2006 head on 2005 block?

[JayArr]

Hi All

When I bought the Envoy it had a blown head gasket and a warped head. I pulled that and dropped in an engine from the wrecker. It's been working fine for years.

Then someone on this board spun a lower bearing and pulled the engine and I bought the head from them thinking I could put it on my block and build it as a spare engine. I think I might have bought this from Limequat but not too sure, it was more than a year ago.

I just watched a video where Nivlak57 explained that beehive springs started in 06 and I thought "that's not true, I have them on my 05" then I realized that the head is not from this car. I run out and check and sure enough I've got an 06 head.

So my question is... can I use it?

Assume I'll go to the wrecking yard and get a set of 06 valve covers and exhaust manifold to fit it and then also assume I'll buy an 06 VVT. Will the 06 VVT work with my 05 sensor and ECM?

 

[Mooseman]

I do believe this has been done in the past, especially on 02 engines, as there were some performance gains from the newer heads. AFAIK, the physical differences are the valve cover, ignition coils and temp sensor location. Since you currently have the temp sensor in the block, you can just leave the one in the head alone to keep that location plugged.

Have heard of complete engine swaps between 02-05 and 06-07 so this should work.

 

[JayArr]

Definitely some performance gains, the valves are all larger, with larger exhaust ports, better valve springs and a bigger cam.

The video I watched said the VVT was a different design and thus a different size, smaller on the 06, so the old VVT won't fit in the 06 head.

I need to find out if the 05 PCM will work with the 06 VVT. Rock Auto lists the same AC Delco actuator for both years with a different AC Delco part number for the 06 sprocket.

 

[Mooseman]

On those swaps I haven't heard of anybody having issues with the VTT. Even though it's smaller and different design, sounds like the controls are the same.

 

[limequat]

Yes, I've had a few customers run an 05 engine on 06 electronics, no problem.