What years will interchange?

[BAMonteSS]

I just got hold of a '97 Silhouette with blown HG's. The van has over 160K on it, so I thought I'd just swap motors instead of fixing this one. Are there any differences between 97 and 05? If so, are the long blocks at least the same?

Thanks
Jake

[kc9dre]

I just did this conversion on an 98 transsport, same engine. I went to Ebay and purchased a 3.4L from LKQ. Was out of an 04 Venture. The fuel injection system is different and the camshaft is different, along with the flywheel AND the the newer engines do not have the low oil sensor in the bottom of the oil pan. I took no chances and changed the camshaft with a new from advance Auto $175. I used my fuel injection system off the old engine. and all the externally different items as well. MAKE SURE YOU LABEL ALL THE SENSOR POSITIONS on your ewiring harness, the "professional" that I had install it did not do this and I have spent that last few months figureing out what sensors he hooked up wrong... For direct interchange with no changeover, 2002 to 1997 If I remember correctly with interchange flawlessly. You can always question your local GM parts counter guy. They can look up the information easily and you don't have to buy anything for them...

In my opinion I think you could go with out changing the CAM. As I said I did it one because my "pro" said it was different, and two. I was to lazy to do it myself...

[cdru]

Don't take this as discurgment from doing an engine swap, but swapping engines in our vans is a very long process. The proper way is to remove the engine from the underside of the vehicle. A shop would basically drop the engine sub-chassis then lift the vehicle, swap engines, then reverse the process. A home mechanic can do it, but it's more likely you lift the van over the top instead of hoisting it up.

Someone a few months back said that you can just barely squeeze the block out the top of the compartment, but you have to strip everything off of it to do so. Installing the new engine would also mean striping it down. Gaskets and seals would need to be replaced...again on your brand new engine. So you'd still be, in essence, doing a head job anyways.

A head job in and of it self really isn't too difficult, especially if you feel you can do the engine swap. It's a couple of hundred dollars in parts/labor to shave the heads and takes a good portion of a weekend to do (minus shop labor time to do the heads).

[dragomanusa]

Have you all any idea what are the models that will give a flawless swap for the transmissions? would any of the early 2000's swap that used the 3.4 engine?