I ran into this video on youtube today and it made me happy. I've been asking how to swap motors for sometime and never found out how. The shops would make it sound like an expensive task. BS! If you don't know how to remove your Chevy's Motor, Here it is Thanks to my latest youtube subscription:

Courtney Dream's Youtube Profile

Here's Courtney's Contribution to us all:




My Questions & Concerns:

1. On the pic where the front section's suspended in the air, where is the top section that raps around the top of the windshield?

2. What is that section called (Section that raps around the windshield)?

3. When above section is installed, does it:
A. Have rubber seals that connect it with the roof, held together by the pressure of the windshield & being bolted to the front section, ect.?
B. Is it connect by a liquid seal of some type?
C. Is it connected by welds of some sort?

When you had it that far why not a frame off restore ?

I really hope you are kidding.....

......Wookee

It's not my van, it's some one's on youtube I ran into this morning. Frame off would be my choice but I'd never known or seen how these motors were removed.

Is this not right or something? I'm lost..Don't tell me this is all photoshop?

Doesn't look like photoshop, but I think the person who made that video is having a little fun with people. You can take apart a chevy van to get the motor out like that, but it won't exactly go back together by "reversing the steps". My guess is this van was being scrapped but they were saving the motor. Do not cut the front of your van off.

Also technically "frame off" restoration isn't possible on a unibody van, but that's just splitting hairs. I know what you are getting at and you could come pretty close by removing the front subframe and all suspension and driveline. You could then access all tricky to get at places, but really those are not often a problem on these vans.

Common rust spots are all the lower outside body panels, which replacement panel are mostly available for. Also the front subframes themselves some times rust, those are a bigger problem.

Yep, don't believe everything you see on the net !

Everyone knows you take the fiberglass roof off and hoist it through there !

I thought all that came off was the grill , rad, some wire harness and hoses un bolt and cherry pick it out....whats with takin the cab and 1/2 the ft just to get to the block

If you don't care about putting it back together then yeah, sawz-all the whole front off. But for a motor swap on a van you want to keep, yeah you are absoulutely right, out through the front.

Hardest part is that you don't have much space to lift the engine before pulling it out. I have heard of people strapping the boom directly to the top of the engine, not hanging from the chain, because even with just a few links, the boom hits the bottom of the engine shroud/firewall before you even get it up off the motor-mounts.