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Experience with Jasper?

Chris Ziemer

Chris Ziemer

Daily Driver
 Premium
Joined
Jun 8, 2022
Posts
151
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131
Location
Galt CA
Need to either rebuild my 350 engine or buy a long block. Machine shops around here months to 5- 18 months out. So that’s probably not an option for me. My mechanic likes Jasper motors and they come with a three-year unlimited mileage parts and labor. Have heard some mixed reviews, although was wanting to see if anybody had any personal experience with Jasper V8’s. This would just be a 350/300 horse or something like that.
Thanks
 
A lot of mixed reviews is the best way to leave that. ATK also has a lot of mixed reviews…
 
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I don't know much about Jasper, but I recently put a rebuilt motor in my Honda Odyssey (just bought the thing and needed a new motor after 1400 miles:angry1:) built by Powertrain Products. Most parts seemed to be OEM. Even the dealer mechanic foreman noted that this engine was whisper quiet compared to new ones from Honda, so here's to hoping it lasts!
 
seen a welded hole in a cylinder brake and let coolant in the cylinder and kill the motor . . .

why not buy a new replacement and be done with a better warranty
 
Thanks, I’ve had an ATK 6cyl for my 4Runner. Lasted a couple of months then froze. ATK did replace it, but I sold it right after that.
Other option is a new GM motor. About $5600. Seems so expensive!
 
The last 2 ford remans I've been involved with were both replaced right after startup. One cracked a piston and the other no oil pressure. The second reman is leaking from the pan now after 15k or so miles.
 
That sucks! I really don’t know what the best way to go is. Keep in mind this is my daily driver.

Option 1. New Summit/GM 330hp $5600 plus tax. Will have to have to pay to have it put in and any warranty stuff will be a nightmare of blame and expense between Summit and the mechanic.

Option 2. Jasper long block, installed $6500 (no immediate details on HP). Warranty 3 year/100k miles and is basically 100% covered through the mechanic. So any problems and - in theory - just a drop off to the mechanic.

Option 3. Buy a used/rebuilt 350 for $2000? Have it installed and take my chances.

I’m leaning toward the Jasper just because it seems like I’d have a covered motor for 3 years.

I wish I was more comfortable putting a whole engine in.

Thoughts?
 
Follow this logic for a moment - I was buying a very high quality starter at a really good parts house and the old starter was the same name brand that had lasted over 15 years.
This guy behind me kept bragging that he buys his starters from Autozone with a lifetime warranty and he knows the warranty is good because he’s replaced it seven times in five years.

I explained that I would rather pay a little more upfront and not have the hassle or downtime with a lesser product even if it had a better warranty.
I replaced mine only once in fifteen years and he’s replaced his seven times in a third of that time frame - plus he’s been left stranded each time !

The old saying goes “ya get what ya pay for” - the warranty is not as attractive if you know you are gonna need to use it and eventually you will end up with a replacement motor that is out of the warranty period and then it’s all on you. The replacement motor won’t start over with a three year warranty like the first one initially had.

Think beyond the warranty time frame and what you will be left with when it’s all on your dime.
 
I have to agree. Buy once cry once comes to mind.

Yeah, GM crates are pretty ridiculous in price nowadays, but you rarely hear of them failing from the word go. As this thread, with limited responses show, the aftermarket is absolutely not this way.

If the engine blows, you are now down for however long it takes to pull it and get a replacement, which I'm sure isn't a day or even week process. So yeah, save a couple thousand up front, and open yourself up to not having vehicle for weeks. That's ignoring the cost of the oils, coolants, filters, gaskets, and time swapping parts that'll be needed if it has to be pulled.

It's frustrating for me to have seen the huge price increase on the GM crates, because it does push people away from (IMO) the best replacement engines. Going on ten years now, but the L31 in 2016 cost me $1900 to my door. :(
 
I might be the minority here but I have bought many used (junkyard or private seller) engines over the years, put new gaskets in them and ran them for years. Id buy a L31 vortec out of something and swap it in. Keep the induction you have now to keep it correct for the smog police and run it. I dont trust any of the major rebuilders (VEGE, ATK, JASPER) I've seen too many strange things to put any faith in one. Oversize pistons in some cylinders, used parts with some stuff, new in other areas, etc.
 
Chickntrk said:
I might be the minority here but I have bought many used (junkyard or private seller) engines over the years, put new gaskets in them and ran them for years. Id buy a L31 vortec out of something and swap it in. Keep the induction you have now to keep it correct for the smog police and run it. I dont trust any of the major rebuilders (VEGE, ATK, JASPER) I've seen too many strange things to put any faith in one. Oversize pistons in some cylinders, used parts with some stuff, new in other areas, etc.
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Well said. I’ve always been too cheap to spend the money on a crate engine.
And, had pretty good results from engines I’ve pulled from junk yards. But, I can also repair almost anything. I’m not afraid to roll in a new set of bearings into an old engine just to get a few miles out of it.
 
In my dealer days we were a Jasper dealer. Things soured over one customer and our wrecker.

The customer deal was a standard L31 vortec I was buying since my tech decided a Mexican tune up on a dead cold engine with a billion miles was a smart idea. First engine came in and I watched the jasper truck driver actually drop the engine off the pallet onto the harmonic balancer. Having watch him do it I said don’t bother unloading it. The next engine came in and wasn’t dropped thankfully. My tech promptly installed it and we discovered by the wonderful noise the valvetrain had that the rockers were all over the place for adjustment. Mind you these engines are supposedly “run at the factory” and ready to go. Valve covers off proved our thoughts. Further inspection found used rocker arms with heavy wear at the tips. The propaganda from jasper said the engines come with all new internal parts. Only the block and heads are oem. I call my sales rep with the standard “wtf?!” I get bs as a response but eventually he allows me to source replacements locally as it would take longer for them to send us more.

I’ll spare the rest, but long story short we ended up having to get another engine due to other issues that developed with the first one we installed. Point being is how hard is it to screw up a traditional small block Chevy build? According to them, not that hard.

We also had bought a first gen d-max for our c4500 rollback due to the General being out of stock and loosing $$$$ per day with the wrecker out of service. Same story. Valvetrain issues. Again it was supposed to have new rockers and bridges, did it? Nope. I was so furious I went well up the food chain to gripe, reaching the vp in charge of quality at the assembly plant and was dumbfounded at the level of stupid I was confronted with.

So needless to say after all that the next time the jasper rep darkened our doorstep the owner of the dealership promptly took him into his office chewed his ass for a while and instructed him never to step foot on the property again.

And that “warranty” they provide is a joke. They will not pay the door rate of the shop doing the repairs. The shop is lucky if they get 50-60% of the posted door rate. In our case they capped out like $65/hr back then. Plus you can’t expect to get paid unless you get authorization upfront. They wanted to chop time from published LTG’s on top of the crappy dollar per hour rate.

Take that info however you want. I will not sugarcoat my experience with that company. Buyer beware.
 
Wow you guys…super appreciate the feedback. I remember this being so much simpler when I was younger. Probably b/c there was no option for these high priced options. Kind of like Chickntrk said, we just used damn near any 350 available and it never failed.

Unfortunately smog prevents me from using the Vortec heads (L31) b/c my 82 intake won’t fit. Fingers crossed for Leno’s Law. Otherwise that’s a fantastic idea. So many of those motors around From wrecked vehicles.

But I think I’m convinced to buy a Goodwrench crate motor. This has been eye opening.

Looking at Jaspers propaganda and how the supposedly run all these motors, record specs, etc… well, it’s disappointing to have so many people with such bad experiences.
 
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Last time I called a machine shop to see how much they'd get to do all the work, I understood how and why aftermarket rebuilds sounded good.

What that should have told me was the corners being cut on the Jaspers and so on were the only way they could be cheaper than having a machine shop do the work.
 
One thing the gm crate is 100% new engine. The L31 has a roller cam.
Any new flat tappet is a gamble flat cam. I would not do Any of the online engine builders. Maybe blueprint but i would need to be desperate for an engine
 
I talked with my local GM dealership a little bit ago and he has a 265hp (75hp more than I have now) in stock for $3800!
I’ll be owning that motor in the next week.
And all thanks to you guys! I feel better about a new GM motor. Will cost me about $2500 to install it and with a little luck, I’ll soon be down the road spending money on stupid stuff again haha.

Thank you to everyone who looked at this thread and replied. Takes a village to raise this idiot.
 
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