2000 Monte Carlo Engine Swap
 

my 2000 monte carlo has the 3400 motor in it and i was wondering if all other gm 3400's will replace it no problem(alero, grand am, etc...) anyway just wanted to know if i could get ANY 3400 or are there ones i should stay away from... second is the a rebuild kit for these 3400. i want to completely rebuild mine its stock. wondering if there was a kit with oversized pistons, rings, gaskets, etc... any help would be fantastic thanks

Ty

So far i have found no internal kits or parts for the LA1 engine that we have. mizzy does offer ported/polished upper and lower intake manifolds and a 65mm tb. they do offer swap kits but i havent heard very many positive things about them so far.

Any 3400 will work, but there might be a couple of things like some brackets that don't work or something like that. The good news is though that the 3400 was in a lot of Monte's/Impala's and you should have no problem finding a 3400 from one of them to make it work.

If you want to do something else with your 3400, my first thoughts are to just swap a 3500 into it, but you might have to ask the guys at 60degreev6.com to know for sure.

The OP can use the existing bracket hardware from the current 3400 in his car on any donor engine and I think he should be good to go.

As you pointed out, the 3400 is a COMMON engine. I go to the junk yard and if I threw a rock, I bet I'll hit a 3400.... OR a 3100....

yeah i dont really wanna go the 3500 route, my monte gets 29mpg easy(when im light one the gas) so i dont really want more power and the i hear the 3100 have alot of problems. there nothing close to wrong with my current engine i just love this car and want to buy a spare engine and completely rebuild it to have a back-up when time comes... at this point time is on my hands finding parts... ill probably have to get a motor tear it apart measure the pistons, find some universal gm pistons and rings and get it bored to those... just didnt know if they had any fits anyone knew about... my next question is there a "better" 3400 out there and how to identify the one i have...

:confused::confused:

The 3100 performance wise is a step BACKWARDS from the 3400 (some 3100 owners, mostly in the N-Body, Grand Am, world swap to a 3400, as it takes very little effort to make a 3400 work in a previously 3100 powered car). The 3400 is basically a 3100 with a larger throttle body, intake and pistons.

As for the 3100 having a lot of problems, not really. To be honest, the 3400 is subject to the SAME 3100 problems. Your primary problem, lower intake manifold gaskets.

I've owned my '94 Grand Am since 2003 when it had about 86,000 miles. Today, it has over 214,000. I did the LIM gaskets at about 90,000 miles and then I did the head gaskets and LIM gaskets in October of '09 when it had 180,000 miles. My only regret, I did not know at the time that aluminum gaskets existed.

I've worked on a bunch of 3100's (for friend's and family) and they are tough reliable engines. Because of this opinion, December of 2010, we bought a '05 Impala with a 3400 and 150,000 miles on it (it was dirt cheap too).

Sorry, I feel like I got on a soap box :):rolleyes::rotfl:

I agree. The 3100 owners are accompishing what you want to do by putting in the 3400s. The issues with these engines follow the family, not just the engine model. Other then the LIM gasket, these engines are very reliable and produce moderate power.

wow you guys seem to know your **** lol, thanks for the information... its there a way to id certain types of motors like markings on the block or in the vin maybe?

on the sticker of the car listing the rpo codes. look up the numbers on there. the 3.4 is a LA1 i dont know the others off hand.

As far as the 3.1L v6 goes I have one in my Lumina and no problems at 140k miles its a 94 so might be diffrent. One advatage to the 3.1 not many ppl know about is that you dont need to drop the engine to work on it like alot of the new stuff. You can Roll it forward after you get the front wheels up and work on the back side of the engine.

As far as 3400 go you should be able to put any engine that bolts to your tranny. Any 3400 from any car should work. Id be willing to bet you could even throw a 3800 in if you wanted to. Chevy used to use the same engine mounts for small and big block motors all you needed to do was flip over the mounting bracket, but that was way older and off topic. I dont see them complicating things with 100 different brackets tho.