What killed it was a head gasket leak or a crack somewhere. Bar's Leak attended to it nicely ..but a bearing rumble could be heard occasionally on startup. I didn't get it under control soon enough. My refresh earlier this year was a waste.
My latest repair attempt was to be fixing the crank seal. This I brought on myself with putting an extraction tube in the exhaust to evacuate the moisture from the crankcase. It worked flawlessly ..putting so much vacuum on the crankcase unvented that it sucked the crankseal in. Live and never stop learning.
Anyway ..last straw was an overheat upon getting off the highway after a trip up to 75 mph.
The cost was $2200 Plus $135 sales tax and $500 core charge. It includes everything except the valve cover, pan, timing cover, intake and exhaust manifold. A short block is only $1200 and heads are over $400 each. Now we're up to $2000 and cores. An additional $200 gets your heads torqued at the factory and the frontend hardware (belt, wp, tensioner, etc.) all setup and timed on the cams. So ..effectively it's wash if you factor in labor for that sorta stuff.
The only thing that will retire this minivan is if it gets cracked up. I'm not going to spend $30k for a new one ..and I see no reason to buy someone elses problems. I would have liked to have scheduled this about 18 months from now (my house will be paid off then) ..but somethings just don't work out the way you like. If not for the insults to this engine, it would have gone on for many years