$75.00. That’s the asking price for this sad pile of pig iron being solon eBay right now. This is of course and infamous Oldsmobile 350ci diesel engine. The motor was an ill-fated attempt by GM to make a gasoline engine into a diesel engine which was one of several factors that helped to knock the development of diesel car and light truck engines here back for decades. The stench of failure rivaled runny cheese and we can still joke about it today.
Here’s the funny thing, though. They sold a ton of them, at least at first. They also sold them for a long time. The Olds diesel was available form 1978-1985, which is a hell of a lot longer than anyone out there usually remembers. In 1981 the company sold 310,000 units that year and honest owned more than 50% of the domestic diesel marketplace. The earliest versions of the engine made 120hp while later ones made 105hp. That’s pretty sad, right?
As best we know the engines themselves did not have a tendency to suffer catastrophic issues but rather reliability was a problem because of fuel quality. Crummy batches of diesel with water in them would make this car run like a cement mixer and people were “cured” of diesel cars for many years after that.
Many people forget that there were 261 and 263ci V6 versions of the engines built at this time as well. Those engines made 85 and 90hp. People wonder why buyers left the domestic manufacturers in droves during this time. The stuff was just plain bad.
The upside to all of this? The blocks are super strong and beefy and many high performance and race engines have been built off of them. We’re guessing that at least half a million of these engines were proceed so finding them should not be that hard. If you want a block, get to stepping!
Click here for the eBay listing that features this Olds Diesel 350 for sale
Dan Stokes would give this diamond in the rough a new purpose.
How bout it Dan? Lol
Um – no. Wrong displacement. However, if I were to build an Olds I’d want that block!
I’ll wager one could make one of those run hard as a Diesel with enough time and money. If I had one I’d have to start the same learning process I went thru on the Mercedes (I knew nothing about them when I started).
Dan
310,000 unites in 1981 alone?!! That seems hard to believe. I remember these cars, but it wasn’t like they were on every block.
hot rod had an article back in the day where they took one of these, turned it n/a, and with a stoker crank went out to 454 cubic inches. Today that\’s nothing but back in the mid 80\’s a 454 small block was extremely uncommon. Made big power too if I remember correctly.
My dad had one. Puked the cam at 23K. POS. The diesel Roosamaster injection pump was the only thing worse than the engine. It died at 18K.
I used to buy these cars dead and pull the motor and put a sbc in them . My favorite was a 82 buick estate wagon . If you had olds gas motors you had it even better . No motor mounts and accessory brackets to change .
Okay, compared to what? VW diesel? you know, the ones who put an aluminum head on a cast-iron block? Mercedes? they’re still a pig. There were maybe 2 decent car-diesels out there (e.g. Isuzu) but all the rest were a joke. I get the hate, but seriously, I think it’s more then a little unfair when there were others that were far worse…. btw, the Buick GNX motor prior to 86 was a pig… where’s the article about how terrible those are? I dare you – though I’d suggest a nuclear bunker for you to escape to that is ready for the flaming you’ll get for publishing that article.
I always thought that old performance rumor was started by guys who would build them for non small block chevy classes at circle tracks.. with a decent cam and the good compression they made for cheap econo class dirt track engines, but for anybody serious theyre limited by parts availability?
There is a very long and involved story behind the scenes about this engine and why had so many problems. It is way to long to put here, but basically GM didn’t want to have a diesel engine in its cars or trucks at that time. The economics of diesel fuel at that time created a market demand for it.