what do you all think of the 6.9

[jbarnett31]

I have found a pretty good deal on an 89 4x4 with the 6.9. I havnt had a lot of dealing with one of them, would it be worth fooling with. Just wondering.

[Bruce Amacker]

Are you sure it's a 6.9? It originally came with a 7.3 in '89. 6.9s were '83-87 IIRC. Check the SN, it starts with the displacement. Common head gasket failures, the 7.3 had larger, longer head bolts. Common pump failures. It was a pig by today's standards and I'm glad it's gone. I made a lot of money off of them.....

 

 

[Jim Warman]

I met my first 6.9 somewhere around '83... Thankfully, I wasn't tasked with working on them. I do recall, however, that the only thing you got when you stepped the footfeed to the floor was more noise.... Seems to me they were very hard to start when the temperature plummeted below about room temp... or if someone was eating ice cream close by...

 

[Keith Browning]

Sheeeeooot! I cut my teeth on a few of them. That was back in the day when you could and had to test injectors on the bench. Many of them had nothing resembling a spray pattern and I always had problems with getting the fuel return collars on the injectors to stop leaking.

[DwayneGorniak]

They were 10 times better than the competition's 6.2L of that vintage though. And the glow plug sytems on the 7.3 were way better than what the 6.9L had. That danged Chev Wrangler I used to have was the most gutless pile O' crap I ever drove in my friggin life. I kid you not when I say it couldn't pull itself up a big hill or through a dead on wind. You could at least pull a travel trailer with a 7.3L. There was no such farmer in all of Saskatchewan who would even dare put a utility trailer behind a 6.2L Chevy. The 7.3's were the true work horse of that day.

[Aaron]

The 6.2 was awesoeme, 'cause all you had to do was put it in drive and just put it on the governor. Ghetto cruise control.

 

I had one in a suburban for a couple years. Decent mileage, just don't be in a hurry to get anywhere.

 

And with 40 series flowmasters and no cats...it was nothing close to bearable noise wise.