Tell me about the 5.6L engines

[Bow_Tied]

Fawk I think that takes it off the list.

[Miner]

Compare the purchase price and the expected cost to repair the known defects, add in the fuel...I bet the answer will become clear.

[Bow_Tied]

Fuel - the extra fuel costs of the Trailblazer SS, know to be a fuel hog w/6L performance engine, is just marginally worse than the pathfinder. I wish I didn't like the idea of the SS so much, lol. The Envoy is making more sense even if I consider some stupid repairs with it - most are "affordable" ....finding one with low km is the hard part.

Too bad I don't live in Ottawa. Of all the vehicles I have shopped on line for in the last 2 years, a HUGE proportion were in the Ottawa area or at the very least Kingston area... so damn far away. London is a dead zone.

[Morpheus]

We sell so few Titans, and we service even less, so I can't realistically provide any details.

http://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale ... 0842&Log=0

[Miner]

Too bad I don't live in Ottawa. Of all the vehicles I have shopped on line for in the last 2 years, a HUGE proportion were in the Ottawa area or at the very least Kingston area... so damn far away. London is a dead zone.

If there's ever something your serious about and want an impartial set of eyes to look at, just let me know.

Note - there is another option for cracked headers. The Dorman replacements are cheap from RockAuto. I have no idea if they will be longer or shorter lived than the stockers but if you do it yourself you could do it 2-3 times for the cost of long tubes and uprev. There are also "shorty" options that do not require tuning, however you need to swap the cats over which is a pain. Neither of these options opens the 5.6 up like the Long Tubes and UpRev, the 5.6 is a really an impeccable motor when not encumbered by Nissan's HORRIBLE manifolds.

I'd say a V8 Pathfinder with an AiRaid MXP intake, Long Tubes headers, decent exhaust and UpRev tuning would be a fair straight line performance match to the SS. That would put them at approximately the same horsepower, with an edge to the Pathfinder in torque and with a 5-speed vs the 4-speed in the SS. The SS does have 4:10 gearing, which is hard to overcome but pays a penalty in fuel economy.

A big factor for me would be the transmission. The Titan and the Volvo's are 5-speed autos, any time I drive a 4-speed I never forget that its missing a gear and notice every shift. Conversely every time I drive a 6-speed I note how much of a difference it makes over a 5-speed. With all the new vehicles going with 6-9 speed auto's I don't think I'd consider anything with a 4-speed.

[Bow_Tied]

Thanks for the offer to look at vehicles, Josh. If I find something worth driving 14 hours round trip to pick up having a pre-inspection would be awesome. I am hoping to find something more local (GTA?).

I agree the 5 speed is nice. The one 5.6L pathy I drove was great in that regard. I grew up on 3 speed autos and have had experience with 6 different 4 speed autos (4 GM 2 Nissan). I am comfortable with the 4 speed auto - I agree the more the merrier, but I am ok with the 4 since the towing I would do won't be that often to make a 5+ gear trans a requirement. It's not like it gets me better economy than the Envoy.

I don't know if the pathy could match the SS in performance, perhaps possible, wouldn't match the handling, but that angle is at best a nice to have anyway. The SS is also known for having a weak trans despite it being an upgraded version of the regular trailblazer trans - seems to tow ok but abuse/mods over power it (though there are some upgrades such as vette servos that can help). As much as I think it'd be cool to have the SS the purchase price is harder to justify. It'd be a min $5k? more than a pathy (for similar miles) and likley more again over an envoy and more again over a saab 9-7x. I actually like the denali styling best. It kills me that any manufacturer thinks plastic wood grain is a premium appearance item though.

When it comes down to it I don't want to spend the time and effort to modify stock parts to the extent the pathfinder needs in the exhaust manifold area. If it was a simple swap - in and out for $500, well ok maybe, but paying others upward of $2k and having tunes etc. is too much to stomach. I simply don't have the time to do it myself. I wish I did.