Basically I wanted to get a 5300 Vortec for my Camaro due to lower costs and generally (the way I see it) less worn out engines, in other words more bang for my buck. Yet on the other hand.. I had a conversation with a senior mechanic today who claims it would be horrible as a sportscar engine due to the way it's built, it's made for hauling around big trucks instead of fast acceleration like you'd want for a sportscar. He came with the very reasonable alternative of getting a cheaper 1998-2002 Z28, for around 4000 euro (Vortec swap will most likely not be considerably cheaper), then I'd literally have everything I need in one go and could swap it all over including stuff like the brakes and the rear end.. could potentially save me so much money and frustration and what not in the long run, so much added ease and I'd end up with something possibly much better. The choice seems kind of obvious now.. but what do you guys think? My car could sort of become a legitimate Z... I would have everything in one go then with the hassle and added high expenses of having to get a gazillion things from over the big pond excluded. My only concern is the fact that these kind of engines are known to be worn out here by people with so called heavy right feet, especially those from Germany.

 

Starting with a donor car will save you a ton of money being overseas. Using a truck engine, only the longblock is useful. Everything else must come from a Fbody or special solution

Find a ragged out 98-02 Fbody, crashed is OK too. If the engine is a dud, use all the parts on it and find a cheap 5.3 or 6.0 and swap the long block in

Might actually be cheaper to import a completed LS1 swapped 3rd gen instead of doing the swap overseas

 

Yeah, should find one of those cheap F-bodies and use them, probably just use their engine as well. And I want to swap it myself into my car so importing a completely LS1 swapped third gen is out of the question, and besides importing overseas is very expensive. Basically all I'm after is a really fast yet relatively fuel efficient car (as it is my daily driver), and this is fast in European terms, as I think my father's 2003 BMW e39 530D is already hella fast with it's 3.0L 195hp diesel engine. LS1 Fourth Gens are hard to come by here though, or at least people usually ask at least 6000 euro and up, while V6 Camaros are all over the place on those car sales websites for just as much if not less than what a Third Gen costs.

 

As a matter of fact, wouldn't it be possible to buy one in the U.S. and have it disassembled there, or buy one that's in the progress of being disassembled in the U.S. and have the parts set aside for me? Or get someone who has disassembled (a lot of) them to sort the parts out from storage for me? I see that they are generally much less expensive in the U.S. and obviously the offer of those Z28's is ginormous compared to here. I could possibly offer the rest of the car as payment, does that sound reasonable? Disassembling the drivetrain and other necessary parts in return for the other spare parts? Dunno who the offer would be interesting too, just a thought though, would be pretty convenient if possible. By the way, what would be good websites to search for used cars? I know there's Craigslist, but that seems region dependant. And now that I think about, my car should be worth more in the end if it has a Z28's 5.7 instead of some other car's other engine even if the differences are small, it's sort of an 'originality' issue or general preference I suppose. Although my car isn't a Z28.. could always rebadge it, but it won't have t-tops and I don't think I really want to rebadge it anyways despite the fact it'd actually be a real Z28 'internally'. The car will always be worth a lot less than what I put into it, I know this very well, but it's nice to know the car is at least worth a certain amount of money despite the fact I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world. If ever I might want to sell it, which would be a big mistake if you ask me now, I could always still rebadge it to satisfy the preference of the general potential buyer. The only downside of my idea would, as far as I can see now, be that I can't do the disassembly myself.. but what money I could save might be worth it since I'll be able to do the swap sooner as the budget could be obtained faster. And I know sooner isn't always better, but this could be quite a bit sooner that I would have my daily driver Camaro with real LS1 Z28 'internals'.