I have a 95 Bronco with 5.8l EFI that may need to be replaced. I have located an 88 F250 with a 5.8l and would appreciate some help understanding the issues that could pop up if I grabbed the truck and tried to use the engine in the Bronco.

AFAIK both have auto trans (95 definitely does, have to inquire about truck though).

Is it as easy as swapping the 88 block and heads in place of the 95 block and heads and just using the intake and all the accessories from the 95?

Should I keep looking for a later model 5.8l?

 

Yes it's nearly that simple and you don't even need to strip the intakes off, put all the accessory brackets, smog components, wiring and such from the '95 on the 88 and plug it in. The one exception is with the distributor, you want to use the '95 dizzy but you have to change the drive gear since the '88 motor has a cast iron flat tappet cam where the '95 motor has a steel roller cam, so the drive gears also have to match. If you were to use the steel geared '95 distributor in the '88 it could chew up the cam gear very quickly and that would lead to complete engine failure since the the distributor also drives the oil pump.

 

Conanski,
Thanks for the detailed reply. I was hoping it would be this simple. We're lining up our options with this Bronco right now and may end up having to do this swap. Reply posts like yours are exactly what I needed.

Much appreciated!