Longevity of LT1 4thgen
 

How many miles should a (did your) 4th gen LT1/t56 f-body last before major repairs were needed? What repairs were they? Kind of a boring post but I would greatly appreciate your input. I'm looking at one with 100k or so on it and I'm wondering how much hell is in store for me if I buy it.

A friend of mine has a '96 Trans Am with 130,000 miles on the clock. The only thing she has had to replace is the water pump.

I just picked up a '93 TA for a beater- it has 137,000 on it. Still runs like a champ and holds good oil preasure. Former owner had to replace the auto trans about 7,000 miles ago though.

Have noticed that the less modded a car is, the longer they seem to last. ;)


Both examples mentioned above are stock.

Yeah I know the autos can be trouble. One reason I'm seriously considering getting rid of the caprice.

My LT1 has about 211,000 miles on it now. I've never even removed a valve cover. I've spent under $2,500 in repairs, including a rebuilt T-56 & everything needed to swap it for the 4L60E. It depends GREATLY on how the car was maintained and taken care of. I drive my car hard, but take care of it too. The interior still looks good, other than the cracked dash. No rips or stains in the seats at all.

My uncle has a 94 25th anniversary white with the blue stripes. He has 160K on it and he also has only had to swap out the water pump. He keeps plugs and wires changed and oil changed every 2500-3000 miles. His is also stock so that prolly has alot to do with it and he drives it like a 200,000 mile car as well. It's an auto and he's never had any probs with the tranny or the opti. :)

That's very impressive, 200k+ miles and running mid 13's. :bow:

Any horror stories out there about these cars shortly after 100k? (besides the opti) I want to hear both sides here. ;)

My car has 146k+ miles and the only thing major that I've replaced was the water pump and opti. I honestly don't know about the clutch because it's the same that was in it when I bought it, but I'm pretty sure even it's stock.:eek: It's always had mobil 1 syn. in it and it's been run pretty easily all it's life (mostly stock). I put down the #'s in my sig with 130k on it. Pretty good if you ask me.

I'm crossing my fingers that nothing happens in the near future cause it's been so good so far.

Kyle

THis one has a new clutch, which may be a bad sign as far as abuse is concerned. However, a new clutch at 100k is not unheard of... I only put on about 6k a year so problems at 130-140k sound fine to me. Thanks for your feedback guys, if things work out I may be a member of this community in a few days!

78K miles. Then I blew a head gasket and installed a cam and heads to go with my supercharger. That was the biggest thing to go wrong with the beast. :)

Ouch. How much boost were you running?

Got about 113k in my LT1. Replaced the auto tranny at around 100k and the water pump shortly after. Just did my first tuneup about 500 miles ago. Still runs like a champion.

7 PSI. Currently down to 3. Brent did a pretty decent econo job on those heads. ;)

I have 78K on the clock on my '97 Z28. The only problem I've had was the fuel pump went out at around 45K. I had a '94 Caprice LT1 and put about 135,000 miles on it and had the normal LT1 problems: opti and waterpump went out at 70K and fuel pump went out at 128K and thats all.

1995 Z28 stock except for bolt ons and well taken care of, head gasket blew at 131,000 and some of the front end componets loose and replaced them also. Otherwise just normal maintenance and water pump.

Turned out to be a total POS. It had so little torque I had to go WOT to keep it from stalling on the launch, and it had a bunch of other problems. My caprice could 0wn it (all motor) with an L03 and 1000 extra pounds. Thanks for your help anyways guys. If anyone has a GOOD LT1/t56 4th gen for a reasonable price in the DC area, I'm all ears.