The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Engine Shop Vortec 4200 Inline Six

Has anyone had any experience with installing a GM 4200 Vortec 6 in an old Chev truck. Have a '46 1/2 ton and am toying with the idea of this installation along with appropriate auto tran, rear end, etc. Anyone have thoughts? Is this an impossible project?

Haven't done it and don't know what sort of problems you would run into George, but I've been looking at the Atlas series for the same reason.
If your not looking to build a hot quarter mile hot rod but rather a nice running custome driver, I think one of these drive trains would be a great choice. There orta be a ton of them around in the scrap yards.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Its an interesting combination. I think that the challenge would come fitting the transmission in and also dealing with the brake pedal and master cylinder might take some thinking. You will also need to find a good location for the ECM and all the wiring going to it. Don

This is acutaly a real good idea that I will try myself some day. You could get a wrecked doner from a junk yard and swap over. Im not sure of what you use but you may be able to just put your truck onto the doner fram and all. Not sure but sound like a good idea. 270 HP I6 would work well for a DD.

Here is a pic of one in a old camaro.

http://image.carcraft.com/f/32046902+w750+st0/ccrp-1108-01+turbocharged-vortec-inline-six.jpg

A GMC Envoy is 113 in wheel base and the 59 apache 3100 is 114 in wheel base. Think this swap of frames and engine would be rather cool. I could have the 4 wheel rdrive and it would look like stock 2 wheeler. Plus you would have the power brakes and steering. And A/c if you hooked it all up. Thank you for the great idea.

Here is a link of a 40/50 with the I5 in it

http://www.67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/showthread.php?t=240772

Thanks for the feedback everyone. You've provided good links that I can use for further education on this. My original plan was to put a 292 engine in the '46 truck, but a friend of mine showed up the other day with a '67 Chev truck with a vortec v8. It sounded like as much time was spent trying to figure out how to make all the modern electronics work as was spent turning wrenches. So now I will do my further research...

George, Did you make the swap? I have a 60 El Camino, 235, and am thinking about the Vortec 4200 swap. Wonder about lining up the engine mounts and locations. How did this work for you? What fuel pump did you use?
Thanks,

Here we are over two years later... What actually happened was we installed a GM LC9 crate engine. An LS V8 with 315+ HP. Fits great. Runs great. Took up less length than the inline six.

The Vortec 4200s have tremendous potential for making huge horsepower. You can buy them CHEAP too. Just poke around on youtube and you'll see - there's lots of people making nearly 1000hp with these engine in nearly stock form, with the exception of forced induction and a fancy fuel system.

Another nice thing is that dimensionally, they are almost identical to the 235, length and height are identical, and it's only a little wider.

A guy over on Inliners has done it and is getting over 500 HP out of his with a turbo. There is also an early Chevy truck build on hotrodinlines.com using a 4200. They shipped it Bonneville this year(they live in Alaska)and drove it back home after the event. Pretty reliable and cheap easy HP.

This swap sounds awesome. Anyone have photos?

You'll have to go to Inliners to find some of them.

If you go to Inliners, look for guys that go by EFI-DIY or Limequat.

EFI-DIY (Jerry) has a turbo '50 GMC with the 4200. He's a wealth kwowledge.

LIMEQUAT (Jeremy) has a turboed 4200 in a Toyota. He does custom wiring harness' and re-flashes ECMs on the side.

Both guys are more than willing to help anyone. They also have a ton of You-tube videos of their projects.