so i bought a 89 z71 for 1700.00 bucks got screwed long story short the engine is no good. but i ran across a friend of mine with a newly built 350 to put back in it only issue is its an old style carbureated engine and im not sure if its going to work i know im gonna have issues with the distributor but the oil filter also looks like its gonna be in the way of my 4x4 drive shaft does anyone have any experience with this?

 

You're correct, your oil filter will definitely hit the driveshaft. You'll have to swap over your oil filter adapter from the engine in your truck already. Otherwise, everything should be about the same give or take. Maybe the exhaust is different? If both engines are the a 350, then you shouldn't really have to change anything really. The distributor should be able to be swapped from your current engine.

Basically everything on your current 350 should be plug and play with your new (old) engine.

 

so i can use my tbi distributor and coil? or will i need to buy one of the older vacuum style distributor?

 

It's my understanding that you can take all of the old parts off of your no good engine, the original 89 engine and swap them over to the 350 engine you got. You should be able to swap the TBI intake from the 89 over to the new engine, swap the distributor, the oil filter adapter and all of the other parts that go on the engine. The accessory drive belt brackets should even be the same. If it were me, I'd swap the block onto all of the old parts.

Being swap the heads, intake, distributor, intake, valve covers, accessory drive belt brackets, oil filter adapter, exhaust manifolds - everything. That way you end up with as much stock equipment from the 89 truck as possible. So really all you'll be doing is pulling the old engine, and instead of rebuilding it, swapping all of the parts off the old engine onto the new one.

You might not have to swap the cylinder heads, but you should be ale to get away with swapping the TBI intake, distributor, coil and EGR from the old 89 engine onto the new 350 you got. Should really be pretty plug and play.