what is the best v6 ever made?

Originally Posted By: addyguy
Chevrolet 2.8L V-6, 1979-1989.


Junk. Weak and thirsty. Unreliable. Owned one in an S-15 Jimmy, and one was enough.
 
Originally Posted By: chevyboy14
am i wrong on this i would assume the vulcan wore reliable than the GM offerings. is that wrong?


IMO, the 3.0, ON AVERAGE, is more reliable. Perhaps less powerful, but more reliable. (Now waiting for the posts that say I'm wrong because somebody owned a GM that was more reliable.....)
 
Originally Posted By: KD0AXS

Another one of my favorite engines is the Yamaha 3.0/3.2 V-6 that Ford put in the Taurus SHO.

ease of maintenance eliminates it.
Originally Posted By: morepwr
1st for me would be the 4.3 Chevy. I have had and seen many go way over 300K miles with minimal maintenance.

CPI spider fail, difficult to access plugs (through wheel well) on S10/Blazer....

The Mazda KJ-ZEM would win based on sophistication, fuel economy, and horsepower. But that's not the criteria and unfortunately, the Mazda was difficult to service and not extremely reliable. The KL was a real gem but has a timing belt.

Honda's V6es are solid, but again with the timing belts.

Ditto for the Toyota 3.4

The Toyota 3.5 V6? Gotta' take off the intake manifold to do the plugs. It narrowly edges out the Ford Duratec/Mazda MZI by having longer lived coil packs.

Subaru doesn't make a V6. Unless you consider the Horizontally Opposed 6 a 180° V6.

So that leaves us with the Ford Vulcan and the Chrysler 3.3. I'm going to give the edge to the Vulcan for Chrysler's early 3.3 rocker arm problems.
 
no love for the crysler 3.3, 3.8 family? ive seen many of those engines in dodge caravans run a long time reliably. the transmissions they were mated to ruined their reputation, but they were/are reliable engines.
 
Originally Posted By: donnyj08
no love for the crysler 3.3, 3.8 family? ive seen many of those engines in dodge caravans run a long time reliably. the transmissions they were mated to ruined their reputation, but they were/are reliable engines.

They were mediocre engines that guzzle fuel, have no power, and consume a lot of oil. They're better forgotten.

As far as the best V6s, the ones currently in production by all major manufacturers all seem to be pretty darn impressive. They all seem to get 260-280hp out of 3.5 liters and get close to 30mpg doing it, even with modern emissions controls. I think that's better than something made in the past.
 
Buick 231 or I guess its also a GM 3800. An GM 4.3l are the best IMO.
 
I had a 4.3l in my 1996 C1500 truck. Sold it and got a 4.8l V8 in my 2000 Silverado 4x4 truck. Liked the 4.8l V8 but...

When I bought my 2004 Sierra I was VERY happy it had the 4.3l V6 in it with the 5 speed.

Full size truck, plenty of power, great 20+ MPG with a 4x4 and SIMPLE to work on.

Plus they last forever. (my 1996 has close to 300k (it may have over since I have not seen it since the owner moved to southern Utah))

My vote is the 4.3L V6

Bill
 
Originally Posted By: chad8
3.0 toyota. I have had 3 of them . Not a problem ever. Dealer said that they last 250000 with little maintenance. I changed oil and plugs . that was it. sold it with 133000. I'm sure its still going.


I thought these were known for head gasket failures and Toyota was replacing the HGs for years outside of the original warranty? That was the case with the 4Runners/pickups at least in the 1990s. I'd argue that maybe the 3.4 was a better motor, but I really hated doing oil changes on them through the wheel well.
 
Originally Posted By: chevyboy14
am i wrong on this i would assume the vulcan wore reliable than the GM offerings. is that wrong?


That's a coin toss.

The GM engines are highly prone to LIM failures and it is a major issue if ignored. Otherwise though, not many issues with them.

The Vulcan is good, but not without its issues either though...
- Cam synchro. Affects all models with distributorless ignition (coil pack). This part replaces the distributor in EDIS Fords and likes to destroy itself. It gives PLENTY of warning, usually for months before failure. It will scream bloody murder long before it gets to the point of locking up the oil pump. People do sometimes ignore the months of "SCREEEECCHH...chirp chirp chirp" though until the oil pump does fail. If you replace it when the noise starts it's not a big deal. It's about $80-$90 for the OEM part, at least back in 2009 or so when I last bought one. Not hard to replace, though you need to mark the orientation of the original when you take it out. Do NOT use Dorman...Motorcraft or A1 Cardone only. Most Vulcans will need this part replaced at some point in their life, and some, particularly on Taurus boards, do it as preventive maintenance at around 100K miles. Failure can happen much sooner than that though. My truck trashed the original at 60K miles. Dorman replacements only make it 10-15K miles before failing.

- Taurus cooling system. Aerostars and Rangers are unaffected by this, but the Taurus used a completely different cooling system from these RWD vehicles, and the Taurus cooling system has some issues. Corrosion, early water pump failures, and coolant reservoir failures are common. If you are anal about cooling system maintenance, it's fine. If not, problems. Not too different from GM in that respect, but probably just not as widespread.

- Oil leaks. All Vulcans leak. Ford supposedly revised the gasket for the oil pan at some point, but you'll likely still get a nice film. I just consider it automatic undercoating. My truck has leaked the same amount since about 40K miles, not going to bother fixing it.

Other than that though, the Vulcan is a super reliable engine. Hard to say if it's more or less reliable than similar GM engines, but if reliability is what you want, it's hard to beat an all iron pushrod V6. If you're aware of the potential issues, it won't let you down. I still beat the tar out of my truck fairly regularly and am really not worried about the engine.
 
Originally Posted By: chevyboy14
i am wondering what the best v6 ever made was. best meaning reliability and longevity and ease of maintenance. it seems like there is a lot of thought about the 4 bangers and v8 but v6 seem to be a middle child. whats your opinions and preferably some info / facts on why you picked what you did. i would like to weigh in on this but as of now i cannot pick one..... i honestly don't know enough about the broad class of v6's to have an opinion. hope this turns into a good educational thread.
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3800 Buick.

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I have a 3.5L with 179K+ in a 1996 Chrysler Concorde and I have no engine complaints...and I'm the third owner of this car.
 
Originally Posted By: addyguy
Chevrolet 2.8L V-6, 1979-1989.

They had an awesome growl too them, and were great in the smaller J-bodies. They were also pretty reliable, seen lots of them go 200k+ miles.

It did seem pretty impressive at the time in my Dad's 85 Buick Skylark, Dad would hit the gas and the tail would drop and the angry chewbacca noises would start.
We had a Mazda KLV6 in a 626 and it was nice too, almost an inline 6 sound and smoothness to near 7k rpm.
The 3.5 in the Intrepids had also great power at the time, and recently I got to thrash around a pentastar 6 saddled with hauling a Grand Cherokee, I imagine it must make a Chrysler 200 quite a rocket.
 
Ford 4.0 OHV. I have 174k on mine, never had any problems.

Ford 4.0 SOHC - OK, they were known for bad timing chain tensioners for the first few years, but Ford eventually got it figured out. I expect to get 200k+ trouble free miles from mine. I'm only at 41k so far. Gas mileage isn't that great though.
 
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Only V6's or are i6's included too? If I6's, the Ford 300 for sure. If V6's, I'm not sure, there are many really good ones out there that aren't plagued with intake gasket issues like many of the GM ones that, albeit being generally long-lived engines, were saddled with this particular "issue".


If you include I6's count my vote for the Ford 300, in fact I'd call it the best 6 cylinder engine ever made. Their little 3.0L V6 was one tough cookie too.
 
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