AMC Eagle Den Forum
Eagle Gallery => Our Members AMC Eagle(s) Engine => Topic started by: kit_16 on August 07, 2010, 12:55:50 AM
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My '81 sx/4, originally began life as some others with a small iron duke. Now its in the process of getting a new power plant, but still a pontiac one none the less. I am placing the Pontiac OHC-6 sprint into it. never seen or heard of this being accomplished. but with both sitting in the garage and duke was on its last leg, so the thought occurred to me, high torque and high rpm and all wheel drive seem like a nice match. I will post pictures and more info as I go along. Would appreciate any input on this matter and would like to hear about other custom engine conversions and upgrades other people have placed into their eagles. especially the all wheel drive ones. this car seems like it would make an awesome rally car.
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Neat idea, but it will make parts more difficult to find, and you'll have to fabricate axle mounts/engine mounts.
If it shares the SBC bellhousing bolt pattern, then wouldn't a 4.3L V6 swap be easier? Vortec would be nice. But it would lack the cool factor of the vintage engine.
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I am not familiar with that Pontiac engine.
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even though it is a pontiac engine, i find its a refreshing change from the warmed over "just throw a chev engine in it" idea. you should definately fill some of us less informed in on a little history on that engine
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The OHC-6 design was adopted by Pontiac in the 1966 model year. The block was based on the Chevrolet Straight-6, but had block and head castings unique to the OHC. Both head and block were cast iron; only the large cam carrier/valve cover was aluminum. The engine featured a Single OverHead Cam and was the base engine in the Pontiac Tempest.
The Pontiac OHC-6 engine shared internal dimensions with the standard 230-cubic-inch (3.8 L) Chevrolet I6 block. The OHC head design put it in the avante garde of Detroit engineering. The single camshaft was supported by journals within the aluminum valve cover: no separate bearing shells were used. The cam was driven by a glassfiber-reinforced cogged rubber belt, instead of the usual metal chain, making it state of the art for the time - and very quiet. Valves were opened with finger followers (centered under the cam) that pivoted at one end on stationary hydraulic adjusters. The oil pump, distributor drive and fuel pump drive were not within the block, but were handled by an external jackshaft in an aluminum housing that bolted to the right side of the block. The jackshaft was driven by the rubber timing belt. The head had a single port face (exhaust and intake were both on the left side) and the valve stems were strongly tilted towards the left. This engine was used on the 1966 through 1969 Tempest and Le Mans and the 1967 through 1969 Firebird.
A high-performance version, called the Sprint, was an option. The Sprint featured high-compression pistons, a hotter cam, dual valve springs, a split/dual exhaust manifold, a better coil and utilized the then new Quadrajet 4-barrel carburetor. It was the first American high performance six cylinder engine since the demise of the Hudson Hornet.
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some of those ideas sound familiar having looked inside an ecotec engine. interesting
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Didn't Willy's offer an OHC 6 in the Wagoneer line when it was introduced?? Putting THAT engine in an Eagle would be way cool as well......
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Willys offered the The "Dauntless" 225 cu in (3.7 L) V6 engine in their Jeep CJ's and in the Commando for awhile (1966-71).
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i need to figure out which would be the best style tranny to take the place of the four cylinder one with the least ammount of modification that would hold up, especially since mine is straight all wheel drive. i have been going back and forth and thinking about the ectd-locking differentials for the front and rear. the is a switch with an elctromagnet in the differential case that changes it from limited slip to full lock up, which should be a nice added touch. this is a little costly at around 700 per axle, but on the other hand when has restoring a car been cheap.lol. any suggestions on tranny setup would be appreciated. i already have an alluminum pontiac bellhousing that came with the ohc-6 originally. any input and suggestions welcomed
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Didn't Willy's offer an OHC 6 in the Wagoneer line when it was introduced?? Putting THAT engine in an Eagle would be way cool as well......
your thinking of the kaiser ohc6... they used it in the m715 military 5/4 truck and the kaiser darrin... post willys
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When I was in college, I had a '69 Firebird with this engine in it. I was impressed with a friend of mine who had the 4bbl version in his '68 firebird. Man was that thing fast off the line! Very unique engine for it's time. While in college, I got tired of those gas lines during the second oil shortage, and so set about to convert my car to propane. i sort of had the idea of what I needed, and got most of the parts rounded up. Then when I was home from school one weekend. it was time to do it! The tank went in the trunk, the spare went under the trunk( like a pickup truck) , i got the fuel line and heat exchanger installed. Then I realized that I did not have a 1bbl adapter to get the Impco 225 mixer onto my manafold. About that time, my dad came out to the garage and found me with my old carburator in the vise with hack saw working away...I needed the butterfly valve off the bottom half. He said" man you are committed now!...once ashore you burned the ships!" Yea, if this doesn't work I'll be walking back to college. .....But it did work.....I did manage to get the bottom half of my old carb screwed onto that Impco mixer...and drove it that way for a month or so. So...I can say that engine works well on propane!
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oh yeah propane in my opinion is the way to go if you have the resorces. it can be a bit of a hassle but it burns way cleaner than gas and does a lot less damage to the engine. And if you work for a propane company it can be quite cheap to use since you would likely recieve a discount on it and its already only 2.20 a gallon. I know a guy getting it for a ford f350 dually who is paying around 1.70 a gallon. Only down side is that it gets a bit less mileage. Ive also heard great things about biodiesel but my buddy just uses filtered used fryer oil from chicken coop and mcdonalds but he says the downfall is that he gets so hungry from the smell when he drives his truck that he has put on about 30 pounds eating at his "fuel stops"
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Just got another ax/4 as a donor car, the sprint engine is about to finally get installed. Turns out the sprint engine has a place to mount the front axle the same way the iron duke does. A very welcome ironic coincidence
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Also grafting a 1972 goes ranchero gt hood scoop onto the eagle hood to give it that 1970 amex ram air hood look. Along with some 1998 jeep Cherokee 5 spoke wheels. This sx/4 is coming along nicely. Hope to have pictures up soon. And hopefully when it's finished, get some national recognition in a magazine or two
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Didn't Willy's offer an OHC 6 in the Wagoneer line when it was introduced?? Putting THAT engine in an Eagle would be way cool as well......
Too heavy. All torque no RPMs
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IKA-Renault_Torino
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Wow, this sounds cool. Let's see some pics already! :)
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Those Pontiac OHC sixes are beautiful looking, unfortunately everyone goes for V-8s because they fit so well in the old Pontiac cars. The big Pontiac engines came in 400, 428, and 455 in the 70's. I think all the GM divisions had a 455, and Cadillac had the 500.
They Pontiac 6s were 250ci in the last couple of years before the muscle-car wars caused Pontiac to drop them. It's a shame, really; they had a 6500 RPM redline. There's a forum out there devoted to them. If I found one I'd pick it up then find something to use it in just for the uniqueness.
I like the old Kaiser Tornados too, but they're a different breed. They were in the FSJs early on, and they are really good engines. They get a bad rap because of their uniqueness and some of the applications they were used in.
The Tornado had a lot of torque and a low fuel consumption, all while driving both valves off the same cam lobe. It had 6 lobes instead of 12. They were put in a lot of military vehicles for years after they were discontinued in the consumer market, and were maybe a little underpowered for some of those.
But I'm drifting a bit. I'd love to see the finished product and construction photos. I love to see unique swaps, and I think that the OHC would make a good choice. As far as transmission selection, a 700r4 or an NV/NP would probably work, they were used in GMs and Jeeps so you may get lucky and find all the parts at the junkyard.
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I like the idea. Its unique yet do-able, and hey, if you can put a 151ci pontiac motor in one why not a pontiac ohc i6? Like amcinstaller said, its a refreshing change from the "chevy" thing.