Question about a Drivetrain Swap from 94 to 97

Hello everyone, I currently have been given an offer to purchase a beautiful car. It's a 97 lesabre that is mint, except the kid who had it let a head gasket make milkshake in the motor and blew it. I can get this car for 300 and I think i might, but it would need a new motor. I was wondering if it's even possible to do a complete drivetrain swap from my 94 lesabre. The only differences known to the naked eye are the fact that the body is a little different and that mine is the 3800 series i and the 97 is the series ii. how hard would it be to drop the engine and trans and lift the car off of it and put it into the 97? also would it work, is there much different wiring from series i to ii? what's your opinion. the 3800 series one i have has 210k on it and it's still going great. just that the body has a bit to be desired.

At minimum the wiring harnesses and the pcm must be changed, and I believe the the trans may be different also, as the harness will not connect from the 94 to the 97, there are a lot of subtle differences here. In NY it will not pass the emissions test either as you will no longer be an obd11 vehicle.

You can actually run the 94 engine on the 97 PCM... But you would have to do some serious adapting to the harness to make it all work... And even then you'll want a tuner to be able to get the correct program for the PCM...

In the short.... Its really not worth the trouble to swap in the older motor..

If you buy that car for $300 the best thing I can tell you to do is find an LKQ or the like junk yard and get an 05-08 L26 3800 Series III and park the series 2 Intake, Throttle Body, Injectors with rail and all like item onto the Series III engine.. That would be your best bet to being compatible...

I just swapped a motor from a 96 Park ave to a 97 Lesabre. Went in no problem. Runs good as new. No mods at all.
I got the motor for $300.
imho, I'd look for a motor about the same year, and put it in and go!
Chris.

Okay well thanks everyone for your help. I think I'm just going to stay with my LeSabre. I mean it has 188k on it, might as well run it for as long as I can. It's still a great car. Probably will have more questions since the car will last another four years at least. :tongue: