Just as the title says! I wanna have fun with my car and work on it and such. I’m past any major work (just need fog lights and side markers worked on and boom) it runs great but now I wanna do more. The cars great but I desire more!

I daily drive it, is this even something you’d wanna not do to a daily? Just swap to a bigger motor no turbo?

what do y’all think anything worth sharing ?

 

No.

 

Sell it and get a V8.

 

Is a turbo 3.1 fun? I guess it depends on your definition of fun. It could be a fun project. It would require quit a bit of fabrication and "creativity". That part could be really fun. I feel like tuning it would be difficult but could be fun for some people. Turbo engines can be a ton of fun. Would a turbo 3.1 be fun? If it was fun it probably wouldn't be fun for long. Im sure there would be a catastrophic failure if you got enough power to make it fun. If you really want a turbo 6 do a GNX/TTA setup. But a v8 swap would be pretty easy and much more rewarding both in power and reliability. If the car is nice a SBC or LS swap is the move. Then it will be fun.

 

A turbo'd stock or mostly stock 3.1 would end up being as much as ~250 hp with sane boost levels and an intercooler (160 + ~50%). With a manual trans it could be kind of fun.

Overall, probably not worth it. I agree with those who are saying "V8".

 

for the cost and hassle of the turbo kit, tuning, new fuel system, the cost alone would be worth an LS swap, and youd have almost double the hp than the turbo'd 3.1 would have.

 

I think it would be cool. But it depends what you want.

If you want it to be fast as possible, probably not the best path.

If you want something unique, it fits the bill. LS swaps used to be novel. But now they're everywhere. Go to a car show and you're about as likely to see an LS in any given GM car than the original engine.

 

yea why not? just keep it cheap and simple

 

So, the real problem is if it's your daily and you don't have anything else to drive, well a turbo or engine swap will take it down for a while and you'll be stuck.

Now, if you have something else to drive, then it depends on your definition of fun. The 60* v6 (2.8/3.1/3.4) is crazy light and compact compared to most other V6's and V8's, there are performance parts available for it (back in the day there was a race series that required it as an engine), so if you know what you're doing it's possible to get into the 4-500hp range with it, and the 3-400hp range could be done and be quite streetable. Not knowing what you're doing HP numbers start dropping quite quickly, but they drop quickly with any engine, so take that for what it's worth.

All the extra space in the engine bay makes packaging a piece of cake compared to other drivetrains and cars, and the 200lb lighter engine in the nose makes it possible to get a car in the low 3000lb range with close to 50:50 weight distribution, a combination that with a very basic suspension will get you a car that will outhandle most cars on the road.

 

Guy is 19 years old and has already wrecked his 91 3.1L V6 Camero and appears to have robbed parts off his other 92 3.1L V6 Camero to fix it.

We all know where this 3.1L Turbo V6 project is going to end up. It's going to end up with both Cameros not running in the front yard as lawn ornaments.

Anyone else remember all the dumb azz car project ideas you had as a teenager?

 

THIS

 

Yeah, possibly. But my biggest teenage dumb azz car project came out awesome. It just started in 1996 and took 28 years to complete!

 

Yeah, I hate to throw a wet blanket on some kid's ambition.

Yep, I was going to have custom needle bearings made that I could use to replace the "high friction plain bearings" on the mains and rods. The idea was "stolen" 'from stroke engines. Obviously, roller bearings would be superior to plain bearings....just look at their names! It's probably hard to believe, but that project didn't get too far.

OTOH, my car didn't end up on blocks, either. I drove the wee out of it...plain bearings be damned!

 

That depends on the person. At 19, I had an '85 Cougar XR7 (2.3L, 4 cylinder turbo + 5 speed in a car that is maybe 500lbs heavier than an F-body). Stock it was fun (and dangerous for a 19y/o), but I ended up upgrading most of the engine with Mustang SVO stuff and a bunch of aftermarket stuff, within a year or 2 it had all the good factory stuff in it, boost controller, intercooler, I rigged up a second wastegate actuator that when I had boost it opened a cutout in the exhaust, N20...

My problem was that it kept getting wrecked, and it was bad luck plus the stupid oddball 390 (metric wheel diameter) tires that only 2 companies made, and they were horrible. Once you locked up the brakes, the tires just slid and never recovered. I had someone cross the double yellow and I slid into a curb/post trying to avoid them, then a kid stole his stepfather's car and came tearing out a parking lot (the guy in front of me, me and the guy behind me all hit him), then a woman in front of me was watching the police car next to her, the truck in front of her stopped, she hit it, bounced off of it and then hit my car. My dad picked it up from the bodyshop that time, someone stopped in front of him, he hit the brakes, they locked up, and he slid it into the car in front of him, he totaled the car and didn't even report that one to insurance, he just decided it was too dangerous if I was going to stay on his insurance and too messed up to fix.

That led me to getting the '83 Crossfire TA that I joined here with... in 1991... Oh boy... and that car was a vandalized (possibly stolen) recovery. I dumped a bunch of time fixing it up before I drove it much..

 

Maybe, but lots of us have one or two, or more, of those under our belts. Part of the process, in my opinion.

My first 3rd gen was my first project car; I stripped it down to literally bare skeleton. A zillion pieces everywhere. Had a crazy idea of swapping a VG30DETT into it. It got no where because I had zero experience in any of it, and had no idea how to put the car back together, so I sold all the parts. Zero regrets. It was fun the whole time and learned a lot.

@Camero1992RS I vote you give it a try, if that's what you want to do. Yeah, a V8 swap, or buying a V8 car is the "easy" approach, but doing all the easy things in life is boring.

That said, like others pointed out - don't do anything that deprives you of a vehicle you need to depend on to get to work or anything else important. Even if you think you have all the parts ready to do the install..there's going to be something overlooked. Expect delays. Expect extra costs. Etc.

 

Yes it is. Go over to the v6 area and check the stickies. Me along with many others had alot of success with them. I took a stock bottom end 3.1 to the 12s pretty easily with a cheepo turbo. In the end i ran alot of 11s with a 3.1/3100 hybrid. Stock everything on the motor besides the injectors, cam, and springs. It was very reliable. Best 1/4 ever was a 11.23@123mph on about 16psig though a s366 bw turbo.

In the beginning I took a stock 3.1 and spent about 800 bucks on it and ran a best of 12.88@104mph. It's documented pretty well in those stickeys. Check it out.

Project 89, mars, me (fasteddi) had alot of threads on this. It's a blast to do and the 660 v6 is one solid engine, hard to break. Mars ran alot of 10s but that was with a 3500/3900 iirc.

 

If your 3.1 is in good shape, and you have the ability to weld and tune, I'd say go for it! I've been wanting to do the hybrid/ turbo swap on mine for the last 8 years, but college and dad wanting to keep his driveway clean has held me back also doesn't help that it continues to be my daily (the "reliable" daily I bought last May blew it's motor in November.... suppose that's what I get for buying a Subaru). Like FastEddi said, check out the stickys in the V6 board. This thread in particular from Eddi is a goldmine of information on the topic, pretty impressive what these motors can do on stock internals given how little power they made from factory This thread is also pretty useful. I forget who said it, but the quote that always sticks with me is "Any idiot can make a V8 fast... it takes a smart idiot to make a V6 fast". For what it's worth, the 3.1 has been great to me for the near decade that I've been daily driving it, and I'd hate to swap it for a V8 without giving it a chance. In that time, while I wait for the opportunity to afford my car the downtime needed for this kind of project, I've been doing little modifications here and there; suspension upgrades/ replacement, 4thgen brake swap, changing out the rear diff for a Torsen, etc. If you know you at least want to keep that car, motor aside, getting the rest of the car ready for more power is a good start.

Like the others have said though, and what is my problem as well, is that you're gonna want to stay away from doing such an involved project if it's your only daily driver. Being able to get where you need to go will always take priority over getting there faster, as much as I hate to say it.