1983 5.7 Diesel engine colors

[pikapp]

Anyone have any idea what the correct color for this engine would be?
It appears to be a pale metallic greenish/blue.
The BBO blue metallic is way too dark blue.
There was a SBO blue but I can't find any representations of it.
Until I find a reason to remove a valve cover and photo match it I'm stuck.
Dupli-Color does not seem to have anything closer than Detroit Diesel
Alpine Green K02013, which is not metallic.
Any help or ideas would be appreciated.

[helfen]

I'm not a expert on engine color of Olds diesel, but I thought all GM engines built from 1983 were painted black.

Don

[rick60]

The original color was a silver-blue color. I don't know if it available in the aftermarket.

[pikapp]

Thanks for the quick responses.
You are correct Don, MOST of GM's
engines were black by 1983.
This makes this original example mounted in
a GMC Caballero even more weird. I can't
locate accurate production numbers for this
model, but by guessing from ElCamino production
it could have been 150 to 250 units in 83.
Acknowledging most peoples opinions on the 5.7 diesel maybe
I should just install a small block and spray it black, but,
it runs great and never ceases to attract the curious which is
fun in itself.
I was hoping someone in the Olds forum would have had
experience with the diesels or would admit to it anyway!

[rocketraider]

Like Don, I thought they had started painting all engines black by 1983. If you have a good paint and body supply, they may have the formula and be able to make you a couple of spray bombs.

I've learned something today too- never knew the Diesel was offered in the Caballero/ElCamino.

If the Diesel runs well, keep it. A 4.3 Diesel 1982 Cutlass showed up at the 2009 OCA Nats and it kept a crowd around it all the time. It was actually hilarious- when it arrived and went thru the showfield to its spot, the Diesel clatter made everyone turn and look to see what it was. Several people (guilty as charged!) started following it. A Pied Piper to a bunch of Olds rats...

[helfen]

[QUOTE=rocketraider;853121]

I've learned something today too- never knew the Diesel was offered in the Caballero/ElCamino.
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I think Glenn would agree with me in saying " Never say Never " . I have been in automotive 40+ years ( 34 years for a manufacturer ) and sometimes some pretty weird things happen. Since first responding to this thread I started reading about the 4.3 and the 5.7 and once Olds got beyond some early teething problems and if you did proper maintenance, made sure you had clean fuel and especially did this warm up thing before you drive that they are decent engines. Some of the owner reports in the 200,000- 300,000 mile engine life category.

Don

[rocketraider]

Trouble was the die was cast by then and it never lived down its earlier reputation. It didn't help that GM chose to advertise the Diesel as "lower maintenance" which a lot of people unfamiliar with Diesels took to mean no maintenance.

I've known several people who got in the 300-500k range on their Olds Diesels. All of them said the key was religious maintenance intervals, best quality oils and filters, and clean high-grade fuel. Most had an extra fuel filter with water separating capability installed.

Also worth noting that these folks had 20-30 mile daily commutes to work with very little short trip driving.

If a nice early 80s Ninety Eight Diesel came up, I'd consider it. But I don't think there are any left.

For all its perceived faults, the 350DX block is in high demand among hardcore Olds drag racers.

[helfen]

[QUOTE=rocketraider;853469]Trouble was the die was cast by then and it never lived down its earlier reputation. It didn't help that GM chose to advertise the Diesel as "lower maintenance" which a lot of people unfamiliar with Diesels took to mean no maintenance.
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Seems like in the rush not so much in the 50's, but from 60's on the push when not completely ready ruined many good projects. Corvair-after the mods from 64 a great car and as Glenn says a reputation ruined, Turbo-glide ( a investment of 1.5 billion today's dollars) , Tempest 61-62- finally getting it right in 63 with a Pontiac V-8 and a redesigned IRS only to be discarded with the new "A" body in 64, Fiero- finally getting suspension right in the last year of production, Roto hydra-matic-great forward looking concept done in a compromise and never made friends- lucky to never have found their way into StarChief and Bonneville-poor all Olds, Catalina,Ventura, (Grand Prix-62-64) from 61-64 in the small wheel base chassis. Cadillac V8 - 6- 4, Cadillac 4.1. the list goes on and on.

Don

[mortsciguy]

I seem to recall that the silver/blue/green metallic paint was the same Olds used on other gas engines of an earlier vintage, like the olds 350 with roller cam.
Kelly

[joe_padavano]

I seem to recall that the silver/blue/green metallic paint was the same Olds used on other gas engines of an earlier vintage, like the olds 350 with roller cam.
Kelly

The gasoline Olds 350 never came from the factory with a roller cam. Only the 1985-90 Olds 307s came with a roller cam. These motors were painted black.

[mortsciguy]

I stand corrected.

[Oldsfan]

Isn't the diesel color similar to the '66/'67 Toronado? Slate Blue, they call it, or something.

Paul

[rick60]

Oldsmobile put the diesel into the line up in order to bring the C.A.F.E. ratings up to meet government standards. The first Olds Diesel I saw was installed in a 1976 Cutlass 4dr. It was an engineering test car. The zone rep parked it behind the service bay I was working in. It was too loud to be an Olds. He opened the hood to show me the engine. I looked under the car. It was oil soaked! I thought to myself, the oil leak problem will be corrected before they went into production. WRONG!! The early ones ran smooth, but leaked oil. The "D" blocks would self destruct! The later ones would not idle as smooth. The oil leaks were not as bad on the later ones. The "DX" block was much better. The interiors of the early ones would turn black from the diesel soot and oil vapors. If a gas station or tow company used a booster to "jump start" the car, the glow plugs would melt. The end of the glow plug would bulge, making it impossible to remove the glow plug from the head! A lot of long time Olds customers bought these cars expecting the to be as dependable as their previous Oldsmobiles. they were not pleased. They did achieve 30mpg on the highway. They eventually worked out the problems. It was too late. It tarnished the good name of Oldsmobile. Our dealer sold a lot of diesels. We actually had two mechanics that worked exclusively on the diesels. I'm glad I was not one of them!

[Twilight Fenrir]

Well, I kinda skipped a few posts here and there, so sorry if this was answered already :P

I don't know anything about the 5.7L diesel coloring for fact, however, I do know of one other oldsmobile that had a blue engine... Your blue looks a little bluer than what I'm thinking of, but it's hard to tell...

1st Gen Toronado's had their 425, and 455 a slate metalic blue. Which can still be found in aerosol cans from Fusick Automotive.

I tell ya though, I'd really love to find an El Camino/Cabilero with one of those original diesel engines :P They are very rare.

As I understand, by the time they made their way into the El Camino's, they had significantly improved the engines. They no longer had that tendency to break crankshafts in half, or split the block, etc... And were actually increadibly reliable, and very fuel efficient.

But, GM really screwed the first batch of people who got the nightmare engines, and most people stayed away from them in the aftermath.

[NTX5467]

The 5.7L Olds diesels DID have a different color on them than other GM engines of the time. I would call it "silver with a blue tint" rather than "slate blue" (which I would take to be more "gray" in nature). GM did sell engine paint for it, back then, too, in spray cans.

Other than the alleged quality issues with the first ones, there WERE many misconceptions on the buying public about the engines and what they would do. GM did NOT recommend them for any kind of trailer towing activity, for example. Many fleet owners in West Texas bought them as they were "a diesel" and it simplified their fuel situation to be able to use one tank ratner than many, BUT using them as a "heavy-duty" diesel, they were putting short blocks in them at about 30K miles, way sooner than their earlier gas rigs. So they got somewhat burnt on them, but this was BEFORE the distinction between "heavy duty" and "light duty" diesels were made or understood by the buying public.

I was lucky enough to have one for a company-supplied vehicle . . . a 1978 C-10 "gut loaded" Silverado in Dallas Cowboy silver and blue, with a Delco 8-track stereo. Seems like it had a 3.08 rear axle ratio, too, with the normal P235/75R-15 radials. AND it had dual exhausts with the "flame arresters" in the tips.

Compared to the earlier 350 V-8 I'd had (which got no better than 13.25 mpg when new, then settled to 11.5mpg no matter how it was driven!), the new diesel was a different breed of engine to drive. Learning its characteristics was KEY to getting good performance from the vehicle-period!!! Cruising on the Interstate with the sliding rear window open, the pipes sounded great. Small throttle inputs gave the impression that it was very torquey, but larger inputs revealed otherwise. Therefore, as you couldn't jump from lane-to-lane as a gas rig would do, you had to plan your moves. This made driving it much less stressful as getting in a hurry was not an option--unless you planned it a ways back.

I put 70K+ miles on that vehicle before it was turned. We replaced the "famous" Roosa-Master injection pump at about 50K, under warranty (about where many needed to be replaced, anyway). One key thing we did was put a Racor water filter on it, which we did for ALL of the diesels we sold back then, as a part of pre-delivery activities. When it'd get some moisture in it, it'd only run up to about 1/2 throttle before it would lose power and I'd need to make it upshift.

This vehicle also had a THM400 automatic transmission in it. Like many of the earlier THM400s, it would not downshift into low gear at WOT if it was running faster than about 10mph. Therefore, in order to get the performance out of it that I felt I needed (to stay up with traffic or hit the holes in traffic), I figured the mph for 4500rpm (the governed speed) and did manual shifts just before the rpm bumped the governor. And that's the way I drove it to get onto the freeways in Dallas, going over there about 4 times/week, for the entire time we had the truck. NO engine problems . . . period. I don't recall any injectors being replaced, either, just the pump replacement.

ONE issue was that the first year of GM diesels required "CD" rated oil, which was for "heavy duty diesels" and not available too often outside of truck stops or fuel distributors. I chose Exxon XD-3, but it was later changed to Delo (a regional favorite back then). Still, no engine-related issues. For the next year of production, the oil requirement was eased to allow normal Pennzoil gasoline engine motor oil. This was what the next 5.7L diesel I got had to use. I tried to lobby for a more diesel-spec oil, but was over-ruled. That truck was turned at about 35K miles, to a farmer who, literally, "bought the farm" with that truck. Over the course of the next year he owned it, various things on the engine were replaced every few months! I don't know what he was trying to do with that truck, but it obviously was not rated to do it.

Anyway, so to speak, little old ladies in the boondocks seemed to break crankshafts driving to church on Sunday and I didn't break one using lots more WOT accelerations for the course of the 70+K miles we had that one. Go figure!

As we were deep into light duty truck sales, we sold lots of these 5.7L diesel 1/2 tons. I learned that the best way to drive them was to keep the pipes "white". If you floored it from a stop or low rpm, it would "smother" the engine just as too big of a carb would do a gas motor. Blipping the throttle of a 5.7 would make the engine really jerk on its mounts . . . that "torque" again.

Needless to say, I became good friends with every RoosaMaster repair shop in the area. There seemed to be some "black magic" in calibrating them. We'd have two diesels that didn't run too well and got poor fuel mileage. You could swap the two pumps and each truck would suddenly run better! The one repair shop also sold test stands to calibrate the pumps. They maxxed the specs on timing advance and fuel delivery, not unlike "richer jets and more timing" for a gas motor.

The issue with the RoosaMaster pump was that it was previously used for constant-rpm tractor and other stationary engine applications, not anything remotely like "automotive" use. As early as 1980, Japan's DieselKiki had an electronic pump out that was far superior, but GM seemed to ignore it.

Over the years, there were MANY piston designs used in the 5.7L diesels. Depending upon if it was a "car" or "pickup truck" engine. By the early 1980s, the cars were as quiet running (on the outside) as a gas motor with a loud emissions air pump.

One strong point was the diesel's cold weather performance. Once the glow plugs got hot and stayed lit during the initial cranking, the engine would start and run flawlessly. NONE of the sags, stumbles, "flame-outs" of the emissions-controlled gas motors of that era. This also made them more easy to drive on ice and other marginal-traction situations . . . even up hill! Without a P-Track, even! Once I learned how to make them work, we were a good team.

The "little" diesels that went in the A/G-platform vehicles (as the mentioned ElCamio was) were a different breed all unto themselves from the 5.7L versions! One day, a travelling salesperson showed up at the diesel pump shop in a Cutlass station wagon with one in it. The engine was almost as quiet as a gas engine, especially inside the car! At that time, the vehicle had over 200K miles on it and no pump issues. Performance was decent and the guy loved it for its fuel economy on the road.

As for the 5.7L, there were tweaks being added with each new model year. Piston crown configuration was one. There was a local mechanic and former hot-rodder who really got into rebuilding and studying the 5.7L diesels. He knew which pistons worked with which cylinder heads and would regularly mix-match these things for better performance. He also used Total-Seal piston rings in his rebuilds. This as in the earlier years of Total-Seal rings being around. With these rings, the motor oil would not immediately turn black from soot, which normal rings would let happen almost as soon as the engine had run 5 minutes on a fresh oil change. He seemed to be onto something! But he was a little eccentric in some ways, but he was acknowledged to really the one of the few people that really knew these engines. Unfortunately, he had some other problems in his marriage and became self-deceased.

When GM came out with the 5.7L diesel V-8, an article in MOTOR TREND stated that Olds engineers had to learn about diesels "on their own" as there allegedly was no books on "How to design a diesel engine" around. I found this somewhat interesting, but had no way to determine its validity. The Olds V-8's "bottom end" was the strongest in GM's lineup at the time, which was paired with their best W-series hot rod crankshaft for their big-block V-8s.

One issue with the diesels was that fuel economy in them improved each model year, but so did the gasoline engines' economy. For example, if a diesel would average 16mpg and the gas rig would do 14mpg, the next year the gas rig would be at 16mpg as the diesel improved to 18mpg. At that time, diesel was about 20 cents less expensive per gallon, still, the payout for the diesel option's cost and additional maintenance (more oil quarts/oil change) costs put it at a 100K mile payout! PLUS, you have to consider that the 5.7L Olds diesel-power GM light duty trucks kept us being able to sell 454-power pickups, too!

When we got one of the new '81 diesel pickups, we were deep into wholesaleing Chevy 350 crate engines. It was good to haul 5 at a time, but 6 put too much weight behind the rear axle and the springs weren't quite rated for that. 5 were about 2250 lbs. One morning, I had 5 in the back of the truck and went by the diesel pump shop and got their lead tech to go on a demo drive with me. We pulled up to a red light. The sliding back glass was open as it was a nice day. When the light turned green, I throttled into the diesel and away we went, gradually getting to WOT in low gear and then upshifting into 2nd. In addition to the normal exhaust sound, I kept hearing a popping "out back". As we got to the posted 45mph speed limit, I backed out of the throttle, yet the popping continued. Then, a biker passed us in a poorly-running Harley . . . that was what the popping was. We laughed as that Harley obviously didn't have enough power to get past the loaded pickup until we stopped accelerating! But that was not anything like the one model year of mid-80s 305 4bbl V-8 (with a 2.56 rear axle ratio!--"Five full litres of throbbing power", I termed it) that I couldn't accelerate around a 5-cylinder Mercedes diesel driven normally by a 30-something lady!

I know that many people have differing opinions on the Olds 5.7L diesels, but mine is generally good. Problem areas were the injection pumps, the need for water filter/separators, and the obvious need to use diesel-rated oil in them (along with regular oil changes, due to soot and diesel fuel dilution of the motor oil). One universally "bad" thing was that they weighed about the same as a Chevy 454 V-8, which made the trucks more nose-heavy then they already were. But the 6.2L diesel which followed added another 100 pounds on top of that!

As for GM changing their "corporate" engine color to black, that change also coincided with a marked decrease in oil leak complaints (and V-8 valve cover gasket sales!) in our dealership shop! GM's performance parts book had been advocating "black" as the best engine color for many years before that.

Ahhhh, the thoughts of "back then"!
NTX5467

[Twilight Fenrir]

Wow.... that's more informatino than I ever managed to turn up when I did my research intot he engines... thanks NTX5467

But, then, all my research turned up was, "Replace them" :P But I knew the Elky's had much better versions.


If you do wind up replacing that engine, I'd like to buy it from ya to drop ii my '82 Elk :PP

[rocketraider]

Ya gotta remember Willis was there. His insight on things as a dealership employee is invaluable.

[pontiacguy]

The original color was a silver-blue color. I don't know if it available in the aftermarket.

Yup it is GM group 1 part # 12346301 Goodwrench engine enamel " BLUE GRAY " Used on Diesel engine.... I have about 30 cans of this ORIGINAL GM cans from a dealership buy-out... Can post pics and yes they are for sale...will be putting some on eBay shortly

[pontiacguy]

Yeah I know its a dead thread but you found this...

[NTX5467]

That part number sounds like a later part number than the original, which I believe was a 6-digit part number in the "Oldsmobile" part number sequence. BUT, unlike aftermarket engine paint, if it's got the GM labeling, it should be accurate for a NEW motor (rather than one with some time and age on it).

Enjoy!
NTX5467

[pontiacguy]

Sorry for the confusion... it's not oldsmobile paint.... it's GM paint specially made for diesel engines... the color is almost gray/silver with a touch of blue tint sorta.... If it were olds paint it woulda had the olds 6 digit numbers or the superseded gm #s. But this actually diesel blue /gray straight from the general. Gm parts dept will confirm if you call em up with this #..

Thanks a million
Pontiacguy