I tend to juggle ideas for projects in my head quite a bit.

I have this 403 Olds engine I have been thinking about doing something with.

I've also been toying with some ideas for a really nice trail vehicle (preferably a jeep)

You know, something I can build instead of buy if you dig what I'm saying.

So naturally, I got to wondering how well the two things would work together. The 403 has it going on in the torque department while being only 25 pounds heavier than a SBC so...

So I'm wondering...
Has anyone actually BUILT an olds powered 4 wheeler?

I think there was one in TTC a few years ago using a 455. Cant see why it wouldnt work. use a th 350 or 400 with a 4wd output for the tcase.

Matt

Oldsmobile didn't even put Oldsmobile engines in their 4x4s.

However, since it will bolt to anything a Buick will, there's no reason you can't do it. Have to make your own motor mounts though.

Olds, Pontiac, Caddy, Those big blocks are torque monsters. Why not?

Ive heard of some guys putting in an olds v6 I believe I would go caddy motor that would be smooth.:nuke:

Well, I already HAVE the olds and it's actually a ruuner.

I would just want to do a ring/bearing/gasket freshening first.

Seems to me there was this editor in some magazine. What was his name? What magazine?

OH YEAH! RICK PEWE and JP! :flipoff2:

He had a 455 in his flatfender, SWEET!

Originally posted by Magoo
Seems to me there was this editor in some magazine. What was his name? What magazine?

OH YEAH! RICK PEWE and JP! :flipoff2:

He had a 455 in his flatfender, SWEET!

That's a Buick 455. As I recall, he has a strict rule about installing only parts that have Jeep lineage. The 455 is a stretch, but his reasoning was that Jeeps came with Buick engines so this is OK.

Oh, and he's no longer editor at JP, he's at 4WOR.:flipoff2:

BOP family...

That was when he was at JP, not too long ago :D

Does he not have the injected crate motor in a Flatfender now? The Ultimate A1?

:flipoff2:

Buick is better IMO, but if you got it, stick it in there. You can always replace it with a Buick, or Cadillac later since they use the same bellhousing pattern

See, the thing is that I'd like to find someone who did it so that I can pick his brains about parts combinations.

As far as I know the chevy bellhousing is NOT the same as the BOP bellhousing. I don't know how caddy fits in there.

Motor mounts I'm not worried about. I'm concerned about hooking it up to any kind of drivetrain that's worth a damn.

The BEST would be if I could hook it up to a 700R4 or other modern GM tranny with a good transfer case.

I helped on a Olds 403 swap into a Chevy truck. The guy used a BOP TH350 with an adapter to the 208 transfer case. I don't think there are any 700R4s with the BOP pattern, but I wouldn't think it would be hard to adapt a Chevy patterned one. There is the 200R4, but I don't think it would live long behind a 403. So you may be stuck with the TH400 or TH350. If you go with a manual tranny, you can just change the bellhousing or get a scatter sheild and bolt just about any GM tranny you wanted to.

A friend of mine has an Olds 455 in his extended-wheelbase flatfender. Big motor and heavy, but gobs of torque.
Dion

Originally posted by Blatant
A friend of mine has an Olds 455 in his extended-wheelbase flatfender. Big motor and heavy, but gobs of torque.
Dion

Oh come on, the 455 Olds isn't all that heavy. Its not all that much heavier than a 350 Chevy. Any Olds from 260-455 is basically the same motor, and the bigger ones are torque monsters. The 350 is my favorite, also known as the Rocket 350. I had one in a 79 Hurst Olds that we pumped up mildly, and with a shift kit in the TH350 it would break the tires loose when it hit second gear and end up sideways. An Olds swap into a 4by IMO would be a good choice, its something I've been comtemplating for quite some time. Go for it.

If you want a 700, just use an adapter, availvable from a # of sources, not too spendy either. BOP and Caddy share the same bellhousing.

Also Olds blocks are not all the same externally, the 350 and the 403 are similar, though, while the 455 (and a couple more, 425 maybe?) are larger.

Pete

Grandpa -

Glad to hear that. I already HAVE a THM350 for the motor and I like the fact that it's lighter than the THM400 and has a lower first gear.


Land -
Actually, it's the small block that's about 25 pounds heavier than the SBC. The BB Olds is another 100lbs heavier.

I tried to put a rocket 350 in my toy. I had a chevy th350 I wanted to use. I had it in, all hooked up 2 of the 6 tranny bolts in. The top 4 bolts are a different pattern. :( I looked and looked for a adapter and even checked with a few places local about putting the th350 4wd output shaft into the olds th350 tranny. No luck. I gave up and bought the turbo 4.3. :D

Here's a pretty darn good website, has parts interchangability, weights, and a whole bunch more.:
http://www.442.com/oldsfaq/ofeng.htm#Engines%201964%20-%201990 .

Originally posted by MattS
I tried to put a rocket 350 in my toy. I had a chevy th350 I wanted to use. I had it in, all hooked up 2 of the 6 tranny bolts in. The top 4 bolts are a different pattern. :( I looked and looked for a adapter and even checked with a few places local about putting the th350 4wd output shaft into the olds th350 tranny. No luck. I gave up and bought the turbo 4.3. :D

$54.95 from Summit. http://store.summitracing.com/partdetail.asp?part=27457

Originally posted by nakono
I already HAVE a THM350 for the motor and I like the fact that it's lighter than the THM400 and has a lower first gear.

I really doubt you'd notice the difference between a 2.52 first and a 2.48 first (350 vs 400)

Pete

I'd like to know when they started selling that because I called them and Jegs and asked. I even asked here! Good info. Thanks. Only a year late! :D

Originally posted by pcorssmit
$54.95 from Summit. http://store.summitracing.com/partdetail.asp?part=27457
Pete

Originally posted by MattS
I tried to put a rocket 350 in my toy. I had a chevy th350 I wanted to use. I had it in, all hooked up 2 of the 6 tranny bolts in. The top 4 bolts are a different pattern. :( I looked and looked for a adapter and even checked with a few places local about putting the th350 4wd output shaft into the olds th350 tranny. No luck. I gave up and bought the turbo 4.3. :D

you didnt look to hard, a few months ago I found one for a freind, got it off E-bay but found alot of other sources. Just gotta talk to the right people ;)

If anyone is interested the adapter may be available once we figure out our latest tranny ideas.

You should talk your buddy into buying the 350 I have and then MAYBE I won't put a swamper on your hood next time I see you. :flipoff2: :flipoff2: And don't say "it will never leave the garage" cause I made my brother buy a wheeler and it will be here in 10 days. :evil:

Originally posted by NE-RokToy
you didnt look to hard, a few months ago I found one for a freind, got it off E-bay but found alot of other sources. Just gotta talk to the right people ;)

If anyone is interested the adapter may be available once we figure out our latest tranny ideas.

I'm in the process of collecting parts for an Olds-swap, plus I have a couple of other Olds-powered cars, so here's the deals:

There's two GM bellhousing patterns to be concerned with: Chevy, and everything else. (Cadillac, Olds, Buick and Pontiac.)
Adapter plates (little more than a thin plate) are available from numerous sources- a sufficiently clever individual can even fabricate one easily.

As far as trannies go, THM 350s and 400s are made in both Chevy and BOP-C bolt patterns, and, minor production changes aside, are fully interchangeable. if you're gonna build a 400 anyway, it's just as easy to build one for an Olds as it is a Chevy.

I'm not 100% sure, but I think some 700R4s came "dual-pattern". Meaning the one tranny had boltpatterns for BOTH Chevy and BOP-C. I know 200R4s had that, and some 400s, but I'm not positive about the 700s.

If you're going to drop the Olds into a GM truck frame, scour the junkyards for a mid-70s to early 80s pickup that came with the Olds 350 diesel. Swipe the motor mounts and it'll be a bolt-in job. For anything else, expect to have to do a little fabricating.

While in the junkyard, if you can find the oil pan off a Toronado 455, snag it. It's a six-quart rear-sump unit, as opposed to the stock five-quart. Don't forget the oil pump pickup.

I'm told headers for a '68 to '72 Olds Cutlass will be all but a bolt-in in a 2WD or 4WD Chevy pickup application. Haven't tried it myself, but several sources state that, so I'll assume for now they're right. The Jeep will undoubtedly be a tighter fit, so go with manifolds.

As far as exhaust manifolds go, there's three kinds: Toronado, "High Output" (HO) units off of 442s and Hurst/Oldses (you won't find these cheap, if at all, and they're only marginally better) and everything else. Go with the "everything else". The Toro driver's side manifold (pass is stock "everything else") has a kickup that'll dump the exhaust straight into the brake booster. They're great to turn around and plug a turbo into, but that's about it.

Olds blocks are Olds blocks: The only difference between a "big" block and a "small" block is roughly an inch of deck height. All brackets, pumps, distributors, oil pans, valve covers, etc, are 100% interchangeable. Big block heads have taller ports, too: they'll physically bolt to a small block (though they breathe WAY too deeply for anything but a stock-car 7,500-rpm smallblock) but the SB manifold won't seal.

It's simple: If you have a car with an old smogger 307 small-block, a '70 Toronado 455 (350hp and 500+ ft/lb) will bolt right in.

I have almost all the parts I need: a '71 F-block 455 with G heads, a short-tailshaft Chevy THM 400 that needs a rebuild, a core BOP-C 400 that's gonna donate the case, a divorced NP205, and a selection of manifolds and other goodies.

The engine's gonna get a decent torkmonster rebuild (probably 550+ ft/lb at about 1,800 rpm) and I'm gonna teach myself how to rebuild a tranny by combining these two 400s into a short-tailshaft Olds-pattern unit. I'll hang the 205 in place of the THM350/NP203 (with the patented "So Worn Try To Guess When It's Gonna Let Go" Destructomatic chain) and upgrade everything to 3/4 ot 1-ton U-joints.

Doc.

http://www.docsmachine.com/

I'm in the process of ...................everything to 3/4 ot 1-ton U-joints.

Damn Doc :eek:

What? I've been elbow-deep in Olds engines since I was 14. I forgot to mention the best blocks are the pre-'72 since they're higher in nickel content, which greatly reduces the bore wear. The first 455 I rebuilt had 95,000 miles on it but only had a .0015" wear ring land at the top

Hurry up and finish that hunk of Cad-powered crap you're working on... I wanna know how that multi-link you made works. :D

If I had my druthers (whatever they are) and a bucket of spare cash, at the same time I swap in the new engine/tranny combo, I'd really like to put a new frame under that badboy. Make a lightweight 3/4-frame arrangement that ties to the Corvair's unibody frame (which is pretty damned stout by itself), put a six-point cage inside, hang the front axle on four or six-inch lift leaves (which would leave the body height the same, just raise the frame that distance) and hang the rear 14-bolt off of a four or five-link with coils or quarter-eliptics. I'd also raise the engine and trans in relation to the body- hell, I have a dead-flat floor as it is.

Ditch the 95-pound receiver hitch, and the 150-lb-each bumpers, move the gas tank so it's a little ahead of and above the axle (might drop it down to a 25 gallon too, instead of the 38-gal) and bend up some cool tube-type bumpers.

The damned thing is 5,000 pounds right now, with me in it... I'd like to see it down to 4,000 to 4,200, soaking wet.

Doc.

http://www.docsmachine.com/

BTW Doc...

Thanks for the informative post.

Oh, one thing I didn't see you mention...

The toronado oil pans off a small block are also bigger than usual.

Mine holds close to 7 quarts altogether.

You just can't use a crossover pipe. Oh well.

I recall a test in some car mag regarding extrude honed exhaust manifolds being damn near as efficient as headers at "street" RPMs.

I figure a stock rebuild kit from PAW with hypereutectic pistons for better wear, a relatively mild cam form mondello <cough>engle<cough> and my existing edelbrock 7111, AFB knockoff carb and unilte distributor and it'll make for a very nice trail motor.

Seven quarts? You might double-check that... I've never even heard of a stock 7-quart pan... the Toro pans are a hot item simply because they're a six-quart bolt-on mod.

Which makes me think you have the wrong dipstick or dipstick tube.

As for the exhausts, the one decent aid is to weld up the center two ports' "divider". Or use the gaskets that have the little fin... As I understand it, it helps reduce reversion and improves scavenging, which gives you marginally better- but measurable- torque.

Doc.

I said almost 7 quarts, which is admittedly a generous way of saying 6.5 quarts.

And that's to fill on a stock dipstick.

But beyond that, I ain't gonna quibble about 8 ounces. :D