I had a 1979 Olds Delta 88 diesel that was converted to gas. They used a deck plate to lower compression, and put gas heads and a 4bbl on it. I think it still had 11:1 + compression because it would destroy both back tires if you floored it. 55mph to 100 in maybe 5 seconds. That block was stout, very stout.
@@pcno2832 there was a company that made the plates i guess and Olds 350 intakes and heads were still available off the shelf. It definitely sounded like Oldsmobile Rocket 350. Oldsmobile V8's had a unique sound with a proper exhaust
Diesel block is a favorite for hot-rodders when converted to gas. Extremely strong block and if I remember correctly it’s possible to bore and stroke it to 430 cubes! 🤙
People always thought it was a existing gas block converted, the 358 just influenced the diesel concept before being cast new. Funny though it seems the existing diesel converted to gas on the other hand, this is the first I've heard of. A lot of people gave up on them altogether
The fuel filter on the Oldsmobile V8 diesel engine was also a water separator. You had to change the fuel filter at least twice a year depending on how much you drove. When I was working on cars, I had a gentleman who brought his Olds in every 3 months to have the fuel filter changed & twice a year for a oil change. The engine ran like a top. He never had any major issues with the diesel engine.
Management: "Let's turn a gasoline engine into a diesel!" Engineers: "Diesels run a much higher compression ratio, a gas engine isn't physically strong enough!" Management: "Not with that attitude!"
Look up how AV-1790 benzin engine was turned into a twin turbo diesel AVDS-1790 in patton tanks. It took a lot of effort and re engineering but it can be done
that Honda V5 was in the RC211V motoGP race bike and won 3 world championships. it was a genius piece of engineering; not only did the narrower rear bank fit nicely between the narrow frame spars, but the firing order was similar to a v4 with the center cylinder on the 3 piston bank being out of phase. doing this they were able to set it in a way that gave the engine perfect primary balance so the engine could spin over 15k rpm with no balance shafts or heavy counterweights, unlike most I4's and v4s.
@@vincesimione974 - True, but if Honda could make a V5 spin up to 15k rpm with no balance shafts or counterweights then GM should have been able to make a gasoline V5 auto motor. The small diesel would probably never have produced enough HP to make USA drivers happy unless it was in a very light weight car.
I started as a young tech at an Oldsmobile dealership back in 1981 . I recall the Salesmen telling people this sales feature " You never need to tune up these diesel engines" We were constantly replacing fuel filters on these engines , almost weekly in some cases due to water intrusion . Also we installed plenty of glow plugs and glow plug controllers . Occasionally , while removing a glow plug , the end would fall off into the cylinder which required cylinder head removal to retrieve the broken part .
See one of those would do okay today because the diesel stations have serious water separators and are generally much cleaner. My passat diesel has about 3mm of water in it max over the span of 30k between fuel filter changes
What continues to astound me is that GM had been manufacturing diesels since the 1920s under the Detroit Diesel subsidiary to leave out a water separator was just inexcusable. Diesel fuel just naturally attracts water therefore all diesels, car or truck, have water separators. It's almost like the Olds engineers working on the conversion of a gas 350 to a diesel 350 had absolutely no interaction with their coworkers at Detroit Diesel. So many things that GM did in the 70s and 80s are just mind blowing.
Why wouldn’t they have just tapped Detroit Diesel to make them a motor to begin with… Tell them what they need and want then let the experts design it?
I still got an good-condition 1982 Fleetwood Brougham with the 5.7 diesel, and I love it as a novelty. I've taken in on a few longer trips and I do trust it. I get 21-23 mpg and it is good for 75 mph cruising. Not much for passing power, but can sustain that speed. Get a lot of looks when I pull up to the diesel pumps.
The Olds diesel was NOT a 'strengthened' gas block. This is a common myth based on the fact that it was engineered to use the same accessories as the gas engine and could share some of machining lines in the engine plant.
You are correct. This is noticeable in the earlier 5.7 Olds Diesel block was known as a "D" block. Olds then produced a "DX" block. The "DX" block was beefier and had a better bottom end than the "D" block.
I had a buddy who drove a 5 cylinder flat head Plymouth for a while. It didn't start out as that but after it cratered the number 6 rod journal he yanked out the piston and sawed of the rod so he would just have a sleeve around the crankshaft. It shook a little but it got him down the road .
In the early to mid 1980s, the Volvo 240 had a VW-built 2.4L inline-six diesel that produced 80 HP and 103 lb-ft of torque, and the Mercedes 240D had a 2.4L four-cylinder diesel with 71 HP and 101 lb-ft. So compared to those, this 2.5L V5 diesel would've been a bit short on horsepower (and surely lacking NVH refinement), but with better torque, and probably better (but still leisurely) performance and fuel economy, since the X-cars were lighter and front-wheel-drive.
Cool to see you here! I was ganna try to get a hold of you to ask you to disassemble one of those “power saver” devices, and was happy to see you already had me covered. Thank you for sharing your excellent content, keep up the good work! - Fellow quirk, who DDs a 81 Toronado Diesel
EXCUSE ME but those two were considered to be quick diesel cars! During that era, such figures weren't bad at all for diesel cars. And the Peugeot 505 Turbo with 82 hp was considered an absolute beast! Slowest was the Mercedes 200D at 55hp. Drove my cousins 200 D once, and tried to overtake another car. That was, well, exciting... Anyway, if Olds got 85 hp / 165lb/ft out of a 4.3 l V6, the 2.5 litre V5 should have given about 50 hp and 95lb/ft. Wouldn't outrun the Volvo, but in line with many of the other cars of the era
Haha I wish I had my 91 Jetta coupe set up the way it is now for some hot diesel street racing 😂😂 1.9 block /1.6 head ,and the awy close ratio box ,and short 175-50-13 tires on it. Not a rocket but it'll do the 0-60 in around 10.5-11 or so when stock was like 15.
My parents owned three diesels back in the late 1970's/early 1980's. A 1977 Peugeot 504 sedan, an Oldsmobile Delta 88 seda, and a 1981 Cutlass Supreme coupe. Both Olds had the 5.7 liter V-8, with the 1979 being the 125 hp model, and the 1981 being the 105 hp version. The engine in the 1979 self-destructed at 48,000 miles, with GM spitting the difference in the replacement. I loved the diesel sound in the Peugeot and the Oldsmobiles. My favorite story about the diesels was when I was driving the 1979 Delta 88 in a traffic jam. An idiot was riding my bumper, as if that could get traffic to move faster. Unknown to him, the fuel injectors were in need of replacement. When we passed the cause of the traffic jam I floored the pedal. The result of all that diesel fuel pumping into the cylinders was a huge, black cloud erupting from the tail pipe, a cloud that would put many volcanoes to shame, right in the face of mister tailgater. As the cloud dissipated I looked in the rearview mirror, but the tailgater was nowhere to be seen. I wonder if the smoke stalled out his car?
I had an 80 Oldsmobile Delta 88 with a gas 350 that needed valve stem seals and guides. IF you floored it then it would blast out billows of oil smoke as it took off quickly. I used to always smoke tailgaters. It's better to get a Ford LTD or Mercury Grand Marquis than to get a poorly made gm car.
@@warrenwinslow4266 I completely disagree, I've done very well with GM cars and horribly with Ford's, plus the rwd Ford's didn't handle very well and made very wide u. Turns
I remember reading and seeing diagrams, Saab did play with the idea of a V5 engine. Two of the cylinders were larger than the other 3 in order to provide balance.
Great video! GM finally did add water/fuel separators across the 5.7 Diesel production line in 1985. It also applied the water/fuel separator to the 4.3 liter V6 Diesel as well. However, it was too late.
The water separator issue wasn't even unique to GM, or the 1980s. The 2009-2011 BMW 335D had an inline fuel filter underneath the car with no water separator. The 2009-2015 VW TDIs had a cartridge filter under the hood, but again no water separator. My mom drives a 2013 Jetta TDI wagon and 2 different sets of injectors were destroyed by water in the fuel before I replaced the stock canister with a CAT water separator. Those engines also only have 4 head bolts per cylinder, just like the 4.3 and 5.7 diesels.
Yup, hard to believe they did that...and yet with the 6.2 (did the Detroit division build ?, yes I know the 6.2 was 4 cycle, I had one), they had 2 filters for fuel filtering, one had water separator, from the launch of that engine, mine was an '82. (I had a gloss sheet with specs on it from the 1980s here somewhere. I know it said the Detroit division built the 6.2) maybe they should have let them develop the 5.7, not Olds. But they did even dumber things like waste a few billion $ on rights & developing the wankel rotary for use, & that project was stillborn. DeLorean was upset Ed Cole wasted $ on that project. He said "that damn thing looked like it fell out of a 1912 farm tractor
I may be wrong but I believe that Mercedes did not include a water/fuel separator on their '70s-'80s Diesel cars either. The four-bolt head bolt per cylinder pattern wasn't much clamping power for an engine with a compression ratio of 22.5 to 1 (the Olds Diesel). I knew of an '81 Chevrolet truck with the Olds Diesel that had a large aftermarket water/fuel separator mounted on the firewall and it blew a head gasket. The water/fuel separators weren't the cure-all but they would have saved the lives of a lot of Olds Diesel engines.
@@theodorgiosan2570 wow, that's almost hard to believe. I had a 1982 GM 6.2, with what was on that truck, I would have thought that was a bare minimum going forward, for anyone building diesels,, especially zee Germans .
My parents had a Buick century diesel. Got fantastic fuel mileage like over 30mpg’s on at the time very very cheap fuel. It started to make a funny noise and my dad dropped my mom off to do something so he and I headed to the dealership. It literally threw a rod turning into the dealer. They really did like that car. My mom wasn’t thrilled with the idea of having to go to a truck stop for fuel since back in the mid 80’s that’s the only place that had diesel. Although my father owned an excavation company and my Mom soon figured out she could fuel up at the my dads shop at his bulk fuel tank. I think a lot of engine manufacturers where really getting into uncharted territory as they were by this time good at making big trucks and equipment diesels but a small, light, user friendly diesel was something entirely different that Susie homemaker could deal with. My dad had no issue with it as he was around Diesels all day everyday. I have a VW TDI and it’s an amazing car. I regularly get 50mpg out it. It’s much more user friendly but it’s still different than a gasoline car.
The black exhaust and the clank of the diesel engine is why I fell in love with the diesel, well, the ones that were less problematic. Still, there was a certain prestige to owning one. I loved my '82 diesel Cutlass.
great video I worked for GM Canada in the late 80's through to the mid 90's and you sure got to see many things the average person doesn't, i never heard or saw the V5 diesel, that's just R&D in those times, most GM engineering divisions did their own things without much go between when it came to designing products, the V6 and V8 diesels got to be more reliable in the last few years they were sold in various chassis'd vehicles, here in Canada where it is really cold in the west they didn't fair too well, some of the full size RWD wagons that the 5.7 was sort of popular in were surprisingly reliable with good scheduled maintenance and if you were a person familiar with a diesel they usually ran and lasted better, I even saw one of the early versions come in with what a farmer installed his own water/fuel separator himself and said it ran better than new and had almost 175k miles on it and got regularly in the low 20's for economy ,not bad for a barge with almost no power, great video , the iron duke 2.5 was a great engine there's records of thousands of them with 300/400k on them and still ran good super easy on fuel 👍
I’m so glad the V5 never made it to production. I worked on lots of those damn X cars in the ‘80s and they were some of the worst pieces of garbage ever to hit the road…without an experimental diesel under the hood.
You've got to hand it to GM: they were never afraid to push the envelope, try new methods, really think outside the box, and innovate in the pursuit of junk that didn't work.
Our 1981 Olds Cutlass Brougham diesel performed well. We had farm diesel so that prob helped. Also, we let it warm up a few minutes before driving. Kept it almost 3 years and racked up 123k miles on it. Only left us stranded on one record cold Christmas morning. The fuel gelled up. There were a lot of Olds (Buick, Caddy, Chevy, Pontiac) diesels in my area. None ever suffered catastrophic engine failure. Most of the issues revolved around the supporting equipment. A bad starter. Fuel or oil pump would go out, etc.
I gotta thank you again for this video. I visited the RE Olds Museum last week because you mentioned it in this upload and it was awesome! Saw this engine and also some very interesting Quad 4 variants =).
I hate that people still think the olds and GM diesels were “converted” gas engines. It NEVER HAPPENED!! They only used similar bore spacing and overall shape to save money. I hate that some myths never die. The engines weren’t as bad as most people think, with clean diesel fuel, a knowledgeable owner, and proper maintenance, they are FANTASTIC diesel engines.
Except for the 4.3V6, they were converted gas engines. The blocks and many components were strengthened, but the starting point was the Olds 350 gas engine. They reused distributor shaft hole for injection pump drive, had the same head bolt pattern (which was a major flaw), identical bore spacing and deck height etc.
There are a handful of us who love the clanking of a diesel! I currently drive a 2022 GMC Sierra with the 3.0 Duramax which is admittedly FAR more refined than any of those Olds V6 or V8's. My previous truck not so much, 2001 Ram 5.9 Cummins 3/4 ton 4x4 that I put close to 300K miles on before I sold it, 16 years of Michigan Winters having done their work on the body. Now THAT was a diesel! LOL Great video as always! Have a great 4th of July.
I have a 22 Silverado with that engine. The only clanking I get out of mine is the sound of injector nailing, and marbles in a metal coffee can when it's regenerating, which is frequently. Great mpg on the highway for sure, but if I had to do it all over again, I'd just get the 5.3 and deal with the inevitable AFM issues.
I have a love/hate relationship with diesel noise. They sound cool, but also get old after a while, and taking phone calls is nearly impossible. I have 444k miles on my 7.3 Powerstroke and unknown miles on my 7.3 IDI, neither is going away any time soon.
GM has tried some interesting things in the past. Remember the Corvair flat-6 air cooled engine? They actually made a flat-10 and a flat-12 and tried them out in full size cars. They also tried a four cylinder steam engine in the 70s.
I worked at an olds dealer in the early 80s, the 350 diesel never had a chance, I had lunch with a few of the engineers that designed the engine in 1977, they had a pretty good engine, but gm did not have an overdrive transmission until 1980, the 1st prototype (an olds 98), was not driveable in as far as getting on an expressway ramp, so the engineers were told the engine had tohave a 3,800 rpm redline (crazy for a diesel), but they did it by increasing compression to 23 to 1 (crazy again) and retarding injection timing, they ran ok, and if you advanced the injector timing they had good power, if they would have just waited for a 4 speed transmission and left the compression at a reasonable 18 to 1, this would have been a great engine, it was a good engine if you installed head gasket spacers and had the 4 speed, they would go 300,000 miles, get 30 mpg in a 4,000 lb car, gm just did not do it right
The old Ford/International 7.3 IDI have almost the same compression and spin to the same revs, and they live long lives in heavy trucks and vans, so you can't blame the 350's demise on those things alone.
@@DonziGT230yeah, but the 350 olds diesels head studs weren't strong enough to handle the compression ratio. They were notorious for blowing head gaskets. The 7.3 IDIs were built right from the start. They were pretty gutless too but they would go forever!!
I agree with you, but we had a lot of cars that had unleaded gas in the tank, back then there were still full service gas stations and the diesel was a new thing in cars like a delta 88, it only took a few gallons to blow head gaskets or even bend rods@@DonziGT230
@@invisiblekid7374 The guy I replied to blamed the compression and RPM for killing the 350s, I was pointing out that a properly designed Diesel engine won't be damaged by those things.
@DonziGT230 yeah most idi engines with that style of precombustion chamber are in the 23:1 range. The issues were more so the low power, headgaskets, and shitty quality diesel of the day.
In 1979 I worked on a drilling rig in Louisiana and each driller got an allowance for mileage if they furnished the transportration to the rig. Well the value to the driller was immense as they bought Oldsmobile diesels the V-8 for their crew cars. Consider that they got their fuel for free , their oil for free along with filters from suppliers on the rig. Then one of the hands would change to oil and filters at the rig. So that was free money for those drillers. We drove the hell out of those diesels at pretty much wide open at &0 to 80 MPH. I never saw them have a problem.
During that era, I was working for a used car dealer, ferrying those GM diesels between Indiana and Florida. One day I found myself in a 260 Olds in a parking lot, stopped against a speed bump. It would not climb the speed bump!! Had to back up and take a run at it.
Miss my "D" block '82 Olds Diesel, great traveling car and long range between refuelings. Used to bracket race it too, 21.65 all night long in the 1/4 mile! 24 mpg delivering pizzas!
I've always enjoyed the unusual, bizarre GM stuff (especially from this era) and you were right, I'd never heard of this engine before! I owned an overhauled (read: bandaged) 350 IDI (DX block) in an early '80s DeVille, oh the horror! Strangely enough I actually enjoyed my time with it. Some folks in the Nordic parts of the world even had good luck with those later versions of the mechanical IDIs, so go figure. Always looked out for the GM V6 IDIs you mentioned, but I never found a car with one for sale anywhere near here. The V5 having less power than a Duke though? That's something. I had a TBI Iron Duke in a mid '80s X-body hooked to a TH125C and that car was... quite slow. Oh, and since you brought up the obscure GM diesel topic you ought to cover the Toroflow sometime, that'd be fun.
One of the motorcycle magazines did a spoof of these nonsymmetrical designs back in the 80s. It was the tale of a V7 with three 4-stroke cylinders and four two-stroke cylinders.
I’m amazed the engine made 70hp, each cylinder is 500cc and making 15hp, that’s better than most small industrial diesels, I have a 430cc direct injection diesel that only makes 10hp.
When I was a kid, my friends Dad had one of these diesel Olds. He loved the car, but I remember him saying it was in the shop more than he actually drove it. I'm not a Chevy guy, but I miss the Oldsmobile.
In the early '80s when I was a kid, looking across the street from our house, the family on the left had an Olds Custom Cruiser with a diesel, (which was later swapped out for a gas job) and the family to their right had a Volvo diesel(!), and the empty-nesters to the right of them had an Olds 88 coupe with the diesel!
My dad bought a used POS Delta 88 with a diesel. He drove a dump truck for a living so diesels were in his blood. The only reason I drove it was it was the first car we ever owned with A/C. Tailgaters found out the hard way how much diesel soot that car expelled at WOT. James Bond type of smoke screen.
as european i always wondered how american car manufacturers managed to get engine with so little power with humongous engines while a small 6 cylinders 2 liters (120 cubic inches) Porsche was able to reach 180hp in the early 70's and a crappy PRV v6 was 130hp in the late 70's with a displacement under 3 liters (185 cubic inches) and i don't speak about japanese brands with ultra small engines but with amazing power and reliability. European diesel engines in the late 70's were about 60hp with 2 liters of displacement while US diesel engine were 2 to 3 times bigger with nearly the same power (you don't need to double the displacement to gain only 25hp) . The Peugeot 504 2.3 diesel was 70hp and keep running nowadays in africa with more than 1million kms (504 are used a bush taxi since the 80's and still work today)
also wondering..it might be that pryde prevented any head of engineering to look at Europe and say: why don't we try to understand what they are doing and downside our engines, use turbocharge, reduce car weight (size) and improve handling and safety. They could have easily reverse engineering volvos and Benz, Peugeot indenor diesels etc..
@@themetalslayer2260usually they start out by making big engines, before realising the prototype uses too much fuel. So then the engineers turn the horsepower down to save fuel. If you wanna modify the fuel system and cylinder heads you can make a lot more power.
Heh, that part at the beginning about the transmission reminds me of the 4t65e. It was fine for regular applications but when mated to the supercharged 3800 or later the LS4, they'd get shredded. It's wild because the 4t80e was right there the whole time.
I worked at AAMCO Transmissions in the early 80`s and we used to get cars with destroyed 200 turbo hydromatics in every day, never in Chevettes though. Also unrelated but as a fact Renault Alliances were so bad we wouldn`t even accept them anymore. I remember you did a review talking about what good cars they were. Not from my experience they weren`t. Happy 4th of July Adam I hope you have a wonderful holiday.
@@TroyClayton-w2lI agree with that. I too worked at a Renault dealer. Remember the slogan? "Renault... The One To Watch" yeah, watch that temperature gauge cuz those head gaskets popped all the time. LOL
My brother had a Cutless that a previous owner had swapped the diesel engine for a gas one (305). It still had the diesel "logo" on the dash..passenger side.
Olds was such an innovative company, its engines were often unconventional and often excellent (at least for GM). And think about that Olds 307 that was the workhorse of so many GM vehicles in the late 70s early 80s, too. So sad that it didn't catch on in China instead of Buick - then Olds might have lived on.
@@DanEBoyd- Pull the Earth off is axis?😂😂😂. I've only driven one car with a 307 and while it was smooth, it was the most gutless 4 wheeled vehicle I've ever driven. It was just a test drive, but IIRC it was an 88 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham... I assume a Caddy 307 is the same (or very close to the same) as an Olds 307.
My parents had a 81 Riviera diesel, they drove it 20 years without issues. It had pretty standard puckup between 0-40 mph very lacking from 40-55mph, hated getting behind a car on freeway on-ramps slow and hit the gas at the last minute, i needed a run to reach freeway speed's. I drove one of these v6 Diesels in a Buick Century, it was a pretty nice car
I spent a couple years driving a Nissan 720 pickup that was equipped from factory with a 62hp (when new!) 4 cylinder diesel. It was much the same for highway on ramps, needed the whole thing to get to highway speeds 😂 but cruised 60-65 without much issue. It wasn't geared for 70+
I worked at a Chevy, Olds Cadillac dealership when the 350 diesels came out. I've never seen so many bent rods, come out of (poorly) running engines in my life.
Volkswagen used a shortened version of their VR6 engine, where more or less just one of the cylinders was cut. It was used in the Bora (US: Jetta) V5 for example. Interesting to see that the idea of V5 engines was used in other cars as well - despite it seems the Oldsmobile V5 Diesel wasn't that reliable.
I had a 78 or 79 Chevy half ton pickup bought new had a few problems but luckily I had a mechanic friend that lived two doors from me coulapsed a fuel injector and had to drop the oil pan and replace the rear main seal.
As a mechanic who actually worked on these Oldsmobile Diesels. Yes, they had some problems, number 1 head gaskets and water in the fuel. But actually, if an aftermarket water separator was added, they would have a long life. The truth is that many owners had the cars converted with a used gasoline Oldsmobile 350 rocket engine a direct bolt in replacement. Why? Here is your answer. The vehicle would never need emissions testing. As at the tim, diesels didn't need emissions testing! Two quiet running. And last diesel was not as easily found in many cities. I did forget one. Many times, the vehicle was relatively new, and it was cheaper to replace the engine with a gasoline engine than repair the Oldsmobile diesel. I would have purchased one at the time, but sadly, by the time I could have, they had been discontinued.
yes they were not as bad as the reputation, head gasket spacers and advancing injector timing would make them last a long time, and 30 mpg in a 4,000 lb car
The VW "V5" is not a V5, in my mind anyway. As it really has only one bank, one cylinder head, one exhaust manifold, and one intake manifold. If memory serves that engine was marketed as the "VR5" in their more sporty modles. Yes technically its a "V5", but by my defenition any V configured engine must have 2 cylinder heads and 2 of each manifold, otherwise its just a funky inline 5 cylinder. Later on VW did a VR6 which was same concept, 15° bank, but again one intake manifold, and one exhast attached to a single cylinder head, at least in my head its just a funky inline 6 cylinder. Just my opinion. Although i will say its quite ingenious getting V6 power out of a much more space efficient 6 cylinder, same with the 5 cylinder. Good work as always. I love the channel. Keep it up, man. Earned yourself a new subscriber.
Had a diesel in a Chevy Celebrity. Its failure was a split crankshaft. Starter turned one end and the crank pulley stayed put. Swapped out for a gas engine. The engine was painted that odd blue-green much like a Detroit Diesel.
GM's Diesel issues did not stop with these engines. GM actually co-designed with Detroit Diesel the infamous 6.2 ltr diesel that came in two variants....a C code for light duty (some cars, Blazers, 1500 and 2500 series) and a J code for 3500 series and military applications (Hummer for one), They were produced from '82 to '91 when in '92 they came out with the 6.5 Turbo which fixed many of the problems of the 6.2 while significantly increasing HP and Torque. I had an '83 3500 Dually Crew Cab 4WD with the 6.2 J code. It was by far the most unreliable and under powered truck I ever owned. On a good day with a tail wind, I could get to 65mph...towing with it was a nightmare. It had 130HP and considering it was already a heavy it was way under powered. It was a truck that could not do truck things like towing. I had the truck for 5 years and I replaced the transmission at 17K miles, 4 sets of auto locking hubs, AC fixed more times than I can remember, replaced the Stanadyne injection pump twice, glow plugs I changed like spark plugs (I had to carry a can of either in the event they randomly failed), water pump three times, the press on runner fuel return lines would pop off regularly and spray raw fuel all over the exhaust manifold (I carried extra hoses just for this not to mention two fire extinguishers, and the body was a joke....all 4 doors rusted out badly, around the rain gutters rusted out to the point I could see through them, cab corners...so bad that when I closed the door parts of the truck fell to the ground. When I sold the truck with 67K miles on it I almost had to give it away....it was poorly designed, poorly built, under powered vehicle that neither the dealer or the manufacturer would stand behind. This truck waved me off from buying GM products until I bought a '99 3500 Suburban with the Vortec 5.7 which turned out to be a real good vehicle...but other than that it has been Ford or RAM/Dodge since then.
The 6.2 J code was used in 3/4 tons above 7200# gvw. The 6.2 was in production until 1993. In 1992/1993 the 6.2 and 6.5 used the same block even. All the issues you listed were not changed with the addition of the 6.5 besides yes, more hp and torque with a turbo. There were naturally aspirated 6.5's as well. I'm not sure how you had that much go wrong in 67k miles. I've put probably a million miles on a half dozen pre-worn out 6.2's and never experienced a 10th of your issues. I've never had injector return hoses blow off? You need to run the good German made hoses, not Dorman or Vatozone junk, but still you'd have to have a blocked fuel selector valve to cause that. The water pumps are very stout units, with proper cooling system maintenance 100-150k intervals on them is normal. It you had a 3500 with an auto you had a TH400, if you are ruining TH400's with a 130hp, I'd love to know how. If you had alternator issues, that can trigger the glow plug controller to cycle when driving, I absolutely cannot fathom how else you would go through so many glow plugs. I average about 100k on a set of AC60g glow plugs, and that's with a manual push button to actuate them. 2 injection pumps at 67k?? Were you filling up from a swimming pool? You knew it had fuel filters right? My '87 V10 has over 400k on the original 6.2, it is tired but it's still dead reliable. Squarebodies obviously have a huge following and are bringing so much money lately that I'm not even interested in buying anymore. Hardly a "poorly engineered vehicle" You had to take a 6.2 for what it was in 1983, 130hp and made for fuel economy. If towing was your game then you should have got a 454. If a 6.2 was used within its design perimeters and maintained, they were economical and great. Everything East of the Mississippi rusts, doesn't matter the brand. Washing the salt off once in a while helps. I just can't fathom how people struggled so hard with these.
The 350 diesel may have not helped with the image of GM and American diesels in general but Oldsmobile tried something new and different like their Coal dust powered engine. The backlash and bad PR I think killed creativity and innovation in GMs engines for a while and those other stupid regulations killed so many aspects of the American auto industry
GM Warranty Claims Department: We're having a lot of issues with this diesel engine and customers are having tons of problems. GM Management: Let's put it in everything!
I bought a used 1981 GMC pickup 5.7 Diesel .. it had a Targmaster replacement engine.. I put headers on it .. the Injector pump failed had it rebuilt and turned up 10% The Truck got too rusty and parked it at 260,000 miles on it .. I added a remote Luberfiner fuel filter with water sediment bowl on the firewall .
My grandfather drove diesel Oldsmobiles in the 1970s/80s. I never understood why. I asked my Dad one day and he enlightened me that b/c his business my grandfather had access to a lot of dyed diesel fuel. LMAO Grandpa spent the last 20 years of his life screwing the government out of taxes. Love it.
if you can think of it, it already exists, seriously. a few months ago i was wondering if an odd V engine was possible and the first thing to come to mind were a v9 and a v5. now youtube recommends me a v5.
I love old school Oldsmobile engineers. 'how weird can we get away with?" ....yes! That being said, the V6 conversion was a better set up than the V8. It was possible to keep the head gaskets on them if you kept them cool.
The Olds engines were some great performers! I had many, but mostly the 455. Those DX blocks were ultra strong and came with a forged crank. All of the olds engines back then had forged rods also. For the DX, just use 350 or 403 heads and get something like 14-1. The boat guys really liked those. The 425 engines all came with forged steel cranks, and the early ones had dome pistons. Use the C casting heads (69 only) on the 455 with a 50k deck cut and a fel pro perma torque head gasket (43k crush) get 10.5-1 with shallow dish pistons. I put custom top end oil restricting plugs in my 461 (455 + 30 over) Insane torque and 7,000 rpm also. It destroyed my 84 Cutless with body twist. I still have 2 sets of C castings after all these years... If you want to try something cool and different, but also make real power try a big Olds engine.
My friend bought an Olds diesel. I tried to warn him that they had troubles, but he was excited to have in a car what his 5 ton truck had. He sold it after a year of trouble.
It never fails to baffle me how you get such low power from such large engines. My grandfather had a diesel car early 1980s 1.9 litres and that put out 75 bhp
Simple, diesels are air hungry. No turbo- very low power. A dyno test on the international 7.3 showed adding a turbo and 5 psi of boost on them yielded a 25% increase in power, from 180 to 250hp. Any of these GM engines with 25% more power would have been much more pleasant to drive and merge with traffic.
What was the gas V6 transverse engine in the Cutlass Ciera. It was a V6, and it ran really stout. It was transverse from wheel drive V6. It was stronger than the 3.8, it pulled like a freight train.
Positive comments about the GM passenger car diesels.... We were in the auto parts business in those days. I don’t recall anyone having anything good to say about them. It was assumed they’d “dieseled” the gasoline block, based on the frequent failures. I was the unwilling heir to a 229 V6 when I married. It was a sawed-off 305 with all of the disadvantages and none of the power. Lamest engine in history, in the most unreliable car ever. It seems like I spent half my time replacing alternators and belts. But we did have the longest-lived R4 compressor in the US. My wife never used the air.
I had an 81 Bonneville with the Diesel 350 and it was an awesome car! I paid 500 $ for it with 50 k miles and it was absolutely spotless and everything worked. If it had a v8 gas It would have easily been worth 3-5k. My bonneville was very quick it would roast the rear tires. I drove it all winter and sold it at auto auction for 1200 and thought I did good. lol
Biggest problem with the Oldsmobile diesels was they didn’t have a fuel water separator which if didn’t make sure to use high quality diesel fuel would ruin the injectors
Great video thanks .Rolls Royce used GM gearboxes ,just out of interest would any of GM diesels engines have had enough performance to make it a viable propersition to to fit a diesel engine to a Silver Shadow (3 ton )whose values are generally low .
yes those old rolls royce cars used a gm turbo 400, a real good transmission, I repaired one a long time ago, the only thing different was the rolls transmission had a polished case
I remember GM had a 5 cylinder gas motor and I read where someone bought a truck with one because the salesman said "It has the power of a 6 cylinder and the gas mileage of a 4 cylinder", he returned it saying the salesman had those numbers backwards.
I had a 1979 Olds Delta 88 diesel that was converted to gas. They used a deck plate to lower compression, and put gas heads and a 4bbl on it. I think it still had 11:1 + compression because it would destroy both back tires if you floored it. 55mph to 100 in maybe 5 seconds. That block was stout, very stout.
I wondered if anyone had tried that. It could have been profitable, with all the almost-new diesel GM cars on the market for almost nothing.
@@pcno2832 there was a company that made the plates i guess and Olds 350 intakes and heads were still available off the shelf. It definitely sounded like Oldsmobile Rocket 350. Oldsmobile V8's had a unique sound with a proper exhaust
Diesel block is a favorite for hot-rodders when converted to gas. Extremely strong block and if I remember correctly it’s possible to bore and stroke it to 430 cubes! 🤙
@@pcno2832 a guy was using new government repower 6.5 blocks and CNC machined up aluminum heads bored it to 4.250 max made big power
People always thought it was a existing gas block converted, the 358 just influenced the diesel concept before being cast new. Funny though it seems the existing diesel converted to gas on the other hand, this is the first I've heard of. A lot of people gave up on them altogether
The fuel filter on the Oldsmobile V8 diesel engine was also a water separator. You had to change the fuel filter at least twice a year depending on how much you drove. When I was working on cars, I had a gentleman who brought his Olds in every 3 months to have the fuel filter changed & twice a year for a oil change. The engine ran like a top. He never had any major issues with the diesel engine.
Management: "Let's turn a gasoline engine into a diesel!" Engineers: "Diesels run a much higher compression ratio, a gas engine isn't physically strong enough!" Management: "Not with that attitude!"
Look up how AV-1790 benzin engine was turned into a twin turbo diesel AVDS-1790 in patton tanks. It took a lot of effort and re engineering but it can be done
that Honda V5 was in the RC211V motoGP race bike and won 3 world championships. it was a genius piece of engineering; not only did the narrower rear bank fit nicely between the narrow frame spars, but the firing order was similar to a v4 with the center cylinder on the 3 piston bank being out of phase. doing this they were able to set it in a way that gave the engine perfect primary balance so the engine could spin over 15k rpm with no balance shafts or heavy counterweights, unlike most I4's and v4s.
Cool
But it was a bike
the odd fire pulse gives the rider a bit of advanced warning when the back tire is at it's traction limit.
@@vincesimione974ok and....
@@vincesimione974 - True, but if Honda could make a V5 spin up to 15k rpm with no balance shafts or counterweights then GM should have been able to make a gasoline V5 auto motor. The small diesel would probably never have produced enough HP to make USA drivers happy unless it was in a very light weight car.
Funny how lame that thing is ,when even a lowly VW 1.6 idi pulled 52hp at like 4800 and had a 5400 redline.
I started as a young tech at an Oldsmobile dealership back in 1981 . I recall the Salesmen telling people this sales feature " You never need to tune up these diesel engines" We were constantly replacing fuel filters on these engines , almost weekly in some cases due to water intrusion . Also we installed plenty of glow plugs and glow plug controllers . Occasionally , while removing a glow plug , the end would fall off into the cylinder which required cylinder head removal to retrieve the broken part .
See one of those would do okay today because the diesel stations have serious water separators and are generally much cleaner. My passat diesel has about 3mm of water in it max over the span of 30k between fuel filter changes
@@DarkAttack14 We are located in Farm Country so good quality of fuel is not the norm or wasn't back in the day .
What continues to astound me is that GM had been manufacturing diesels since the 1920s under the Detroit Diesel subsidiary to leave out a water separator was just inexcusable. Diesel fuel just naturally attracts water therefore all diesels, car or truck, have water separators. It's almost like the Olds engineers working on the conversion of a gas 350 to a diesel 350 had absolutely no interaction with their coworkers at Detroit Diesel. So many things that GM did in the 70s and 80s are just mind blowing.
Why wouldn’t they have just tapped Detroit Diesel to make them a motor to begin with…
Tell them what they need and want then let the experts design it?
They never converted a gas to diesel that myth will not die
@@leomonster1973 Having a screaming Detroit in these cars would have been pretty sweet! :)
@@crazyfvckback then it would of been a 2 stroke😂. Would of been awesome❤
@@captaininsano2777 CAFE standards and GM 2 stroke diesels?? Sounds like an oxymoron to me.
I still got an good-condition 1982 Fleetwood Brougham with the 5.7 diesel, and I love it as a novelty. I've taken in on a few longer trips and I do trust it. I get 21-23 mpg and it is good for 75 mph cruising. Not much for passing power, but can sustain that speed. Get a lot of looks when I pull up to the diesel pumps.
My uncle got one a few years later, when they were dirt cheap. He loved it! He grew up with diesel tractors and knew how to keep it running right.
Lol. Go get em! 😈
Ironically a Peugeot 504 Diesel was along with the MB 300D were the gold standard for Diesel cars in the 70's
I had a Peugeot 504 diesel in 1977, loved it.
The Olds diesel was NOT a 'strengthened' gas block. This is a common myth based on the fact that it was engineered to use the same accessories as the gas engine and could share some of machining lines in the engine plant.
You are correct. This is noticeable in the earlier 5.7 Olds Diesel block was known as a "D" block. Olds then produced a "DX" block. The "DX" block was beefier and had a better bottom end than the "D" block.
you are right, it was engineered to be a diesel from the ground up and fit the gm cars and share components
It's a different block than the gasoline block, but it's the same architecture. You can convert the diesel to gasoline.
I had a buddy who drove a 5 cylinder flat head Plymouth for a while. It didn't start out as that but after it cratered the number 6 rod journal he yanked out the piston and sawed of the rod so he would just have a sleeve around the crankshaft. It shook a little but it got him down the road .
I was going to say, a piece of leather belt and a couple of hose clamps if you didn't have the lower end of the connecting rod 😂😂
In the early to mid 1980s, the Volvo 240 had a VW-built 2.4L inline-six diesel that produced 80 HP and 103 lb-ft of torque, and the Mercedes 240D had a 2.4L four-cylinder diesel with 71 HP and 101 lb-ft. So compared to those, this 2.5L V5 diesel would've been a bit short on horsepower (and surely lacking NVH refinement), but with better torque, and probably better (but still leisurely) performance and fuel economy, since the X-cars were lighter and front-wheel-drive.
Cool to see you here!
I was ganna try to get a hold of you to ask you to disassemble one of those “power saver” devices, and was happy to see you already had me covered.
Thank you for sharing your excellent content, keep up the good work!
- Fellow quirk, who DDs a 81 Toronado Diesel
EXCUSE ME but those two were considered to be quick diesel cars! During that era, such figures weren't bad at all for diesel cars. And the Peugeot 505 Turbo with 82 hp was considered an absolute beast! Slowest was the Mercedes 200D at 55hp. Drove my cousins 200 D once, and tried to overtake another car. That was, well, exciting...
Anyway, if Olds got 85 hp / 165lb/ft out of a 4.3 l V6, the 2.5 litre V5 should have given about 50 hp and 95lb/ft. Wouldn't outrun the Volvo, but in line with many of the other cars of the era
Haha I wish I had my 91 Jetta coupe set up the way it is now for some hot diesel street racing 😂😂
1.9 block /1.6 head ,and the awy close ratio box ,and short 175-50-13 tires on it.
Not a rocket but it'll do the 0-60 in around 10.5-11 or so when stock was like 15.
My parents owned three diesels back in the late 1970's/early 1980's. A 1977 Peugeot 504 sedan, an Oldsmobile Delta 88 seda, and a 1981 Cutlass Supreme coupe. Both Olds had the 5.7 liter V-8, with the 1979 being the 125 hp model, and the 1981 being the 105 hp version. The engine in the 1979 self-destructed at 48,000 miles, with GM spitting the difference in the replacement.
I loved the diesel sound in the Peugeot and the Oldsmobiles. My favorite story about the diesels was when I was driving the 1979 Delta 88 in a traffic jam. An idiot was riding my bumper, as if that could get traffic to move faster. Unknown to him, the fuel injectors were in need of replacement. When we passed the cause of the traffic jam I floored the pedal. The result of all that diesel fuel pumping into the cylinders was a huge, black cloud erupting from the tail pipe, a cloud that would put many volcanoes to shame, right in the face of mister tailgater. As the cloud dissipated I looked in the rearview mirror, but the tailgater was nowhere to be seen. I wonder if the smoke stalled out his car?
"Rollin' coal" is what you did...lol
Yes I remember driving my parents 81 Riviera diesel, mom drove it till 2001
I had an 80 Oldsmobile Delta 88 with a gas 350 that needed valve stem seals and guides. IF you floored it then it would blast out billows of oil smoke as it took off quickly. I used to always smoke tailgaters. It's better to get a Ford LTD or Mercury Grand Marquis than to get a poorly made gm car.
@@warrenwinslow4266 I completely disagree, I've done very well with GM cars and horribly with Ford's, plus the rwd Ford's didn't handle very well and made very wide u. Turns
👍 😅😅
I remember reading and seeing diagrams, Saab did play with the idea of a V5 engine. Two of the cylinders were larger than the other 3 in order to provide balance.
I’d turn it into a steam engine 🤣
VW made narrow-angle V5s.
Great video! GM finally did add water/fuel separators across the 5.7 Diesel production line in 1985. It also applied the water/fuel separator to the 4.3 liter V6 Diesel as well. However, it was too late.
Classic GM: finally kinda gets it right then pulls the plug in the last year. Same happened with the Fiero.
The water separator issue wasn't even unique to GM, or the 1980s. The 2009-2011 BMW 335D had an inline fuel filter underneath the car with no water separator. The 2009-2015 VW TDIs had a cartridge filter under the hood, but again no water separator. My mom drives a 2013 Jetta TDI wagon and 2 different sets of injectors were destroyed by water in the fuel before I replaced the stock canister with a CAT water separator. Those engines also only have 4 head bolts per cylinder, just like the 4.3 and 5.7 diesels.
Yup, hard to believe they did that...and yet with the 6.2 (did the Detroit division build ?, yes I know the 6.2 was 4 cycle, I had one), they had 2 filters for fuel filtering, one had water separator, from the launch of that engine, mine was an '82. (I had a gloss sheet with specs on it from the 1980s here somewhere. I know it said the Detroit division built the 6.2) maybe they should have let them develop the 5.7, not Olds. But they did even dumber things like waste a few billion $ on rights & developing the wankel rotary for use, & that project was stillborn. DeLorean was upset Ed Cole wasted $ on that project. He said "that damn thing looked like it fell out of a 1912 farm tractor
I may be wrong but I believe that Mercedes did not include a water/fuel separator on their '70s-'80s Diesel cars either. The four-bolt head bolt per cylinder pattern wasn't much clamping power for an engine with a compression ratio of 22.5 to 1 (the Olds Diesel). I knew of an '81 Chevrolet truck with the Olds Diesel that had a large aftermarket water/fuel separator mounted on the firewall and it blew a head gasket. The water/fuel separators weren't the cure-all but they would have saved the lives of a lot of Olds Diesel engines.
@@theodorgiosan2570 wow, that's almost hard to believe. I had a 1982 GM 6.2, with what was on that truck, I would have thought that was a bare minimum going forward, for anyone building diesels,, especially zee Germans .
My parents had a Buick century diesel. Got fantastic fuel mileage like over 30mpg’s on at the time very very cheap fuel. It started to make a funny noise and my dad dropped my mom off to do something so he and I headed to the dealership. It literally threw a rod turning into the dealer. They really did like that car. My mom wasn’t thrilled with the idea of having to go to a truck stop for fuel since back in the mid 80’s that’s the only place that had diesel. Although my father owned an excavation company and my
Mom soon figured out she could fuel up at the my dads shop at his bulk fuel tank. I think a lot of engine manufacturers where really getting into uncharted territory as they were by this time good at making big trucks and equipment diesels but a small, light, user friendly diesel was something entirely different that Susie homemaker could deal with. My dad had no issue with it as he was around Diesels all day everyday. I have a VW TDI and it’s an amazing car. I regularly get 50mpg out it. It’s much more user friendly but it’s still different than a gasoline car.
The black exhaust and the clank of the diesel engine is why I fell in love with the diesel, well, the ones that were less problematic. Still, there was a certain prestige to owning one. I loved my '82 diesel Cutlass.
No shame in that whatsoever
The idea was high mpg not racing.... At this same time people were happily handing over $24k for 40hp 240D Mercedes Benz.
that would reach 1.000.000 km in middle east of Africa...the Benz diesel of the time are bulletproof
truly impressive just how little horsepower they got out of such a large engine back then
They were kings at it (ruining the diesel image for 30+yrs)
Especially when you consider Europe was getting 60 bhp from a 1.6 litre 4 cylinder normally aspirated diesel back then.
Think the gm idi's were bad? The 7.3 IDI in the F series makes a whopping 180hp 😂
look up power numbers for a 71 series Detroit. Something like 100hp from a 2000lb engine. Just the engine has worse power to weight than many cars.
@@phil955iAnd you could get a Mk.I GTD with a 1.6TD with 70PS and 130Nm. And those were Million-Mile Engines.
great video I worked for GM Canada in the late 80's through to the mid 90's and you sure got to see many things the average person doesn't, i never heard or saw the V5 diesel, that's just R&D in those times, most GM engineering divisions did their own things without much go between when it came to designing products, the V6 and V8 diesels got to be more reliable in the last few years they were sold in various chassis'd vehicles, here in Canada where it is really cold in the west they didn't fair too well, some of the full size RWD wagons that the 5.7 was sort of popular in were surprisingly reliable with good scheduled maintenance and if you were a person familiar with a diesel they usually ran and lasted better, I even saw one of the early versions come in with what a farmer installed his own water/fuel separator himself and said it ran better than new and had almost 175k miles on it and got regularly in the low 20's for economy ,not bad for a barge with almost no power, great video , the iron duke 2.5 was a great engine there's records of thousands of them with 300/400k on them and still ran good super easy on fuel 👍
I’m so glad the V5 never made it to production. I worked on lots of those damn X cars in the ‘80s and they were some of the worst pieces of garbage ever to hit the road…without an experimental diesel under the hood.
I can just smell_ the frustration coming from your comment
You've got to hand it to GM: they were never afraid to push the envelope, try new methods, really think outside the box, and innovate in the pursuit of junk that didn't work.
I remember seeing an Audi commercial with Ferdinand Piech the Chairman of VW Group, discussing the merits of the 5 cylinder engine.
Our 1981 Olds Cutlass Brougham diesel performed well. We had farm diesel so that prob helped. Also, we let it warm up a few minutes before driving. Kept it almost 3 years and racked up 123k miles on it. Only left us stranded on one record cold Christmas morning. The fuel gelled up. There were a lot of Olds (Buick, Caddy, Chevy, Pontiac) diesels in my area. None ever suffered catastrophic engine failure. Most of the issues revolved around the supporting equipment. A bad starter. Fuel or oil pump would go out, etc.
I gotta thank you again for this video. I visited the RE Olds Museum last week because you mentioned it in this upload and it was awesome! Saw this engine and also some very interesting Quad 4 variants =).
I hate that people still think the olds and GM diesels were “converted” gas engines. It NEVER HAPPENED!! They only used similar bore spacing and overall shape to save money. I hate that some myths never die. The engines weren’t as bad as most people think, with clean diesel fuel, a knowledgeable owner, and proper maintenance, they are FANTASTIC diesel engines.
Except for the 4.3V6, they were converted gas engines. The blocks and many components were strengthened, but the starting point was the Olds 350 gas engine. They reused distributor shaft hole for injection pump drive, had the same head bolt pattern (which was a major flaw), identical bore spacing and deck height etc.
There are a handful of us who love the clanking of a diesel! I currently drive a 2022 GMC Sierra with the 3.0 Duramax which is admittedly FAR more refined than any of those Olds V6 or V8's. My previous truck not so much, 2001 Ram 5.9 Cummins 3/4 ton 4x4 that I put close to 300K miles on before I sold it, 16 years of Michigan Winters having done their work on the body. Now THAT was a diesel! LOL Great video as always! Have a great 4th of July.
I love the diesel clatter, but it isn't exactly the sound of _luxury._
It's a shame you live in a rust area. Your new truck won't last nearly as long as that old one. Those DEF fluid systems are awful.
I have a 22 Silverado with that engine. The only clanking I get out of mine is the sound of injector nailing, and marbles in a metal coffee can when it's regenerating, which is frequently. Great mpg on the highway for sure, but if I had to do it all over again, I'd just get the 5.3 and deal with the inevitable AFM issues.
New diesel trucks are a monumental waste of money. Huge price tag off the lot, and massive repair bills a few years down the line.
I have a love/hate relationship with diesel noise. They sound cool, but also get old after a while, and taking phone calls is nearly impossible. I have 444k miles on my 7.3 Powerstroke and unknown miles on my 7.3 IDI, neither is going away any time soon.
I have a customer that still has a diesel Olds, MY 1978 IIRC. Original owner car, and it's very clean. Runs great.
GM has tried some interesting things in the past. Remember the Corvair flat-6 air cooled engine? They actually made a flat-10 and a flat-12 and tried them out in full size cars.
They also tried a four cylinder steam engine in the 70s.
Several GM V5 diesels made it onto the streets back in those days - they were diesel V6s which had chucked a connecting rod out of the block!!!
I worked at an olds dealer in the early 80s, the 350 diesel never had a chance, I had lunch with a few of the engineers that designed the engine in 1977, they had a pretty good engine, but gm did not have an overdrive transmission until 1980, the 1st prototype (an olds 98), was not driveable in as far as getting on an expressway ramp, so the engineers were told the engine had tohave a 3,800 rpm redline (crazy for a diesel), but they did it by increasing compression to 23 to 1 (crazy again) and retarding injection timing, they ran ok, and if you advanced the injector timing they had good power, if they would have just waited for a 4 speed transmission and left the compression at a reasonable 18 to 1, this would have been a great engine, it was a good engine if you installed head gasket spacers and had the 4 speed, they would go 300,000 miles, get 30 mpg in a 4,000 lb car, gm just did not do it right
The old Ford/International 7.3 IDI have almost the same compression and spin to the same revs, and they live long lives in heavy trucks and vans, so you can't blame the 350's demise on those things alone.
@@DonziGT230yeah, but the 350 olds diesels head studs weren't strong enough to handle the compression ratio. They were notorious for blowing head gaskets. The 7.3 IDIs were built right from the start. They were pretty gutless too but they would go forever!!
I agree with you, but we had a lot of cars that had unleaded gas in the tank, back then there were still full service gas stations and the diesel was a new thing in cars like a delta 88, it only took a few gallons to blow head gaskets or even bend rods@@DonziGT230
@@invisiblekid7374 The guy I replied to blamed the compression and RPM for killing the 350s, I was pointing out that a properly designed Diesel engine won't be damaged by those things.
@DonziGT230 yeah most idi engines with that style of precombustion chamber are in the 23:1 range. The issues were more so the low power, headgaskets, and shitty quality diesel of the day.
In 1979 I worked on a drilling rig in Louisiana and each driller got an allowance for mileage if they furnished the transportration to the rig. Well the value to the driller was immense as they bought Oldsmobile diesels the V-8 for their crew cars.
Consider that they got their fuel for free , their oil for free along with filters from suppliers on the rig. Then one of the hands would change to oil and filters at the rig. So that was free money for those drillers.
We drove the hell out of those diesels at pretty much wide open at &0 to 80 MPH. I never saw them have a problem.
I watch this, marvel at the engineering talent, then look at the absolute ineptitude of the management, and am left shaking my head.
During that era, I was working for a used car dealer, ferrying those GM diesels between Indiana and Florida. One day I found myself in a 260 Olds in a parking lot, stopped against a speed bump. It would not climb the speed bump!! Had to back up and take a run at it.
😂
Miss my "D" block '82 Olds Diesel, great traveling car and long range between refuelings. Used to bracket race it too, 21.65 all night long in the 1/4 mile! 24 mpg delivering pizzas!
I've always enjoyed the unusual, bizarre GM stuff (especially from this era) and you were right, I'd never heard of this engine before! I owned an overhauled (read: bandaged) 350 IDI (DX block) in an early '80s DeVille, oh the horror! Strangely enough I actually enjoyed my time with it. Some folks in the Nordic parts of the world even had good luck with those later versions of the mechanical IDIs, so go figure. Always looked out for the GM V6 IDIs you mentioned, but I never found a car with one for sale anywhere near here. The V5 having less power than a Duke though? That's something. I had a TBI Iron Duke in a mid '80s X-body hooked to a TH125C and that car was... quite slow. Oh, and since you brought up the obscure GM diesel topic you ought to cover the Toroflow sometime, that'd be fun.
I have a 478 Toroflow block and crank.
@@vincentdow5899 Oldsmobile was always experimental, they've built some of the best engines, i would say the 425 was their strongest.
@@1_BlackDog_23 Had one in a '65 Delta 88. Fantastic engine.
One of the motorcycle magazines did a spoof of these nonsymmetrical designs back in the 80s. It was the tale of a V7 with three 4-stroke cylinders and four two-stroke cylinders.
I’m amazed the engine made 70hp, each cylinder is 500cc and making 15hp, that’s better than most small industrial diesels, I have a 430cc direct injection diesel that only makes 10hp.
When I was a kid, my friends Dad had one of these diesel Olds. He loved the car, but I remember him saying it was in the shop more than he actually drove it. I'm not a Chevy guy, but I miss the Oldsmobile.
In the early '80s when I was a kid, looking across the street from our house, the family on the left had an Olds Custom Cruiser with a diesel, (which was later swapped out for a gas job) and the family to their right had a Volvo diesel(!), and the empty-nesters to the right of them had an Olds 88 coupe with the diesel!
The olds museum is actually a really great museum, very underrated place
My dad bought a used POS Delta 88 with a diesel. He drove a dump truck for a living so diesels were in his blood. The only reason I drove it was it was the first car we ever owned with A/C. Tailgaters found out the hard way how much diesel soot that car expelled at WOT. James Bond type of smoke screen.
7:10 I'll give Oldsmobile credit for one thing: That "V5 diesel" logo on the engine looks pretty damn cool!
My 1979 Cutlass Supreme Brougham with T tops was ordered with the 260 diesel.
as european i always wondered how american car manufacturers managed to get engine with so little power with humongous engines while a small 6 cylinders 2 liters (120 cubic inches) Porsche was able to reach 180hp in the early 70's and a crappy PRV v6 was 130hp in the late 70's with a displacement under 3 liters (185 cubic inches) and i don't speak about japanese brands with ultra small engines but with amazing power and reliability.
European diesel engines in the late 70's were about 60hp with 2 liters of displacement while US diesel engine were 2 to 3 times bigger with nearly the same power (you don't need to double the displacement to gain only 25hp) . The Peugeot 504 2.3 diesel was 70hp and keep running nowadays in africa with more than 1million kms (504 are used a bush taxi since the 80's and still work today)
also wondering..it might be that pryde prevented any head of engineering to look at Europe and say: why don't we try to understand what they are doing and downside our engines, use turbocharge, reduce car weight (size) and improve handling and safety. They could have easily reverse engineering volvos and Benz, Peugeot indenor diesels etc..
@@loftalofta8423 8 liters 120hp...even in Automation (the game) i can't get so low
@@themetalslayer2260usually they start out by making big engines, before realising the prototype uses too much fuel. So then the engineers turn the horsepower down to save fuel. If you wanna modify the fuel system and cylinder heads you can make a lot more power.
Heh, that part at the beginning about the transmission reminds me of the 4t65e. It was fine for regular applications but when mated to the supercharged 3800 or later the LS4, they'd get shredded. It's wild because the 4t80e was right there the whole time.
I worked at AAMCO Transmissions in the early 80`s and we used to get cars with destroyed 200 turbo hydromatics in every day, never in Chevettes though. Also unrelated but as a fact Renault Alliances were so bad we wouldn`t even accept them anymore. I remember you did a review talking about what good cars they were. Not from my experience they weren`t.
Happy 4th of July Adam I hope you have a wonderful holiday.
They were decent **when new** ;). Same to you!
I worked at a dealer that had Renault bestowed upon it with the Volvo franchise in the 90s. They should have been crushed at the assembly plant.
@@TroyClayton-w2lI agree with that. I too worked at a Renault dealer. Remember the slogan? "Renault... The One To Watch" yeah, watch that temperature gauge cuz those head gaskets popped all the time. LOL
My brother had a Cutless that a previous owner had swapped the diesel engine for a gas one (305). It still had the diesel "logo" on the dash..passenger side.
Pretty awesome to see that strange v5 Oldsmobile diesel engine great info
Olds was such an innovative company, its engines were often unconventional and often excellent (at least for GM). And think about that Olds 307 that was the workhorse of so many GM vehicles in the late 70s early 80s, too. So sad that it didn't catch on in China instead of Buick - then Olds might have lived on.
And Oldsmobile had very nearly every bit of class, which Buick had.
Edit: At least in my Gen-X lifetime - or the first less-than-half, hopefully...😃
The 307 was never great, but it was the last carbed GM engine to meet emissions.
@@matthewbowen5841 And it was a smooooooooth-sounding Oldsmobile V8, ready to almost pull the Earth off of its axis!
@@DanEBoyd- Pull the Earth off is axis?😂😂😂. I've only driven one car with a 307 and while it was smooth, it was the most gutless 4 wheeled vehicle I've ever driven. It was just a test drive, but IIRC it was an 88 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham... I assume a Caddy 307 is the same (or very close to the same) as an Olds 307.
@@dustintunis9347 Same engine. Guess I was thinking of the larger Olds V8s.
I had a maroon 1979 Cutlass Supreme with the 4.3l V8 diesel. Although it had been significantly improved with a 4.3l gas V8 by the previous owner 😅
My parents had a 81 Riviera diesel, they drove it 20 years without issues. It had pretty standard puckup between 0-40 mph very lacking from 40-55mph, hated getting behind a car on freeway on-ramps slow and hit the gas at the last minute, i needed a run to reach freeway speed's.
I drove one of these v6 Diesels in a Buick Century, it was a pretty nice car
I spent a couple years driving a Nissan 720 pickup that was equipped from factory with a 62hp (when new!) 4 cylinder diesel. It was much the same for highway on ramps, needed the whole thing to get to highway speeds 😂 but cruised 60-65 without much issue. It wasn't geared for 70+
I worked at a Chevy, Olds Cadillac dealership when the 350 diesels came out. I've never seen so many bent rods, come out of (poorly) running engines in my life.
Imagine being in the board room back then!!!
Volkswagen used a shortened version of their VR6 engine, where more or less just one of the cylinders was cut. It was used in the Bora (US: Jetta) V5 for example.
Interesting to see that the idea of V5 engines was used in other cars as well - despite it seems the Oldsmobile V5 Diesel wasn't that reliable.
I had a 78 or 79 Chevy half ton pickup bought new had a few problems but luckily I had a mechanic friend that lived two doors from me coulapsed a fuel injector and had to drop the oil pan and replace the rear main seal.
As a mechanic who actually worked on these Oldsmobile Diesels. Yes, they had some problems, number 1 head gaskets and water in the fuel. But actually, if an aftermarket water separator was added, they would have a long life. The truth is that many owners had the cars converted with a used gasoline Oldsmobile 350 rocket engine a direct bolt in replacement. Why? Here is your answer. The vehicle would never need emissions testing. As at the tim, diesels didn't need emissions testing! Two quiet running. And last diesel was not as easily found in many cities. I did forget one. Many times, the vehicle was relatively new, and it was cheaper to replace the engine with a gasoline engine than repair the Oldsmobile diesel. I would have purchased one at the time, but sadly, by the time I could have, they had been discontinued.
yes they were not as bad as the reputation, head gasket spacers and advancing injector timing would make them last a long time, and 30 mpg in a 4,000 lb car
I’ve been a gm guy my entire life and have never heard of the gm v5 diesel.
That thing would’ve been awesome in a chevette with a 5-speed and straight pipe!
The VW "V5" is not a V5, in my mind anyway. As it really has only one bank, one cylinder head, one exhaust manifold, and one intake manifold. If memory serves that engine was marketed as the "VR5" in their more sporty modles. Yes technically its a "V5", but by my defenition any V configured engine must have 2 cylinder heads and 2 of each manifold, otherwise its just a funky inline 5 cylinder. Later on VW did a VR6 which was same concept, 15° bank, but again one intake manifold, and one exhast attached to a single cylinder head, at least in my head its just a funky inline 6 cylinder.
Just my opinion. Although i will say its quite ingenious getting V6 power out of a much more space efficient 6 cylinder, same with the 5 cylinder.
Good work as always. I love the channel. Keep it up, man.
Earned yourself a new subscriber.
Had a diesel in a Chevy Celebrity. Its failure was a split crankshaft. Starter turned one end and the crank pulley stayed put. Swapped out for a gas engine. The engine was painted that odd blue-green much like a Detroit Diesel.
1980 the 200 Turbo hydramatic Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme, the torque convertor blew in the first winter, they replaced it with the 350. 260 V8
I loved the iron Duke for its durability.
GM's Diesel issues did not stop with these engines. GM actually co-designed with Detroit Diesel the infamous 6.2 ltr diesel that came in two variants....a C code for light duty (some cars, Blazers, 1500 and 2500 series) and a J code for 3500 series and military applications (Hummer for one), They were produced from '82 to '91 when in '92 they came out with the 6.5 Turbo which fixed many of the problems of the 6.2 while significantly increasing HP and Torque. I had an '83 3500 Dually Crew Cab 4WD with the 6.2 J code. It was by far the most unreliable and under powered truck I ever owned. On a good day with a tail wind, I could get to 65mph...towing with it was a nightmare. It had 130HP and considering it was already a heavy it was way under powered. It was a truck that could not do truck things like towing. I had the truck for 5 years and I replaced the transmission at 17K miles, 4 sets of auto locking hubs, AC fixed more times than I can remember, replaced the Stanadyne injection pump twice, glow plugs I changed like spark plugs (I had to carry a can of either in the event they randomly failed), water pump three times, the press on runner fuel return lines would pop off regularly and spray raw fuel all over the exhaust manifold (I carried extra hoses just for this not to mention two fire extinguishers, and the body was a joke....all 4 doors rusted out badly, around the rain gutters rusted out to the point I could see through them, cab corners...so bad that when I closed the door parts of the truck fell to the ground. When I sold the truck with 67K miles on it I almost had to give it away....it was poorly designed, poorly built, under powered vehicle that neither the dealer or the manufacturer would stand behind. This truck waved me off from buying GM products until I bought a '99 3500 Suburban with the Vortec 5.7 which turned out to be a real good vehicle...but other than that it has been Ford or RAM/Dodge since then.
The 6.2 J code was used in 3/4 tons above 7200# gvw. The 6.2 was in production until 1993. In 1992/1993 the 6.2 and 6.5 used the same block even. All the issues you listed were not changed with the addition of the 6.5 besides yes, more hp and torque with a turbo. There were naturally aspirated 6.5's as well.
I'm not sure how you had that much go wrong in 67k miles. I've put probably a million miles on a half dozen pre-worn out 6.2's and never experienced a 10th of your issues. I've never had injector return hoses blow off? You need to run the good German made hoses, not Dorman or Vatozone junk, but still you'd have to have a blocked fuel selector valve to cause that.
The water pumps are very stout units, with proper cooling system maintenance 100-150k intervals on them is normal.
It you had a 3500 with an auto you had a TH400, if you are ruining TH400's with a 130hp, I'd love to know how.
If you had alternator issues, that can trigger the glow plug controller to cycle when driving, I absolutely cannot fathom how else you would go through so many glow plugs. I average about 100k on a set of AC60g glow plugs, and that's with a manual push button to actuate them.
2 injection pumps at 67k?? Were you filling up from a swimming pool? You knew it had fuel filters right?
My '87 V10 has over 400k on the original 6.2, it is tired but it's still dead reliable.
Squarebodies obviously have a huge following and are bringing so much money lately that I'm not even interested in buying anymore. Hardly a "poorly engineered vehicle"
You had to take a 6.2 for what it was in 1983, 130hp and made for fuel economy. If towing was your game then you should have got a 454.
If a 6.2 was used within its design perimeters and maintained, they were economical and great.
Everything East of the Mississippi rusts, doesn't matter the brand. Washing the salt off once in a while helps.
I just can't fathom how people struggled so hard with these.
Drove several v8 200 transmission cars, never had any problems. Same transmission was in the Buick grand national with few problems.
That was a 200-4R in the GN, not a THM200. They are different.
Interesting video! I've owned a car with the 4.3 V6 diesel in it. It was super cool.
The 350 diesel may have not helped with the image of GM and American diesels in general but Oldsmobile tried something new and different like their Coal dust powered engine.
The backlash and bad PR I think killed creativity and innovation in GMs engines for a while and those other stupid regulations killed so many aspects of the American auto industry
I honestly thought that the only v5 was the Honda RC211V racing bike engine but it’s cool to know that there are at least 2
Also the VW VR5...the only one to actually see volume production, I believe.
Master at work. I have watched dozens of breakdowns. Where are the builds?
The Iron Duke could have been a lawn mower engine or auxiliary generator engine. The 471 made it look like crap.
Wouldn't an inline 5 cylinder make much more sense? A very interesting video showing a very, very different engine.
GM Warranty Claims Department: We're having a lot of issues with this diesel engine and customers are having tons of problems. GM Management: Let's put it in everything!
I bought a used 1981 GMC pickup 5.7 Diesel .. it had a Targmaster replacement engine.. I put headers on it .. the Injector pump failed had it rebuilt and turned up 10% The Truck got too rusty and parked it at 260,000 miles on it ..
I added a remote Luberfiner fuel filter with water sediment bowl on the firewall .
My grandfather drove diesel Oldsmobiles in the 1970s/80s. I never understood why. I asked my Dad one day and he enlightened me that b/c his business my grandfather had access to a lot of dyed diesel fuel. LMAO Grandpa spent the last 20 years of his life screwing the government out of taxes. Love it.
if you can think of it, it already exists, seriously. a few months ago i was wondering if an odd V engine was possible and the first thing to come to mind were a v9 and a v5. now youtube recommends me a v5.
I love old school Oldsmobile engineers. 'how weird can we get away with?" ....yes!
That being said, the V6 conversion was a better set up than the V8. It was possible to keep the head gaskets on them if you kept them cool.
On transmissions, GM did the same dumb thing with the Turbo 350. That whole lineage of transmission had no business in 6000LB trucks.
I can't fault them for trying something different, but man, those were dark days for American iron.
Thanks to the pests at the EPA.
I worked as a GM tech in the 70s and 80s, when a diesel would come in the shop everyone prayed it wouldn't end up in their stall.
yea me too, I lied and said I was allergic to diesel fuel
The Olds engines were some great performers! I had many, but mostly the 455. Those DX blocks were ultra strong and came with a forged crank. All of the olds engines back then had forged rods also. For the DX, just use 350 or 403 heads and get something like 14-1. The boat guys really liked those. The 425 engines all came with forged steel cranks, and the early ones had dome pistons. Use the C casting heads (69 only) on the 455 with a 50k deck cut and a fel pro perma torque head gasket (43k crush) get 10.5-1 with shallow dish pistons. I put custom top end oil restricting plugs in my 461 (455 + 30 over) Insane torque and 7,000 rpm also. It destroyed my 84 Cutless with body twist. I still have 2 sets of C castings after all these years... If you want to try something cool and different, but also make real power try a big Olds engine.
My friend bought an Olds diesel. I tried to warn him that they had troubles, but he was excited to have in a car what his 5 ton truck had. He sold it after a year of trouble.
There seems to be a pneumatically actuated valve connecting the exhaust manifold to the inlet. Some sort of early (uncooled) EGR perhaps?
The best thing about the olds 350 diesel is you can convert them to gas and you got a super strong block
That was certainly true for the DX block.
It never fails to baffle me how you get such low power from such large engines. My grandfather had a diesel car early 1980s 1.9 litres and that put out 75 bhp
Simple, diesels are air hungry. No turbo- very low power. A dyno test on the international 7.3 showed adding a turbo and 5 psi of boost on them yielded a 25% increase in power, from 180 to 250hp. Any of these GM engines with 25% more power would have been much more pleasant to drive and merge with traffic.
Have an 88 buick with 2.8. 83k miles. Great car
VW had the 2.3 V5 150-170 hp in its engine program between 1997-2006, however, they were petrol engines.
What was the gas V6 transverse engine in the Cutlass Ciera. It was a V6, and it ran really stout. It was transverse from wheel drive V6. It was stronger than the 3.8, it pulled like a freight train.
Positive comments about the GM passenger car diesels.... We were in the auto parts business in those days. I don’t recall anyone having anything good to say about them. It was assumed they’d “dieseled” the gasoline block, based on the frequent failures.
I was the unwilling heir to a 229 V6 when I married. It was a sawed-off 305 with all of the disadvantages and none of the power. Lamest engine in history, in the most unreliable car ever. It seems like I spent half my time replacing alternators and belts. But we did have the longest-lived R4 compressor in the US. My wife never used the air.
Some blame the bean counters for the weak/cheaper head bolts and the lack of proper filtering.
The best part about having an old diesel is the ability to use free fuel.
Sometimes your videos really surprise me. This is one of those times! 😆 Good stuff, Adam! Keep it up!
Suzuki also did a 2 stroke V3, also on motorbikes.
I can't help but look at the cars from this era and think to myself: "How did ANYONE think this styling was attractive??"
I had an 81 Bonneville with the Diesel 350 and it was an awesome car! I paid 500 $ for it with 50 k miles and it was absolutely spotless and everything worked. If it had a v8 gas It would have easily been worth 3-5k. My bonneville was very quick it would roast the rear tires. I drove it all winter and sold it at auto auction for 1200 and thought I did good. lol
Nothing could match the Diesel Chevette! It required a tailwind to climb virtually any grade.
I had a Monte Carlo that had the 4.3 diesel. Never did get it to run.
Biggest problem with the Oldsmobile diesels was they didn’t have a fuel water separator which if didn’t make sure to use high quality diesel fuel would ruin the injectors
Great video thanks .Rolls Royce used GM gearboxes ,just out of interest would any of GM diesels engines have had enough performance to make it a viable propersition to to fit a diesel engine to a Silver Shadow (3 ton )whose values are generally low .
The venerable Turbo Hidramatic TH400.
yes those old rolls royce cars used a gm turbo 400, a real good transmission, I repaired one a long time ago, the only thing different was the rolls transmission had a polished case
My first diesel was an inline 5-cylinder Audi sedan
I remember GM had a 5 cylinder gas motor and I read where someone bought a truck with one because the salesman said "It has the power of a 6 cylinder and the gas mileage of a 4 cylinder", he returned it saying the salesman had those numbers backwards.
Yep that was an in-line five gas engine that was available in GMC and Chevy trucks as well as the H3 Hummer.
Interesting Stuff with that V5 Diesel, Adam😯🤘
I had a 1980s Mercedes diesel 240D very clanky but, the best motor ever, definitely a lot better than any USA made diesels made on that time.