have a few friends who are absolutely rotory obsessed... maybe not that bad, but they do enjoy them.

From what I can figure:

Rotorys will last nearly forever if they are maintained. But if they dont get treated right, their tolerances are less than a conventional engine.

That and the older ones I think had particularly high exhaust temps or something that made them hard to get emissions with in standards...


StomP

 

The Rotarys were an interesting design, I understand they had a hell for high redline

 

They did, it was over 7.5 if not over 9k if I remember right...


StomP

 

Rotory motors actually don't have a red line. They will run as long as they have fuel. I think that the Renesis recommends not going past 12K.

 

I own a 2.8 carb'd and it is indeed awful. The MPI 2.8's are a very different beast. The MOPAR 318's in the late '60's/early '70s have low end torque to burn. The 383's were quite good as well. The 427 SOHC was spectacular, technology-wise, but it had issues with timing chain stretch at hi rpms and it turned out that valves on one bank were behind valves on the other. The 440 MOPAR was awesome especially in 6-pack form. Who could ever forget the original generation HEMI's?

I agree with an earlier post on the c'y 230 and 250 engines. They were good and reliable as all get-out. No one speaks of the 240 I-6 Ford. It has the prospect of a lot longer longevity than does the 300.

The MOPAR 2.2/2.5 were again torquey suckers. Sure, you had to put a head gasket in 'em every 80k miles or so. The 3.3 GM is a nice machine. The "iron duke" 2.5 GM was one rough cement mixer of an engine.

We could go down an interesting road on the Y block engine. I've got one of those and it is a most fascinating engine and I think it gets points for that. I'm sure it'd not rank on anyone's best list, though.

Here's a vote for the 428 CJ and the 429 SCJ. Two different engine families to be sure, but both were street marvels in their own right.

Here's another vote for the Boss 302.

 

Pretty much all the inline six engines Ford produced were good.
The 2300 SOHC I4, 292 Y block would run, The old Ford Police interceptor in the Fairlane 500s, all were pretty good I forgot to mention the 216, 230, and 250 I6s produced by Chevrolet were tough motors as well.

 

I like the 240 I6. Had one in a granada I inherited from my dad. That thing wouldn't die. I never did any maintainance on it for fear of it not running anymore. Car lasted 397,+++ miles before being sold for $600.00. Great engine.

 

In my opinion the 400 was underpowered and the 460 Was the best ford made along with the 300 i6

 

I'm not a mopar man but I have to give credit where credit is due. If it wasn't for the mopars, the hemi wouldn't have made such an impact on racing back in the 60's. My altime favorite engine would have to be the 351C, maybe I'm partial because in HS (on a paper route budget) I manage to beat several BB chevys (396, 400 and a 454), several SB chevy's (LT1, 327, 350's and a 400), one 440 cuda and a 460 with duel quads (note - he stalled it at the line, does it still count?). My only looses were to some really darn fast chevy running 11-12's and a 350 whom I beat two years prior. It took him several thousand dollars to get out of that 350 (Dual quads, NOS, different cam and some trans work) what I had on a paper route budget The worst engine.... Hhmmmm let me see thats tough.
The 305 chevy and 318 mopar come to mind

If you want bullet proof..... Yep, the 300I6.
Cheapest motor to build goes to the 350 chevy but thats a hole nother ball game. Enjoyed the reading.