Gas Engine That Will Make 500,000 mi.

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Lots of good speculation and guessing here. One or two engines have proven time after time to hit 500,000 miles as a daily driver. One is the venerable 4.0 L Jeep/AMC engine and the 199/225 cu in Dodge slant 6s.
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We've got a Chevy 3/4 service van with a 5.7L in it. It has 265K on it now. I'm surprised how well this motor pulls and how smooth it is. Doesn't burn or use oil. 300K will be a piece of cake and I'll bet it'll go 400K+.

Our E150 service van has a 4.6L and 190K on it but the #7 cylinder has a coolant leak from a head gasket so I'm not betting it'll last a whole lot longer.

Some of our service trucks do almost 1000 miles/week. 500K is 10 yrs of use. Maybe the motors will last but not much else. All the high mile trucks and vans we have are falling apart except for the motors.

Doesn't matter much if the motor can do 500K if the vehicle around it is junk.
 
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I haven't seen a Honda V6 make it past 300k yet.




There's a C27 in my '87 Legend that just turned 373k this afternoon. Never been apart aside from a couple of timing belts and water pumps. Uses 1 quart of oil every 4.5k miles (5k OCI). I just run it a quart low until it's time to change.

Now watch...it'll blow up tomorrow.
 
SW99: So did you actually launch a plug or convince yourself that it was going to launch a plug? There are several boards that I frequent that the same five people who had a plug go sure make it seem like every modular V8 will eventually have the problem.

The county I now work for has a respectable fleet of modular V8's - sherrif's Crown Vics, F150, F250, F350's, and E-series vehicles, and they've not had one plug launch.

I'm not saying the problem doesn't exist - it does, but has been much less frequent that sometimes portrayed. It attracts a lot of attention when it does happen though! Given the number of these engines on the road,
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I haven't seen a Honda V6 make it past 300k yet.




There's a C27 in my '87 Legend that just turned 373k this afternoon. Never been apart aside from a couple of timing belts and water pumps. Uses 1 quart of oil every 4.5k miles (5k OCI). I just run it a quart low until it's time to change.

Now watch...it'll blow up tomorrow.




Tell me more about the C27...what is it? How big? Is it comparable to the current Honda 3.0 V6? Is it VTEC? Just curious what you did to get it that far, since I have a vested interest in one!

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SW99: So did you actually launch a plug or convince yourself that it was going to launch a plug? There are several boards that I frequent that the same five people who had a plug go sure make it seem like every modular V8 will eventually have the problem.

The county I now work for has a respectable fleet of modular V8's - sherrif's Crown Vics, F150, F250, F350's, and E-series vehicles, and they've not had one plug launch.

I'm not saying the problem doesn't exist - it does, but has been much less frequent that sometimes portrayed. It attracts a lot of attention when it does happen though! Given the number of these engines on the road,
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No, not me personally. My buddy had one go at approximately 100k on his 97'. He had to have the insert installed. Like you said, lot's of talk about it made me worry a ton. On F150online.com & ford-trucks.com, there were a ton of folks who reported that it happened to them. I just did what I could and installed the updated plugs and used the correct torque.
 
As a person that started off with aluminum headed engines in the 60s, I suspect that many people still don't treat a plug change with the proper respect on a modern aluminum head. I do like the GM warning under the hood to remove the plugs on the engine cold. I have not seen such a warning on the Fords, so I really wonder how much John Q. Public and Mr. Brutewrench have to do with damaged threads. Sure is nice and easy to change the plugs on the 2 valve modulars (haven't done any 3 or 4 valve ones yet).
 
From my experience BMW 4 and 6 cylinders from the 80's and 90's are VERY robust. I have seen them running strong with 300k+ miles, however while still being used for weekends at the track and generally spirited driving.

I don't know of many engines that can handle the abuse a BMW engine can for a full lifetime and by abuse I mean sitting near redline at a track event for the day or in generally spirted driving.
 
Apparently the State of California has a lawsuit against Ford for this problem. The Ford dealer I worked has hardly seen any cars including police cars with this problem, but tons of trucks are spitting plugs out.
 
i never had a plug launch in my 98's vic, expy and conti..i changed my plugs in the 4.6 sohc vic and my 32 valve dohc conti all was extremely easy..on a cold engine..
 
I just sold my one owner Toyota pickup with 578k miles. It has a 20R engine and has had one valve job. The bottom end was in perfect condition. Nothing in the bottom was replaced. This engine can make it to 1M miles. The body can not, without major help. This engine was in excellent condition. On it's last Calif smog test it blew zero's. Everyone in the shop came to look at the results, and many said things like, what do you expect. It's a 20R. Same for the 22R. It has original spec compression, starts quickly and runs very smooth. There was one mod done about 10 years ago. The original carb just wore out. After having a stroke at the Toyota parts counter over the price, I installed a Weber carb. I messed with the jets and finally drilled out the main jet and changed the linkage on the accl pump, and it ran just like brand new. Everthing looked factory and no smog tech over the years ever noticed the change. The truck has always had the smog air pump and it was always kept in working order. The only reason I sold the truck is because I'm getting older and dead people don't need a truck. I sold it at a give away price to a college freshman that I think will use it a lot and drive the rest of the miles off it.
 
I'll also vote for the 3.8 liter Buick V6, the 300cid Ford straight six, and the 20R-22R Toyota 4-cylinders.

I also see no reason the 2.2 liter GM Ecotec 4-cylnder wouldn't make it.

I had a 1989 Escort with the EFi 1.9 engine and it had 351,000 miles when I sold it. I'll bet that car would be close to 500K by now had I kept it, but it had no AC, so no point it hauling it down to Texas when I moved here.
 
I believe that if you check the GMPowertrain website, the prior-gen Chevy small block is still available for some uses, plus being produced for crate motors for GMGoodwrench and GMParts. In that criteria, the orig 305 in my (purchased new) 1977 Camaro was pulled out at 576K -- the reason? 4 leaking core plugs (i.e., freeze plugs) on the side of the cylinder block. It was still running well and not using massive amounts of oil (the oil? Castrol GTX 20W-50, which later was upgraded to SyntecBlend 20W-50 toward the end). I suspect the oil was coming in through the valve guides and a little from the rings.

When new, it used 1/2 qt in 4K. When usage increased to where it took more than 1 qt to go 5K, then I went to a change interval of 'put one quart in, change it when it needs another one'. As things progressed farther, still, in the winter months there were some times that things went longer than that. End result, it got oil changes when I felt like getting under it rather than by miles per se. Even with that "so-so" oil change schedule, there was no significant accumulation of things in the lifter valley.

As for timing chains/belts, I consider that part of any high mileage engine maintenance situation--I call it "insurance". When I did the cam/intake/carb upgrade at 92K, I put a Cloyes Plus timing chain set in and it is still in the motor (now residing on an engine stand).

I didn't mean for this to be an endorsement for Castrol GTX, but that's what it had in it from the first oil change when new (until far, far later in life). I'm sure that others might have similar experiences with other brands. At that time, too, 20W-50 was a little heavy compared to the normal 10W-30 recommendations. In the coldest weather (i.e., below freezing), when new it had only a second or two that a lifter would tick upon first start in the morning.

Therefore, with the greater accuracy of factory machine work that goes into current production motors, I'd say that most any of them (4 cyl and otherwise) should make 500K with decent maintenance and current motor oils in them (with a quality oil filter). If they might need a timing chain/belt change as part of normal maintenance, I wouldn't count off for that as the basic short block is a greater determiner of longevity, but a broken/failed timing chain/belt CAN affect the short block too, just as no oil in the crankcase would.

I know that Mercedes makes a big deal of their extended-mile club. Chevy's now doing that with their Silverados. I used to get tickled at Toyota television ads about how great it was that their vehicles (by customer testimonials) would easily go 100K miles with no trouble.

I also have observed that many people brag about how their oriental import brand vehicle will last, but I feel that such longevity (of those engines) is highly influenced by a rigorous oil change schedule (as some definitely need it!) that seems to be the mantra of those brands and owners. I suspect that if an American brand vehicle was treated to the same regular maintenance schedule, they would have done equally as well--by observation.

The other thing is that many of these imports were used as daily drivers for high-mileage commutes and they were "beaters" and not traded-in every three years for a new one. I observed as the bodies deteriorated, the interiors were gone in a few years (from the TX sun), and the paint was far beyond any "magic wax" resurrection, yet the engines purred right along.

On the other hand, most USA brand vehicles were traded-in every 3-5 years (well BEFORE 100K!) so not everyone knew that they could last as long as they can (engine/powertrain wise). Some might claim there was a reason for the USA brands being traded that often, but I feel it was more for style than necessity that they were traded--a sign of prosperity, too.

With all of the electronic controls on modern engines, the machining advances, balance shafts, and much better motor oils, not to mention greatly improved designs of vehicle bodies and chassis items, I see no real reason (especially for engines for which 'oil gel' is not a problem with particular motor oils) for any current production vehicle to not be able to see the other side of 500K miles, with decent care and maintenance.

You might also attrribute some of that longevity to overdrive transmissions, but highway cruise rpm in OD is not that far from what the old 3-speed automatics (as in my Camaro) with "highway gears" (also, as in my Camaro) in them would do. The OD automatics generally have deeper "direct" gear ratios which allow better performance and still have lower cruise rpms on the highway--especially for the smaller engines.

Just some thoughts,
CBODY67
 
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