Buick 231 V6 HEI Conversion

one place to look would be at the 90's and 2000's firebird and camaro's they had the 3.8 efi with rear wheel drive. good luck and let us know what you find out.................

 

Another thing nobody has really mentioned (no matter how unlikely) here is the fact that the block might be an 87-88 model but that doesn't mean somebody didn't swap in an odd-fire crank and rods into it along with the cam. At that point that might be why it had a 225 (oddfire) pointed distributor.

 

sparky;

i was thinking [well you know ] if all he was looking for was a efi that it might bolt up to his block and heads. not to wasp complete engines.
i know that the turbo guys wasp heads from the 89 tta to the 86-87 gn

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=7919447638&category=33625

Will this work?

 

Depends on the year, I think. Did you determine whether you are OF or EF? The Late 70's had both OF (1975-1977) and EF (~1977-and above) HEI's. Not sure if Firebirds were one or the other.

 

Ad says pontiac 232. Might be a chevy motor.

 

Hello All,
Finally found a HEI from an 84' RWD Regal today. A couple of big questions. My current dist has a vacum advance that goes into the 2 bbl Holley Carb. Do I just plug it and not worry about vacum advance? What makes the new dist advance? How do I wire this thing? There are four wires coming out of one side of the dist and three out of the other. Any help would be greatly appreciated as always.

 

HTML:

Finally found a HEI from an 84' RWD Regal today

if the dist. does not have the vac. adv. it means that dist was used with a computor to control the advance. i would not use that dist. look for one that has the vac. adv.........

 

That's what I was afraid of, Thanks!!

 

sparky;

does mop's dist. have the notch in the rim of the housing for the vac. adv. unit to sit in? also is it drilled and tapped for the hold down screws and does it have the detent in the housing for the alignment of the vac. adv. unit?

 

The advance is original on mine....it had a different ignition module that had to be changed in order to get mine to work, because it was an ESC HEI (see below). After replacing the module it worked fine. Everyone has to buy an aftermarket vacuum advance kit for the proper advance. The HEI distributors advance at something like 5-7 mm mercury, whereas the stock delco doesn't advance until around 11 mm mercury IIRC.

I stole this from a response by Patrick one time, it refers to my EF HEI source:

 

Would a picture of what I bought and the original help? How do you run a vacum advance to the dist?
Thanks

 

OK, will a 76'-77' non computer vacuum advance electronic distirbutor from a 231 Buick V-6 work???
Thanks

 

Boy have I learned alot about HEI's in the past 6 months. Thought it was easy until I sold my ESC distributer to MOP (that I thought I wasn't going to use). Now I need a pre-ECM distributor with ESC (had it and didn't know it) I have a lead on one now.

Jeff, for even fire, you need a 1978-1980 with vac advance. Don't worry about the ESC pigtail as it is attached to the module --which will need to be replaced with a standard non-esc module as mentioned above.

I don't know if you can convert an ECM distributor without major surgery. I have one here that I bought off a guy for cheap (wrong one of course)

edit: The ESC was a stand-alone module to retard timing in the event of knock. The carb was still on its own, no wiring until 1981. The ESC works well to control knock by electronically retarding timing. The problem is that it is an all-or-nothing proposition by pulling about 20 degrees of timing out to save the pistons. Great system but with 87 octane and harsh emission controls in early 80's cars, they all seemed to knock a little thus timing not optimized.

 

I think 76-77 may still be OF, not EF..... may not need to do conversion... Once I get home I will try to post pictures of EF versus OF pickup. That is what you will have to go by if you do not know what it came out of. I think I have read the switch to EF was sometime during 77 production year.


I act like I have learned a lot about HEI's in the past 6 months, only because of the problems encountered and lessons learned. I may have some spare parts left over I can donate to your cause Michigan.

 

I think 76-77 may still be OF, not EF..... may not need to do conversion... Once I get home I will try to post pictures of EF versus OF pickup.

Pretty sure mine is an EF engine after looking at the current dist. It has six evenly spaced lobes. Not really sure what the abbreviations from Michigan mean?? (ESC & ECM)
Thanks everyone!