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Off Topic Off Topic - General non-Corvette related discussion. |
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06-02-2011, 9:40am | #1 | ||||||
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Oldsmobile LF9 Diesel?
never heard of it before.
I was tootleing around Summitracing, and noticed it was a choice in the 350 SBC area. I'm guessing it was a diesel 350, but I can't recall any vehicles that had... what's the deal with it? |
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06-02-2011, 9:43am | #2 | ||||||
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I used to drive one (not new) around Florida around 1985? It was a 98 Olds loaded. Nice car but pretty loud and smokey.
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06-02-2011, 10:07am | #3 | ||||||
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Late 70's-early 80's GM had the infinite wisdom to rush to market a passenger car diesel. Said diesel was a quick conversion from the GM small block gas engine, which is why they were enormously popular and why you see so many of them still on the road today.
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06-02-2011, 10:22am | #4 | ||||||
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Nailed it.
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06-02-2011, 10:32am | #5 | |||||||
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when you use the term SB, small block, you almost always are referring to the SBC, the Olds block was in fact very similar to the Pontiac blocks of the 60-70's and Olds took the 350 version of that engine, and made a diesel out of it, lotsa troubles with the things, bottom ends let go, and something about pumps....many in junkyards with rods through the skirts..... and NO you don't see many/any around, they all died a way premature fugly death.... |
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06-02-2011, 10:35am | #6 | |||||||
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Yep, after the first big oil crisis in '73, GM jumped in with diesel engines for for big cars like Olds. Prob was that the 350 engine wasn't beefy enough and they were a consant maintenance headache besides being noisy and stinky. Many were replace with gas engines, most were junked as they had little or no resale value. :train: |
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06-02-2011, 10:50am | #7 | |||||||
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Which is why I said "GM small block" refering to the generic Buick-Pontiac-Olds all-in-one motors used in that era. |
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06-02-2011, 12:10pm | #8 | ||||||||
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As for the diesel, as others have said, the design was based on a small block Olds engine - with many components from their gas engine being interchangeable. Which gave the (more sturdy) diesel block the ability to accept gas heads, etc. making them a good choice for a base for a performance Olds small block. |
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06-02-2011, 12:29pm | #9 | ||||||
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[QUOTE=88Z51;298329]"GM" small block? You do realize that other than distributor tuneup components and perhaps a bolt here or there, nothing interchanges between the Buick, Olds and Pontiac V8's- right? They are each of their own design - not generic.QUOTE]
Good point, as a matter of fact there was a great hue and cry from Olds lovers and others in the late '70's when GM started to use Chevy engines their beloved behemoths . It was considered sacrilege. |
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06-02-2011, 12:58pm | #10 | ||||||
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In the early 80's GM eliminated redundancy in the corporate line up by replacing the Olds 260 and 307, the Pontiac 301 and the Buick 350 with a generic GM small block, a version of the Chevy 305. Lawsuits were file when the consumers discovered this. GM stopped associating engines with particular divisions, and today all GM engines are produced by "GM powertrain" (GMPT) and are called GM "Corporate" engines.
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06-02-2011, 1:19pm | #11 | |||||||
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I think the Buick engine, especially their version of the 455 was a considerably lighter casting, which is why the Wildcats of the era were a surprise in performance compared to others.....but I know the head bolt pattern was different and so would be the block casting... |
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06-02-2011, 1:26pm | #12 | |||||||
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I could see the obvious end of the divisions in GM back in the 80's when a chebby engine was across the board, and Olds 350's got into Sevilles, even back in the 70's |
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06-02-2011, 1:29pm | #13 | ||||||||
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06-02-2011, 1:31pm | #14 | |||||||
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This might help to understand ALL the differences, and SIMILARITIES http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buick_V8_engine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontiac_V8_engine |
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06-02-2011, 1:39pm | #15 | |||||||
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06-02-2011, 1:40pm | #16 | ||||||
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I will add to this post is that the "Diesel" engines GM produced in the 70's and 80's are the reason that the US consumer fears diesel engines.
They were shit. Known for injector problems, fuel pump problems, loud, smokey and generally just shit for engines. GM and their cost cutting cheap ass "rush it to market" thinking is the reason why we can't get some of the GOOD diesels from Europe right now. The MFG's always say the same thing " We don't think that there is a market for them in the US". GM ( and the other MFG's) is and was full of Fuking idiots. Ford seems to be the only one with a clue on the powerful small displacement engines. |
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06-02-2011, 2:17pm | #17 | |||||||
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I assumed Ron was being sarcastic. The Olds block was chosen as the basis for the conversion and the compression issues were bad in '78 and '79, but were mostly cured in '80 and '81. Injector pump issues were never solved, mostly due to a lack of filtration and separation. They were junk, plain and simple. You could convert 'em back to gas pretty easily as the injector pump hot wire plugged right into the gas engine's distributor. You also had to change the gears in the rear end, otherwise you got crap gas mileage. Most all of 'em have long been junked. |
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06-02-2011, 2:27pm | #18 | |||||||
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06-02-2011, 3:02pm | #19 | |||||||
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06-02-2011, 3:11pm | #20 | ||||||
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My parents had an Olds 98 with the diesel and it was a great car for them, it never gave them a bit of trouble and they drove it nearly 250Kmiles. I bought a Buick Park Avenue with the Diesel and it was a Royal POS. I worked on it constantly, got to know the guys at the local diesel injection pump place well.
It was so frigging hard to start that I rigged up a separate little tank under the hood to hold a mixture of methanol and gasoline in. I used an aftermarket windshield wiper fluid pump to squirt a little of the mixture into the air cleaner housing. It evaporated too fast so I started using WD40 in the tank. Worked like a charm. I eventually traded it in and took it in the shorts on value. Some people pulled the diesels and put in small block gasoline V8, there was a local shop that did the job for aroud $2500.00 turnkey or $1200.00 if you supplied them with a V8 that would fit. |
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