Chicken Drumstick Posted April 28, 2015 Share Posted April 28, 2015 In the interests of building an amusing for fun Land Rover (coil sprung chassis, 90, 110, Disco/RR sort of thing). And you want to junk the RV8. What options exist for fitting alternative engines? I know Overfinch are known for fitting the old cast iron 350 Chevy SBC. But I think it was normally to an auto transmission. Are kits available to do this? What about fitting the new 346 LS1 Chevy V8? And what if you want to retain a manual gearbox? I know the LT-77/R380 will be at or beyond their limits. But they would give you are starting point. Or are there any other gearboxes you can use? Retaining the LT230 isn't essential, but I think retaining a centre differential is. Running 4wd on the road is a nice thing to have IMO. I know there are some companies fitting the new Mustang/Ford 5.0 engine. I suspect because this engine mates to the 6 speed gearbox as it is also used in other Ford's (the Mustang), so makes for a fairly straight forward swap, assuming you are starting with this gearbox. No diesels. What other petrol, likely V8 engine swap options are out there, that don't need you to do all the R&D and get custom bell housings made. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jackmac Posted April 28, 2015 Share Posted April 28, 2015 Quite a few people out there running LS3 / LS7 with an LT230. Not sure what gearbox goes in between though but there must be a common solution, the only one I know of for sure is an £8000 quaife sequential box Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lewis Posted April 28, 2015 Share Posted April 28, 2015 Marks 4wd and Advance Adaptors both do conversion kits to mate various yank gearboxes to the LT230 As for engines, theoretically you could mount a 4l v6 from a NAS or ROW disco 3 and use the cosworth heads and turbos from a Granada Scorpio. There used to be an adaptor available to mate the ford v6 to series gearbox, this same adaptor can be used on the LT77 and R380 used for 4cyl applications There is an old thread in tool and fab called engine bunfight or some such, you may find its content interesting - a lot of vapour discussions http://forums.lr4x4.com/index.php?showtopic=9003&page=1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chicken Drumstick Posted April 30, 2015 Author Share Posted April 30, 2015 Thanks for the link. It turned out to be not so helpful. Either silly suggestions mostly, or just citing random engines with no info or conception on how to actually get them to work in a Land Rover. Moving on from that. I have found some info on fitting an LS1. It seems easier than I thought. First option is to mate the LS1 to the GM 4L80E 4 speed auto. Then there is an adapter that will allow you to mate the gearbox to the LT230. My only issue is, why fit a performance V8 to blunt the fun with an automatic gearbox. I've also found a company that claims to sell an adapter to mount the LS1 to a "Rover 4 or 5 speed manual transmission". Not sure what this exactly means, but I assume it should work with an LT-77/R380 and maybe something like an LT-95. I'll try and find out. This sounds much more appealing to me, as all you'd need is the engine, adapter and some way to control the engine. I guess the only down side is, the LS1 is really pushing the these gearboxes to the max and beyond, so if you are brutal, then I don't know how long they'll last. There also seems to be adapters for older GM V8's (350 SBC) that will mate to the 4 speed ZF auto box. But I think the cost of doing this you'd end up with a heavier worse performing setup than the LS1 and 4L80E setup. I've also found a number of gearbox adapters for the Series transfer box. Not sure how useful this is, but if you want to run a beefier 4 speed manual, 5 speed manual or even a 4 speed auto from the likes of Dodge/GM. Then there are adapters to use with the Series transfer box, if you are happy with only 2wd on the road. Don't really know how much power the Series transfer box can handle compared to the LT230. There are plenty of other 2wd/4wd transfer boxes available from people like Atlas and ones used stock on American trucks, which will also mate to these gearboxes. So I guess the saving is not buying the transfer box and depending on location maybe retaining stock props. Obviously these GM/Dodge boxes allow you to mate a number of engines too them. Probably nice if you are US based as you could significantly upgrade a Series Land Rover to something more potent and durable and likely at minimal cost. But probably of less significance and use in the UK. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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