89 to 93 engine swap

I have a 89 limited that I laid over and starved the front of the motor of oil, now the motors knocks. Have a friend that gave me a complete 93 motor. Correct me if i'm wrong but the long block should be a direct swap. If that is correct is there anything else i can leave on the 93 to save some time and labor.

Since your renix has EGR you want to swap over your intake and exhaust manifold. I believe the HO's have a better cam/head and such. Most Everything else should be bolt in

The only difference I can remember is that the 93 block will not have a temp sensor hole in it, but this sensor will fit in the 93's thermostat housing. It will also not have a threaded hole for the knock sensor, but may have a blank hole that can be threaded if you wish to retain said sensor. The legal way to do this swap would involve swapping the 89's head onto the newer block so that both manifolds, and the EGR system could be retained. If the 93's head and intake manifold are to be used, you lose the option of keeping the EGR system, and need to adapt the TPS sensor to the 93's TB. If the EGR is removed, you must either plug the hole in the exhaust manifold, or use the later manifold.

Of course everything electronic must be swapped from the 89 including all sensors, alternator, distributor, etc.

It has been done alot, however is not as direct of a swap as you would like.

not worried about the "legal" way we dont have inspections in OK. just looking for the easiest and fastest way to do the swap.

Then ignore the head swap, and adapt the TPS to work on the HO throttle body. Theres alot of ways to get it done, it just takes some thinking and fabricating.

If you search around on here you will find various examples.

That shouldn't be a prob have friends that can fab almost anything you throw at them.

A buddy of mine just pick up a 88 for dirt cheap but the motor is bad. so we want to swap in a HO WITH the HO CPU and wiring harness. How much of pita are we talking? anyone have tips or know of anything that I can read on here that will help in or effort?

Just swap every wire in the entire vehicle, and the gauges.

wow...

Its not that hard. Just get a notebook, some blue painters tape and digital camera. Take good notes, label everything, and lots of pictures. OR as they say " Installation is reverse of removal"

PM me if you hit a snag. I should still have my notebook floating around somewhere.

My swap was the opposite, I put a renix long block into an HO. The intake and exhaust bolted up, though of course there was some misalignment between the two. The newer gasket worked for my app best, so I would assume it's best to use the gasket that mates to your intake.

I just left the unused sensors in the block. I used the alternator and bracket from the HO. There were a few minor hitches in the process, though I'm not sure I remember them all. The bracketry on the passenger side of the engine is different, there may be threaded holes where there were blanks before, and vice-versa. The coil mounts aren't in the same place on the block (I mounted mine to the inner fender with a longer wire, I'm not sure where it's at on the Renix engines). The hole in the water pump for the heater outlet hose/pipe is a different size. With both complete engines present, you should be able to make it work.

One part I didn't switch over popped up later when I changed the oil. I bought the standard 1991 filter with SAE threads and it wouldn't thread on right. Don't force the issue, the threads on the Renix are metric.

There is one thing that I'm still wondering though, and perhaps someone on this board can help me. I can't remember if I swapped the plugs or not, but I suppose they should be changed. As far as fuel/ignition goes, does anyone know if mismatching the head and FI systems will cause an over/underfueling situation? Does the HO use a hotter plug? My engine seems to have a flat spot in the power right off the second gear shift (maybe 2200-3000 rpms). My guess is that the intake ports are too restrictive and the spark is too cold for the amount of fuel the HO system wants to dump in there.

Use the plugs that match the year of the head, and fuel injectors that match the year of the ECU.

I think the HO plugs are longer, so Renix plugs in a HO head would not be positioned proper. When the ECU determines how much gas to give the engine, it assumes that the injectors will flow at a certain rate. When intake and head are mismatched, it will be spraying fuel in the wrong location, but I dunno how important that is, as I haven't tested such a situation.