Lincoln Mark VII Turbodiesel

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

Well I learned something new today! Someone posted a 1985 Lincoln Mark VII for sale with a BMW diesel, and after a bit of checking confirmed it was an option in 1984-85: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln_Mark_VII



It's a little 2. 4L straight 6 with 115 ponies, supplied by BMW. One for sale in Auto Trader http://www.autotrader.com/fyc/vdp.j...07&doors=&transmission=&max_price=&cardist=13



Vaughn

 

[MBergman]

I had a customer with one at an auto parts store I worked at. He bought it with a broken camshaft. Parts were next to impossible to obtain from Ford or BMW for that engine. I think it took him a couple of months to track down the parts to fix it. He LOVED that car once it ran.

 

[bmoeller]

Wow. Never knew that.



GM used a 4. 3L V-6 diesel in some of the Chevy Celebrity/Pontiac 6000 cars. Real PITA to work on. Heads had a cracking problem. Didn't matter if it had cast or aluminum heads. Cracked between the valves.

 

[WDixon27]

same exact motor as the bmw 524td of the same vintage (they had many other cars in europe that we never got with that engine too), ve pump with a cam belt capable of eating the engine if it breaks, ford had a huge warehouse or those engines for a long time after the diesel boom crapped then a motor home manufacture built a camper around the engine and bought them all, turbochaged non intercooled made around 120 hp if i remember right, i always wanted to bomb one because you can make the car it's attached to handle very well but they are few and far between and cheep ones are trashed

 

[JHerr]

That 2. 4TD engine also was available in the Lincoln Continental, I think. I remember seeing one in a big 4-door Lincoln.

 

[Jdonoghue]

Wow. Never knew that.



GM used a 4. 3L V-6 diesel in some of the Chevy Celebrity/Pontiac 6000 cars. Real PITA to work on. Heads had a cracking problem. Didn't matter if it had cast or aluminum heads. Cracked between the valves.

A small change to the cooling system (how the heater hoses were routed), and never let it overheat or run low on coolant - that's how the head-cracking problem was solved. But no one discovered this (the heater routing issue) until it was much too late. I had several of those things (cast iron heads, though) with close to 200K on them and they didn't leak.

 

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

Other than the the head cracking issue and general lack of power the 4. 3 GM diesels were a halfway decent motor- much more so than the 5. 7L. Didn't eat rods and head gaskets as readily and could even handle light turbocharging up to about 10psi. I drove a '83 rear-drive Cutlass with the 4. 3 about a year ago, had more poop than I expected and the owners claimed it often topped 35mpg on the highway.



Vaughn