One of the major problems with I6 faclon engines is the fact that they have head gasket problems.

Have you ever noticed that it's always the cylinders towards the back of the engine (normally 5 or 6) that blow. It's caused by the fact that it doesn't get the same amount of cool air compared to the front cylinders does.

Also because their the furthest away from the water pump. so it doesn't get as much circulated "cooler water" than the other cylinders do.

Where the V6 engines do. That's why you see alot less V6 engines blowing. Thatnk god cos changeing 2 head gaskets is a b**ch. Especially on Holden V6 engines. I've done acouple and I'll tell you, i'd rather do a falcon I6 than a Holden V6 any day.

Also, have you ever had the do extrators on a Holden V6 engine. The passenger side is easy. Drivers side hard. I had to do a set of extractors on a VK commodore with a V6 ecotec engine with a variable rack in it. Nightmare. Had to modify the extractors plenty. had the right stork out about a dozen times to do the job. Never again.

I6 engine. Piece of piss.

Your all on about Holden V6 verses Ford I6. What about the Mitsubishi V6??? They use a 60 degree V and no balance shafts. They are silk smooth and redline at 6000rpm. Then there's the old Audi I5, 2.2lt EFI, redlines at 7000rpm (non sporty model). But the similar engine used in the Group B rally cars of the 80's and was pushing out 600+ HP, with a single turbo.
Anyway, the Holden pushrod V6 is a crap design, fullstop. The have a balance shaft and are still on the rough side.

the HG probs are also because the block is case iron and the head is alloy. after enough repetted cold start stuff, the metals expand and contract at different rates and wear through the gasket. not to mention the thermo temp ford chose

How many Nissan L or RB (excluding VL due to low radiator design causing trapped pockets of air) or Toyota 1J or 2J or Holden black/blue/red or BMW or any other straight 6's rarely crack the heads or do the HG's? Other sixes always crack heads or gaskets, eg Ford 6, Toyota 7M, Nissan RB30E in VL's etc. It's engine design and specific design issues or flaws that cause failures, not engine layout.

Air circulating around the motor has 2/10ths of nothing to do with cooling the block and head, not since VW and Porsche dropped air cooled motors. You're spot on about the water though.

Engine layout also has very little to do with revability, NVH, torque and power. Its engine design, over/undersquare, head layout (pushrod, 2/3/4v, sohc, dohc, chamber design etc), overall design goals etc. Old holden straight 6's s**t themselves when they rev high, Nissan RB20's can rev to almost 8000rpm reliably and most other jap and euro 6's can rev nearly to 7000rpm. Some v6's may s**t themselves when revved like the buick 3.8 in the VN onwards and I can't think of any others. On the other hand, heaps of V6's are sensational at revving, think VG30DET, VQ35DE etc.

It's all to do with the design goals of a motor, pretty much nothing to do with the layout. I'd bet the layout is decided based on cost of engineering and building the car, not much to do with performance.



It may be the car but its certainly nothing to do with the engine layout. Gearing, computer, engine power and torque curves, aerodynamics and heaps of other factors play into this.



I read this somewhere as well, I always thought the straight 6 was the inherent "perfect" motor regarding to balance, got any more detailed info on this?

Why would you be trying to drift on public roads anyway?

You would have to be a pretty big moron to do something like that.

The sound of a v6 commo reving out is sickening haha,
bit better with an exhaust tho

not really looking for critizim with what my friends and i do with our time.. man um.. who sed anything about public roads anyway??

A "v" type arrangement is inherently the mechanically easiest to balance.
3 cylinder 2strokes aka Orbital (Sarich) and 6 cyl 4 stroke combinations (6,12,18,etc) have their power pulses arranged at 120 degrees of crank rotation and this has proven to be beneficial to bottom end torque.
A longer stroke produces more torque at lower revs than a similar capacity shorter stroke engine due to the crank throw being longer and giving more leverage (torque). A 6 inch spanner requires more effort than a 12 inch spanner.
The shorter stroke can run at a higher rev due to piston speed being slower at equivalent revs.
The 250 cc honda i6 developed its max power between 18,000 and 22,000 rpm and had 10 gears. A single cyl dirt bike of 250 cc pulls from low revs and doesn't need the same amount of gears.

The Holden V6 is a 90degree V and needs offset crankpins and a balance shaft to sort out bad vibes. A Mitsubishi V6 has a 60 degree V and no balance shafts and is smooth as. The VW V6 has a 15degree V and only has 1 cyl head.
It all depends on how far they wanna go with the design, el cheapo like the pushrod 3.8 V6 or like the mits and others that have a more refined design.

cjh is right about the mitsu motor, it is a good unit. I should have said that the 90 degree v engine is inherently the easiest to balance. The cleveland can be internally balanced by drilling the crank and adding mallory which makes it smoother than the factory method. The holden v6 is a p76 motor with 2 cyls chopped off (buick 350 series) and is really showing its age, just as the early datsun engines (Morris minor/mg blocks) were until the daddos came out with their own designs. Their Q45 engine (90 deg v8 4.5 ltr) is quite strong. Its the old story. Horsepower/reliability/smoothness costs, how much of each can you afford and what compromises are you prepared to make along the way?

I did 4 drags with my EF (2.5 inch catback) against my mates XV (no rear resi) and out of these four i lost 2, drew 1 and won 1. But we didnt really go over 100kph.

The ECOtec was the same as the bewick motor just with added crap. ECOtec stood for emissions and consumptions technology. It was s**t in the BS when it first come out (VS had alot of bottom end and trans problems).

The problem with the holden v6 is its 50 years old. I think that motor was first used in a bewick in 1957 IIRC. The bewick factory stayed open for 20 years cause those motors were made and shipped to adelaide for production.

Its Buick. and the engine blocks were made by Saginaw, which is owned by GMC.

this is fkn gold info guys =D

Why's that???

coz im learning somthing i dont no and.. i actually have some really decent arguments as to why V6 is s**t compared to the Inline lol i basicly want them coz im sick of his remarks about him saying all my au is good for is a taxi and that my inline 6 is slow compared to his ecotech blah blah blah