I see a lot of people swapping their NBS 4.3L's to Gen III smallblocks which is pretty cool.

Would it be even easier to swap to an L31 5.7L Vortec? From what I understand in the OBS trucks that was a pretty simple swap. Since the 4.3L is still basically a Gen I design wouldn't it be easier to swap to the Gen I V8?

The reason I ask is that it is kind of hard to find a V8 truck with a manual transmission around here. I'm having a hard time deciding which route to go with this. Do I buy a 4.8/5.3L truck with an auto and swap it to a 5 speed? Or is it cheaper to buy the 5 speed truck and put a V8 in it.

Im not going to be blasting down the 1/4 mile. Im looking for a motor with some grunt. The older engines seems to build torque at 2500rpm where the Gen III's seem to have their peak torque at 4000rpm.

Thanks for looking,
Joey

 

Mykk did this exact thing.
Here is the thread Link

 

why old technology, not to talk **** about the guy, but his built gen1 smallblock is running what cam only 5.3's with supporting mods are running.

Just saying.

 

I like his truck just for the cool factor

 

forward flipping hoods and open mouth bass grilles are cool?

OH your talking about the engine swap haha.

 

he ran a low 14s IIRC, on HEAVY 22 inch rims, i think if he would swap to some light rims and slicks, he could dip into the 13s.

and his 355 isnt really 'built', a stock ZZ4 bottom end, and heads and cam.

 

Ok, so hes running what very LOW modded 5.3 rcsb's are running...i stand corrected, cool idea, but not practical imho

 

2005 Silverado, if I remember correctly your truck started life with a 4.3L right? Does it perform like you want it to now?

I have been doing some thinking on it and I think the best way to go would be with a Gen III engine. What I really want is something that is fun to drive, but can still be worked a little if it needs to be. I need something in between a work truck and a fun truck, lol.

Thanks for the replies,
Joey