Chris9450

Ok, I know there's a million and one V6-V8 swap threads on here...and I've read many and I've yet to hear or read about this problem.

I've got a 1987 camaro with the 2.8L that went out in July...and I've been collecting parts ever since then for a swap. I built a sbc 383 and picked up a donor car so I have just about everything. Everything has gone smooth and as planned until we pulled the v6 out and attempted to change the engine mounts. I bought some poly engine mounts for an 1987 z28, and after I removed the v6 engine mounts I realised that there was no way in hell that the v8 engine mounts were going to just bolt in. I have read all over and many people have said that everything bolts in...but these do not. The v6 mounts only have 3 holes to begin with and the v8 mounts have 4, but the holes do not even line up. I was just wondering if I'm getting the wrong engine mounts or what's going on. Any information would be extremely helpful...I've invested 500+ hours in this since july and I refuse to let a few bolts stop me .

doug791

its really quite stupid honestly. It looks like by the mount that there should be 4 bolts, but there truly isnt. IIRC if youre standing infront of the car the mount uses the two bolts on the top and the one closest to you on the bottom. The mount sits on an angle and when you drop the motor down the top half of the mount will only sit flush (assuming its not already bolted together) if you have it in the proper bottom hole. But the important part being that it only uses one of the bottom holes.

Not sure why in the hell GM did that, maybe there was a good reason for it, and maybe they were just being retarted as usual

97WS6SCharged

Stupid engineers!! The bad part is they couldn't spend like 3 cents per car to have the nuts welded onto the crossmember. It's a royal pain in the *** to change the motor mounts since you have to snake a freakin wrench or socket through the thing. I won't do mounts on a car that doesn't have a tubular K member anymore.

Chris9450

Nothing quite like fumbling around trying to get a good grip on those nuts...is there an easy way to getting those damnded nuts back on the bolts? I guess you almost have to do them blindly considering there's just enough room to get my hand in the freakin hole.

97WS6SCharged

For about $400 bucks you can get a tubular k member and never have to worry about those problems again.

They are listed at the bottom of Thunder's page.

http://www.thunderracing.com/index.c...ategoryid=1141

Unfortunately, you have to use their control arms as well, so it is actually a little more expensive than $400. But it's alot easier to work on, plus you drop 40 lbs of nose weight.

doug791

ive heard the tubular k members are not intended for street use?

Regardless i agree the motor mounts are rediculously hard to deal with. Me and my friend (although it was with the tinyest jack youve ever seen and the car no more then a foot off the ground) attempted to change the motor mounts on my iroc....it took us 5 hours of sweat, tears, and sore eyes from dirt falling into them from above.....we got one mount done.....took it to a mechanic and paid him 200 freaking dollars (canadian) to get the other one done said it took him like 3 hours (although i dont really trust this guy, my step dads mechanic, for various reasons im never going back there)....the worst part is its 3 bolts.....3 BOLTS!!!!....ack i never want to do that again.

Anyways hope the info i put forth was what you needed. Lets get some pics when its all put together!

97WS6SCharged

I've heard the same, but I've got a few friends who are using them with no problems. I wouldn't hesitate to use one on a weekend car. I would be a little leary about using one on a daily driver though.

Zepher

You only use one bottom hole since the bottom edge of the motor mount sits off of the K-Member,

doug791

im trying to remember from when i changed the one mount but it seemed like my motor mounts were on a bit of an angle and if you had straightened them out it could have used 4 bolts. I dont really remember plus i had the engine hovering about an inch over so i probably just had my eyes playing tricks on me.

Zepher

did you look at the pictures I posted?

doug791

yeah i did and what i was trying to say is i dont remember my engine mounts looking like that, but my memory of my engine mounts is also after 5 hours of sweating and dirt falling into my eyes so i dont exactly remember it all that clearly. In the next day or two ill go take a look at my car again i dont feel like it right now

95NateZ28

Great, I am moving mine forward this week. Looks like a great project that I'm sure I'll cuss at repeatedly.

I love this board....so much great 3rd gen info on topics I didn't even care to know about.

doug791

might i ask why youre attempting to move them forward??? Do you mean actually drilling new holes and sliding the mount forward, because youd probably have to pull the engine to do it.

95NateZ28

Well, I just removed both of my engine mounts in about 20 minutes. The key is getting the car high enough off the ground so you can see well, and wrapping a wire around a wrench so you can manuever it easily inside the frame. All I did was take a piece of stovepipe wire and wrap it tightly around a 15mm wrench....and bam! Easy access.

My V6 engine mounts from 84 look completely different that those in the pics posted, I had to print these off before I run back out to the shop and try to re-install these bad boys.