It's generally acknowledged that the expense of any engine conversion is directly related to the skills of the converter. Welding skills, fabrication skills, well equipped shop or driveway/shadetree work area and so on are huge factors. All that said, anyone able to contribute to a "Cheap" recipe to install a 4.8, 5.3 or LS engine in a AD truck? Questions right off the top is how much (or little) would it cost if one made the conversion with a modern transmission with overdrive.
Do you buy a donor vehicle and use all the appropriate parts, selling the rest to recoup some of your money?
Buy just the engine and other hard parts from a recycler with a warranty?
Pare down the factory wiring harness or buy a ready to install harness?
What year and platform (donor) makes the best, easiest, cheapest engine upgrade without worrying about max hp.
The above is just a primer and hopefully this thread will provide some of the answers for those of us with no hands on experience with GM's more modern, easy horsepower, high mpg engines.
Added in edit; I'm not planning to make the subject change to my '51 3600 since it's a pretty original truck and a as yet untested 261 is waiting in the wings. But if a pretty straight, original truck came along then a LS conversion would definitely be a possibility. Also I personally like the old school designations of 283LS for the 4.8LS and 327 for the 5.3, then 350LS for the 5.7 LS1. Just sounds right.
RonR
Last edited by moparguy; 11/28/2019 4:06 PM.
