IRocN87

Lo and behold the "l98 swapped" engine in my car has a very faint and rusty looking "5.0" badge on the driver side of the block by the firewall. Oh well! I'm curious to know if I got a higher or lower rated 305 though. I know GM did some changes to the cams and such over the years. The engine is v-belt, as well as it has injector 9 so it must be 85-87. No idea what trans it had on it. Is there any easy way to tell which year / "model" (cam) I have?

BONUS QUESTION - 87 Iroc, no rpo paper in center console or rear glove box. Any other "factory locations" it could be?

sofakingdom

iTrader: (1)

"The engine" is not "V-belt". Rather, the accessory drive system INSTALLED ON the engine, is V-belt. You can bolt that drive system onto any engine, and if somebody actually has swapped out that engine, it would in fact have made the most sense to do just exactly that, rather than keep whatever foreign system was on it, that might have necessitated changing wiring, plumbing, and so on. That does not identify "the engine".

Same for the 9th injector... "the engine" doesn't have that. The intake does. And that intake will bolt to any 87-up SBC. So if your 2 center intake bolts on each side are more vertical than the 2 at each end, you have a 87 to whenever they dropped the 9th injector intake manifold. 87-88 I think but I'm no expert.

Look at the pad on top of the block, the head deck surface, right behind the alt. It will have 2 lines. The top line is an engine code, which isn't always readily decodeable. The 2nd line is a partial VIN. I'm going to go out on a limb here and bet that your engine is still the original 305 it came with, in which case, the VIN on the block will match the car's.

If I had a dollar for everybody that's come on here and been told by a used-car seller "must be a 350, runs too good to be a 305", I'd be A SHIPLOAD closer to retirement than I am right now.

IRocN87

Actually, the car came with a factory LG4, so I doubt any of it was re-used :P And it was a private seller. I had my doubts that it was a 350, but I still hoped. I will check out the intake bolts later today.

EDIT: My bad, they are the same blocks... Likely same drive system was used!