The GM 3800 v6 engine is a modern marvel, in my opinion. This is the little engine that could. Here is a more detailed history of the engine. Full disclosure: I’m a big GM guy. I built a 64 Impala SS with my dad at age 13 that has slowly morphed into a glorified race car, so that’s where I got my start. When I turned 20ish I bought a 2001 Monte Carlo SS which features the 3800 engine. I got the car used (as all cars should be bought) brand new cars do nothing but depreciate in value, add the added expenses of financing a car loan, and carrying full cover insurance and new cars equal one great way to lose money, just ask my friends from graduate school who bought new cars they couldn’t afford when they got their first jobs. The car was bone stock when I got it and performed admirably getting 27 mpg in the real world in my experience, and I have a heavy foot. After making some modifications in large part thanks to the guys at zzperformance. I created a monster that when mashed to the floor could keep up with V8’s of the day and when driven at 55 mph got 40 mpg. I won’t get into all of the details because I believe one was frowned upon but I will tell you about how I stretched so many mpgs out of this little engine.
When thinking of an engine it is basically a glorified air pump and to the extent that you can improve the engines ability to breath, it will run more efficiently. The cool part, if you are a gear head like me, is that power and fuel efficiency are correlated to a certain point and then power requires more fuel. One of the first modifications I made and one that can be done on any vehicle was to add a cold air intake (CAI). CAI improves the amount of air flow into an engine. The more O2 we can get into the combustion chamber the more power we will make. I followed this modification with a ported and polished Throttle Body (TB). This allowed more air into the engine and the polished nature of the TB smoothed airflow into the engine.
Getting air in is only half the battle, a deep inhale isn’t much good if you have a weasy exhale. I could have gone with headers but I didn’t want to modify the exhaust that much so I ordered zz’s power log which is a ported exhaust manifold as well as their down pipe, these cars have a bad bend in the exhaust that chokes the exhale to a certain extent.
Almost all cars can benefit from similar modifications, anything you can do that will allow the car to breath better should increase your gas mileage unless you do something crazy like add a supercharger or turbo, I’m assuming you all have the good sense not to do these things as we are after MPGs and not raw power when leading a frugal lifestyle.
But all this costs money you say. I agree auto parts, modifications, and auto ownership in general is an expensive endeavor. They also tend to depreciate in value over time, making them a poor investment. However, if you plan on keeping your current car forever these modifications can pay for themselves over time. I also tend to bike and don’t use my vehicle unless I am taking a long trip, but because I live 500 miles from my family, car ownership is a necessity for me personally.
While I’m biased as a GM guy, if you are looking for a good used car finding one with a 3800 is a great way to go. These engines made the Ward’s best engines list several times, the Series III engine also is classified as an Ultra Low Emissions engine, and I have heard stories of these engines running to 300k plus miles. I currently have a thrice hand-me-down, twice wrecked (I fixed) Pontiac Grand Prix with a 3800. I got this car for free from my parents (so great deal there) with 122k miles. I’m currently at 152k miles and no problems. All of this really leads into my broader project which is eco-rodding. Please follow along with my next post if you would like to see how I make classic cars much more of an investment, if they can be considered that at all.
