Hey all, working on a friend's '89 with the 2.9 in it. Motor's in bad shape, but have access to a good running 2.9 out of an '87 or '88. Just wanted to check if there's any differences in these years on this motor before I tell him to pull the trigger on it.
TIA!
-Niles

 

There's nothing different that would prevent you from swapping those engines. All of the 2.9L were fuel injected.

 

Thanks Jim.

 

You may have to swap some of the engine "dress" from the newer engine onto the older engine. Or get the newer computer. In the very late 80's they did away with the EGR valve, so you will get a EGR code if the newer engine doesn't have provisions for a EGR.

 

How'd the swap go?
my brother blew the motor in his 89 while visiting from out of town.
My dad gave him air tickets home and kept the truck for a swap. He then had some backyarder replace the motor with an 88 and I ended up with the heap.
Just as a hobby i began tinkering with it and like a lost dog have fell in love with it.
Then I began having issues with the pcm, and have been unable to satisfy it as far as sensor readings that are incompatible with the motor sensor outputs.

Im wondering if he's having the same issues?

 

Sadly it hasn't. My friend's tweaker father talked my friend into letting him help do the swap instead so they'd have a "father-son" project.
So now it's a year and a half later they just got the engine from the doner truck pulled. :/

 

Update, finally. Friend finally got convinced after 2.5 years that his tweaker dad is as worthless as suspected. We drug the truck over here last month, did the engine swap, she's now running and driving well except surging at idle, I'll make a new thread for that.

There were a couple of minor differences between the '88 and '89:
1) where the transmission dipstick retainer and alternator brackets bolt to the back and front of the R/S head uses larger bolts on the '88 so we drilled out the mounts/brackets on the '89 to fit the '88 engine.
2) The intake manifold vacuum tree on the L/S has been moved from the rear runner to the center runner for 89, (I presume to equalize vacuum demands across the engine so it's not just pulling the vacuum from the rear cylinders.) Doesn't cause a problem other than moving the vacuum lines back. You could swap manifold instead of course.