[asbennett]

Hi everyone - I have searched many forums and can't find the answer I need. I recently purchased a 1994 Grand AM GT 3.1 L Automatic V6 for $500. 1 owner - said they parked it when they found water in the oil - Lower intake manifold gasket - right? So I pulled it home on a trailer and tore down the top end of the engine. Yep LIM gasket was bad - I went ahead and took of the heads and had them re-built and replaced head gasket, LIM gasket and so on. Pistons looked normal, shop said heads looked fine.

So I put it all back together and tried to start it - CLUNK - no movement. Tried new battery and starter - same thing. I took the plugs back out and tried turning the crank with a socket and breaker bar - no luck - would not move. I noticed the harmonic balancer was moving slightly when I tried to start the engine - so I put penetrating oil in the cylinders to soak overnight - next day kept bumping the starter and finally (after about 20 bumps) it started to move more - then finally turned over like normal - great right?...wrong- I put things back together and it started fine - next day started fine again - ran for about 20 mins - decided to take it for a test drive - drove about 500 feet to end of driveway. Car died - I restarted it fine - drove another 500 feet died again and now it's back to doing the same thing - clunk - engine not turning over - can't move crank.

I need help - trying to decide my options and next step(s).
1. Do I assume the engine is seized and junk it (I have about $1200 in the car total as of now).
2. If it is seized - why did it start and run 20 mins?
3. Is it better to fix (what is broken? I don't even know at this point).
4. Is it better to put in a used engine? How hard is it to pull an engine? I am comfortable tearing an engine down to remove the heads - but that is as far as I have gone.

This forum has given me excellent advice in the past and I look forward to everyone's ideas and guidance - thank you!