Australian guy needing help about buick

[adz]

Hi yeah im from Australia and love the buick turbo so i own a vn commodore which use's the buick 3.8 litre v6 and runs E.F.I but these engines dont run turbo. Im looking to see if i can use a exhaust manifold on my buick engine instead of getting custom manifold's
Information about my engine is its a series 1 engine http://www.vncommodore.com/Technical/ there is a photo on this page of a series 2 engine the difference is the series 2 have thermostat at the front of the moter , my radiatior pipe runs to the back and my thermostat is back there . The transmisson is a th700 automatic tran's.
im hoping i can get a decent exhaust manifold and turbo with oil lines etc and do a backyard job fitting it and to the throttle body.
i only want to run 5 psi or so i dont think ill need an intercooler
and the engine will be run on premium fuel ( here premium is 98octane )
Also instead of the turbo option i was curious on supercharging it with using a supercharger off a 3800 , the engine we have that use's this comes in the Vs through to vx and is supercharged but i was told i carnt use this cause of injector's ??.
Can you guy's help me out im just learning and want to do this job myself. My computer wont be remapped for about another month so it should be ok for that month of hard driving then ill rebuild the engine. I wish our vncommodore that use's the buick engine could have had the great looks like a buick i love them
the only good thing our car has is weight which is 1370 Kg with me sitting it in it.
im more keen on supercharging for Low - mid power and torque as my gearbox needs fixing when it gets to 130 Km/h it rev's to nuetral
Thankyou Adam

 

[jastrckl]

I've never taken a look at those, but it looks like our modern (post 1987) fwd regal motor that was never turbocharged, stuffed in a RWD application (in the states it's FWD these days, sigh). Yeah, OHV so it's basically like our 3800 "series II". No way our manifolds would fit on those heads, it's a completely different beast. I'm guessing the reason someone said you couldn't do the blower is that you'd need bigger injectors. I've changed injectors on my 87 (turbo), and it was fairly easy, aside from a stuck nut on my rail supply line. If you want to keep your current motor, you can probably throw a series II blower on it imho and some fatter injectors, with a retuned computer. If holden can stuff that motor in there, I bet an LC2 (87 turbo buick) motor would fit, but I don't know where you'd fit the manifolds for the turbo and whatnot. If you're going to drop a blower on it I'd get some thicker headgaskets to lower the compression some more. Should be basically bulletproof after the new injectors and that. Interesting that someone else is using something similar to the buick series II though, I thought the late model regal and whatnot was all they were putting it in. Good luck.

 

[V6 Beast]

From looking at the pictures of your block and heads I would have to say no they will not work but I can't tell for sure. I am going to email you a couple of pictures of the exhaust side of a Stock GN head so you can compare.

Sully

 

[REDS HOT AIR]

I'm not too fimiliar with them but wouldnt turbo ta headers work ??

 

[adz]

Thanks for helping us out guy's.

yeah id look at fitting a series II blower i found some bigger injector's that are driven by the standard computer but i think this would still need a remap i wanted to fit it then get a remap done a month or 2 later but ill do some reading up and see what will work and what wont.

also a new company here has started doing a conversion crank for the 3.8 litre engine it strokes it to 4.3 litrebut the price is $2000 Australian i wish more shop's around here did more mod's on this engine cause it would be alot cheaper.
So far the best vn (buick engine ) ive seen has run 12's without
turbo,nos or supercharger which is pretty good i suppose
i wish holden just imported the whole buick and badged it as holden cause i really want one.

ill figure somthing out i normally get what i want ( i hope )
if anyone wants info on holden's ill help out where i can

 

[blackbuick87]

I think the early 90's Rivieras and SSEi used Superchargers that will bolt right onto your engine. Dont know if they have bigger injectors or not, but if so they would be easy to find, along with an ECM.

I bet Red is right, that a set of 89 TTA headers will fit the heads. The problem is if your car is FWD they may not clear the engine bay since your engine is sideways

 

[jastrckl]

Hi is RWD, but that's still not a guarantee they'll fit. Fairly good idea though.

 

[adz]

Ok thanks for that ill try read up on 90's Rivieras and SSEi
and see what injector's they run hopefully they flow the same so i dont have to replace it or the computer.
Yeah my car is Rear wheel drive the worst part on my engine is where the inlet manifold and throttle body are there is not alot of room.