[TheGrim]

I have an 07 R/T with no engine. I bought it for parts but it turns out the body is really nice and it's complete other than the engine.
Well I can't find a 4.0 to put in it for less than $1800. I can't really justify spending that much money on a car that will only be worth about 3k when I'm done.
Are there any other vehicles that had the 4.0 in them? Caravans and Pacificas have them but they are fwd. Are the blocks different or could I make that work?

 

[2ndgen]

I believe the 4.0 in the Nitro is tuned differently--it uses a different balancer--so they might have a different ECU--but otherwise are the same engine and would likely drop right in.

allpar 4.0L engine article

thread about the Nitro 4.0 balancer. A hard-to-find part. You could probably just use the balancer on the Pacifica 4.0 engine, but you'd have to figure out the new belt length. Worst case is it would run with the Nitro ECU tune but have a slightly altered perfomance profile--or put the ECU from the Pacifica in and see what happens. Might need to do some VIN programming with alfaobd to make it happy.

 

[2ndgen]

Why do you care about the cars value after you're done? Are you trying to flip it?

Honestly, if you have a good rolling chassis, I'd go find a 2008+ 4.7L V8 (corsair) and drop it in. 290 HP... before mods. So much you could do with that. There exist forged pistons and rods for it--you can boost them and get upwards of 500HP.

 

[TheGrim]

Unfortunately I live in a county in Georgia that does have emissions so I can't get crazy with engine swaps or anything.
And I'm not sure if I want to keep the car or flip it but either way I'm not trying to drop thousands on it.

I'll read that article on the balancer and see what I might come up with. I might even be able to get the nitro balancer from the last owner. Of course that's if the fwd block is the same as the rwd.

 

[2ndgen]

Pretty sure the block is the same, but the harness is probably completely different arrangement (same pin-out, but physically different because of the transverse orientation), so you'd still need a harness from a RWD 4.0 unless you want to have to go through it and do your own wiring mods to make it reach.
But, who knows, maybe the harnesses are the same also.

 

[TheGrim]

Actually I believe I have the nitro harness as well as the intake, oil pan, possibly exhaust manifolds. The PO took the engine apart after it threw a rod through the block and he stored almost everything inside the car so when I bought it I got a lot with it.

 

[2ndgen]

oh. that's gold!
That oil pan alone is worth a fortune--there are none to be found in the US. There's been several threads recently of people searching for one.
I've been researching, and appears all the harnesses have different part numbers between pacifica, T&C, and nitro for the 4.0. All probably just because of differences in how they arranged the engine bays--electrically they're probably all the same.

 

[teahead]

ya, just get another engine from a minivan. Just replace any Nitro-specific parts of course.

Should be just fine.

 

[BearlyNitro]

I have an 07 Nitro 4x4 R/T that is beaten up on the bumpers, and one fender, plus it has dents in the hood, rear hatch and above the right rear fixed window, and someone backed into the driver side front door, but the engine has been well maintained and runs great. I don’t want to sell it for what you are willing to pay for the engine, but I would be interested in buying your parts Nitro. What color is it?

 

[TheGrim]

It's black but I believe it's been painted.

I wasn't really considering selling it but I suppose that's a decent solution.

I'll pm you and we can talk.