Thread: How to tell the difference between a 3800 Series II and Series III engine/ L67 vs L32

The engine cover is just a cover and tells you nothing. Even if he replaced the engine with a series III, he probably didn't replace the engine cover...

The L67 has a gen 3 5 rib supercharger and the L32 has a gen V 7 rib supercharger.

Both series II and III blocks are stamped, however a lot of series III engines use series II stamped blocks.

If it has black valve covers, it is most likely an L32 (although not all L32s had black valve covers).

Likely any engine from a junk yard did not include the supercharger or the engine cover. So you can not judge by that. A series 3 supercharger (L32) would not let you bolt your throttle body up with out a $100 adapter ordered from a performance shop and he would have had to put your old fuel Rails back on.

That being said there is no easy quick way to tell what was put in. He most likely bolted your old supercharger and fuel rails to what ever was delivered.

He had to get a supercharged motor (heads different than normally aspirated) but L32 motors are over $1000 for ones with 100,000 miles. Chances are it's a high mileage L67.

5 grand for a used engine swap? do you not know about getting estimates? i hope the second engine swap was on the house cause he made enough off you to do 4 of them.

used engine costs around 5 to 800. the labor for a swap is around 500 with fluids. unless they are flat out thieves.

theres no way to tell what block you got. unless you saw the engine before they put it in and you saw it had a gen 5 blower on it.

the engine cover is your old one if you had one.

Ouch that mechanic made bank, bet he ate a big ol steak that night that you paid him too lol.

Originally Posted by Scottydoggs

5 grand for a used engine swap? do you not know about getting estimates? i hope the second engine swap was on the house cause he made enough off you to do 4 of them.

used engine costs around 5 to 800. the labor for a swap is around 500 with fluids. unless they are flat out thieves.

theres no way to tell what block you got. unless you saw the engine before they put it in and you saw it had a gen 5 blower on it.

the engine cover is your old one if you had one.

R and R is not 5 hours of labor lol.

Think like 10-12 total, plus the motor and fluids. I bet the avg price is roughly 2500-3000 at most shops depending on miles on motor and cost of the engine.

Shoot, we a 05 alitma with the 3.5 VQ motor for 3,100ish.

But in the end he kinda got shafted on the price by atleast 1500 buck.

shops that charge that much didn't want the job in the first place.

around here i can get a engine swapped for 5 to 600 tops just the labor and fluids. you need to look for the shop that has the engine hoist outside all the time and old engines piled up outside. thats the shop that wont rob you blind.

Even at $10-12/hr that's only $500-600 around here. Normal shop rates here are around $45/hr.

I charge $400 for labor on older fwd engine swaps. Used engines around here can be had for around the $150-300 range. There's no way an engine swap should cost 2-3K unless the customer is getting a reman engine and even then its that's a steep price. Hell if I charged a customer 2K for an engine swap I'd probably have a used vehicle forsale! Lol

Damn I need to move up north so I can make more money!

Sent from Not so smart smartphone

I live in a area with 4 dealerships and roughly 20-30 repair shops in 10-15 mile circle, you won't find a shop that charges "cheap" labor. It's 90-100 bucks an hour, most dealerships are 90-95 an hour. Parts become cheaper though because of all the business but for a motor swap it's never cheap. And 2-3k for a R&R of a engine is a good deal, plus you get a warranty with my work anyway.

Also figure a motor can cost say 500 bucks to any joe blow on the streets, but a shop needs to mark it up to gain money off the part and most customers have no real clue what a engine cost or even how they run in general.