Low Mileage Engines

Toyota owners have lots of worrisome recall news lately–but you positively envy most of them. Your Toyota Celica GT engine is shot, and you know what that means: a big, big repair bill. Toyota’s reputation will come back. But your Celica needs some work, and that’s going to cost a lot.

Not so fast. You can save considerable money by buying a low-mileage used engine from Low Mileage Engines, and get the performance you would expect from a re-built engine, or an engine from Toyota after a few months to a couple of years of use.

How do you know? When you buy from Low Mileage Engines, you get a CARFAX vehicle history report to verify the miles of wear, and a one-year standard-parts warranty. Like any company that provides quality, we don’t like lemons, and we don’t like the companies that fool customers into buying them. That’s why we’re proud to participate in the Better Business Bureau reliability program, and why we’re proud to have the best record in the business.

Request an engine quote today on a low-mileage Toyota Celica engine. We’ll get to work finding you the best deal possible on a reliable product. We have ready-to-go products that have been tested, pre-cleaned, and certified ready to sell. We’ll show you the CARFAX vehicle report, and we’ll stand behind your almost-new engine with our one-year warranty.

We don’t want to repair the engines we sell, so we test them first. But if you have any trouble under the one-year warranty, we go out of our way to make the repair as simple and straightforward as possible.

So do the math. Toyotas still enjoy top-of-the-line resale value, but not Toyotas that don’t run.

So you can buy a new engine direct from the dealer, at a cost that rivals some new cars. You can scour the junkyards yourself, cross your fingers, and buy an engine with little to go by but the word of the yard owner, only to go through it all again in six months. You could get a towing company to take your Celica away for parts. If you’re lucky, you won’t have to pay them to take it off your hands–and sacrifice thousands of dollars over the cost of the engine in lost resale value.

Or, you can come to Low Mileage Engines, where replacing engines is what we do. We do everything we can to take the risk out of buying a used engine, from the Vehicle History report, to custom quotes, to machine-testing every Japanese market engine we sell, to our industry-leading warranty. We don’t just want to sell you an engine; we want to sell you a good engine.

With an almost-new engine from Low Mileage Engines, you know what you’re getting: a high-quality used engine with a known track record and a warranty. We believe our engines will run trouble-free for years past their warranty, and our BBB record attests that in most cases they do just that.

So whether you’re a home mechanic, a repair shop, or a dealership, if you need a Toyota Celica engine, call Wade today at 901-384-5624 (direct) for a fast, free, no-obligation quote on the Celica engine you need.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Mechanics nationwide have long known about Low Mileage Engines as a great company to buy used engines from for the vehicles they commonly work on – GM, Ford, Chrysler, Toyota, Nissan, etc. What you may not know is that we’re also a fantastic company to buy less common engines from. Some of our happiest customers are those that have saved money buying Volvo engines from us.

Finding a Volvo engine can be more frustrating than finding a common engine. There simply aren’t as many Volvos on the road as other vehicles, and Volvos tend to hold their value well so insurance companies are less likely to total them when in wrecks. Further, there are quite a few engines available for most Volvo models. For example, if you have a 2004 Volvo 40 series, there is one 1.9L engine, two 2.4L engines, and a 2.5L engine available.

How to Identify your Volvo Engine

Below, I’ve included some pictures of a common Volvo engine – a B5254T (if you’re interested in this engine, call Wade at 901-384-5624) with 14,000 miles.

If you were to call me and you were looking for this engine, we would have to wade through the myriad of options available. Fortunately, Volvo utilizes the sixth and seventh digit of all VINs to identify the engine.  For example, the engine below has “59″ as the sixth and seventh digits of the VIN. You’ll also note that the timing cover has a sticker on it. Besides the bar code, which is used during manufacturing to track parts, the sticker has a serial number (directly linkable to the VIN), part number, and, at the bottom, an engine model number.

2.5L Volvo B5254T engine, VIN 59 Side View

2.5L Volvo Engine B5254T

Note the Sticker on Timing cover with identifying information.2.5L

Popularity: 50% [?]

GMC Canyons [04-06 3.5L (VIN 6, 8th digit)], Chevy Colorados [04-06 3.5L (VIN 6, 8th digit)], Isuzu 350s [06 (3.5L, VIN 6, 5-214)] and Hummer H3’s
HUMMER H3 [06 (3.5L ,VIN 6, 8th digit)] all have a head issue that was fixed in production about midway through the ‘06 production.

Low Mileage Engines has the production date this change was made on file, and always verifies any engines we sell for these applications were manufactured after the production issues were resolved.

If your engine has failed, chances are it was due to this production issue. Of course, verify this with your mechanic, since knowing the cause of a failure can prevent it from happening again!

If you need an engine for any of these vehicles (or any other late model vehicle), please call us at (800) 709-9233. We’ll help get you back on the road at a great price!

Popularity: 52% [?]

The first man I knew who had GMC truck with a 5.3L Vortec engine was a farmer in the Red River Valley of Minnesota. He loved it, and over the years modified it heavily. It got to be well known around the Breckenridge, MN and Wahpeton, ND area. After all, a farmer’s truck is more than just a work vehicle. It’s a statement!

I haven’t lived up north for quite some time, but not a day goes by that I drive without seeing a GMC Sierra or a Chevy Silverado with a 5.3L Vortec engine in it. The 5.3L has had strong results and thus GMC has used it in a lot more than just pickups. In 2008, for example, the 5.3L engine was used in the GMC Envoy, Buick Rainier, Chevy Avalanche, Chevy Tahoe, Saab 9-7X, Sierra, Silverado, Suburban, and Trailblazer.

In other words, the 5.3L is one of the most common engines on the road in America.

There have been no major recalls on the engine that we are aware of. Further, problems unique to the engine are rare. Sure, it has “problems” that other engines have that could be classified as maintenance issues.

I like to browse car forums to see what problems folks are having, and it seems like a lot of folks don’t keep their throttle bodies clean. I suggest you clean your throttle body at about 60,000 miles with approved cleaner to prevent throttle body sticking. This to rough idling and stalling out. This is an issue on almost any vehicle today though.

A recurring problem with many GM engines is the plastic intake manifolds. Plastic intake manifolds cause a problem because they don’t dissipate heat as well. This leads to a sort of drying effect on the intake manifold gasket, which can lead to the gasket not doing its job. Oil and water mix when this gasket fails, reducing effectiveness of the cooling and lubrication of the engine. Anytime I replace a GM engine, I always use an aftermarket gasket of higher quality than the OEM part.

So what do you do if your Vortec engine has failed?

Several weeks ago, an elderly gentleman from Louisiana called us asking for a price on a 5.3L engine for his 2005 Silverado. His local dealership charged him $2800 to pull his engine apart to diagnose the specific problem with his engine. This was bad business by the dealership, and cost them a customer for life (and his kids, grandchildren, and extended family, who had all bought from the dealership in the past). You see, they didn’t need to take that engine apart. They knew it was bad from the get go. Don’t let any shop rack up billable hours on you. If an engine is bad, competent shops can diagnose it in under 4 hours. Tops. There can be extenuating circumstances if an engine is having electronic problems (which aren’t really an engine problem per se), but a shop would have to be pretty convincing.

This dealership then proceeded to tell the man they would fix his engine for $7,200 – leaving his total bill right at around $10,000 + tax.

When I quote this man $1,400 on an almost new engine (we had a real deal at the time!) with under 4,000 miles, he sounded like he was ready to cry. You see, he knew that he could have just replaced the entire engine for less than he was charged for diagnosis.

So if your Vortec engine is having issues and you’re not a mechanic, go through this procedure:

1. Find an HONEST mechanic who is accredited by the BBB, who has a fair hourly shop rate, and who has been in business for some time.
2. Determine if your problem is the engine itself, peripheral to the engine, or an electronics problem.
3. If you need an engine (and I hope you don’t), please call us at (800) 709-9233.

We can help you save money, time, and heartache.

Popularity: 92% [?]

Sellers of used engines normally don’t start to sell engines for cars until they’re past their manufacturer’s warranty. With that said, intelligent decisions have to be made well ahead of time to secure the availability of low mileage engines for that day when demand does arrive. Most engines with less than 10,000 miles are made available by wrecks that happen within the first two years of the vehicle’s life.

Early adopters of vehicles in which the same engine is repeatedly used can benefit from long production runs on their engines. For example, if you need a 2002 2.4L Toyota Camry Engine, you can get that engine from certain 2009 vehicles made by Toyota.

If you need a 2.5L engine for your 2002 Nissan Altima engine, you can get it from certain 2006 Nissan’s.

Honda Accords? These don’t have production runs that are so long. Accord drivers, the great news is that engine replacements are almost never in the works for you. Accords seem to go forever. I’ve never owned an Accord, but it is a leading contender for my next vehicle. Accords just don’t seem to die.

These vehicles are incredibly important in the recycling world because there are an incredible number of them on the road. Recycling allows useable, undamaged parts from wrecked Accords, Camrys, and Altimas to keep drivers unwrecked vehicles on the road for a long time.

Low Mileage Engines specializes in engines. While we do sell remanufactured engines, we prefer to sell used engines for two reasons (sadly, a used engine isn’t always your best option):

1. We believe in the recycling industry and its benefit to the United States and Canada.

2. We can save you money when you purchase a used engine from us.

If you drive an Accord, Camry, or Altima, and need a replacement engine, please call us at (800) 709-9233. We would love to help get you back on the road and keep you there!

Popularity: 51% [?]

One thing I love about selling engines to customers all over the United States is that you break past the regional stranglehold that some brands have and end up dealing with just about everything. Sure, we sell a lot of GM, Toyota, Ford, Nissan, and Honda Engines, but we also sell a lot of engines for less dominant brands.

For example, we sell Subaru engines all over the country, especially to customers in New England and California. We’ve also been selling a lot of Mini Cooper engines, which are what I want to talk to you about.

Dave Ramsey talks a lot about the Mini Cooper because it has one of the highest rates of value retention. He says that after five years, it is the only vehicle to retain 50% of its sticker price for resale value in private party (individual to individual sale). That means that if you paid $30,000 for a Mini Cooper new (ha!) in 2004, right now you could expect to get approximately $15,000 if you tried to sell it.

There is a deeper meaning to this statistic though. In today’s economic climate where we just don’t have the throwaway money we used to, it means that replacing the engine in a Mini Cooper makes more sense than ever.

Let’s consider a few of the reasons for this.

1. Replacing an engine costs a lot less than buying a new vehicle.
2. If you don’t replace your engine, you lose out on resale value.
3. Buying a low mileage engine with CARFAX mileage verification ensures that you’ll get a lot of life from your purchase.
4. Purchasing a used engine is not only less costly than a remanufactured engine or new vehicle, but saves environmental resources.

Let’s look at these points in a little more detail.

Point one said “replacing an engines costs a lot less than buying a new vehicle.” Let’s say you had a 2004 John Cooper Works Mini Cooper. You need a 1.6L supercharged engine for it. To get a reman, you’re going to spend around $5,000 for the engine and an additional $4,300 for the JCW tuning kit. That puts you right around $9300. You can purchase a low mileage used Mini Cooper engine that is going to be easier to install for $4500 to $5500, fully dressed. On the other Cooper engines for that year, savings are even greater.

Point two talked about resale value. If you have an engine that doesn’t work in your vehicle, you lose a huge amount of resale value. Forget talking about percentages of retail value – we go into wholesale territory here. A vehicle with a bad engine is worth 20% of wholesale cost. That “$15,000″ car will sell for $8,000 at auction. 20% of $8,000 $1600. $15,000 – $1,600 is $13,400. Let’s say you had spent $8,000 to replace the engine. $13,400 – $8,000 is $5,400. Don’t put an engine in, and you lose over $13,400. Put an engine in, and you not only have another vehicle, but you end up saving five figures.

Our third point was about longevity. I will be the first to agree that if you don’t get any life out of engine replacement, it is a foolish waste of money. The fact of the matter is you do! Our standard warranty one used engines is 1 year. We honor our warranty claims, and we couldn’t do that if we had a high rate of failure. The secret to getting lots of life out of a used engine is to make sure it is barely used. If you buy a 150,000 mile engine, you won’t have good results. If you buy a 40,000 mile engine, you’ll have great results.

Don’t ever take any one’s word on mileage. There are a lot of companies out there selling cheap engines who lie on mileage. These companies will lie about the number of miles on a high dollar engine like a Mini Cooper engine in a heartbeat, and they don’t provide a free CARFAX because it would prove they’re lying on miles. Sadly, there are a lot of people out there buying these garbage engines without any verification of miles who would never buy said engine if they had demanded a CARFAX. A lot of them call me 30 days after they get their cheap engine installed. We sell high quality engines a low prices. Since we don’t lie on mileage and always provide a free CARFAX, we won’t always have the cheapest price, but ninety-nine times out of a hundred, we will have the best value.

The last point we have is about the use of resources. Good used engines come from vehicles that have been in a collision or are from a theft vehicle. The insurance companies sell vehicles they’ve determined are “totaled” at insurance salvage auction to try to recoup some of their payout money. Some of the highest quality parts come from wrecked vehicles with low miles because they are all OEM (original equipment manufacturer) parts with low wear. The engine from a low mileage vehicle requires no remanufacturing or reconditioning as long as no damage has occurred to it. Replace the normal maintenance parts on it, and you have an engine that is “ready to drop in.” There is no expensive factory to power, no parts to manufacture, and because of this you not only save money, but resources.

We’ve talked about many of the reasons replacing the engine in your Mini Cooper makes sense. If you find yourself needing an engine, please give us a call. You can reach us directly at (888) 810-0017 or can fill out a request for a free quote online. You might not know a lot about engine replacement, so we’re here to help walk you through the process, answer your questions, and save you money.

Popularity: 59% [?]

In the US, the first fuel crisis prompted the creation of the CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) standards. These standards have changed over the years in the US, getting tighter and tighter – the government is demanding more fuel economy, and recently made huge leaps in demands. The basics of fuel economy boil down to engine displacement, vehicle weight, and engine efficiency. With our current levels of technology and all other things equal, lighter (smaller) cars will always get better fuel efficiency than heavier cars.

Enter China. They have 4x as many people as the US, and next year they are projected to surpass us in the size of their auto market. And they seem very concerned about emissions and fuel economy. The Wall Street Journal reports that China is putting a large tax on vehicles with engine displacement greater than 3.0L. The article further goes on to say that Toyota is moving fast to provide smaller engines – fast.

What kind of vehicles does this affect? If this were the US, the six cylinder Camry would be taxed – it has a displacement of 3.5L (the six cylinder Toyota Camry engine from 1992-2006 was a 3.0L engine). The new Ford Taurus engine that has been receiving so much attention because of its efficient 3.5L EcoBoost engine? Yup! Taxed. Heavily.

Japan has had multiple tax tiers for vehicles based on their engine displacement since before I was born. Europe has focused on smaller engines with turbo chargers for different reasons.

This leaves the US and Canada as the only nations in which big displacement vehicles for daily drivers are the norm. As the biggest market in the world for vehicles, this didn’t matter in the past. With China surpassing the North American market and with the US government pushing for higher efficiency standards, I wonder how long we have left to enjoy (or tolerate, depending on your disposition) large vehicles with large engines in the US. Certainly there has been and will continue to be a respite in our desire for large displacement engines. Most likely, only an alternate fuel source can revive the American love relationship with big engines.

If you need an engine, please call us at (800) 709-9233. We carry a full lineup of used and remanufactured engines, and take the obligation we have to provide great customer service to all who contact us seriously.

Popularity: 56% [?]

Susan from Bridgeport, CT asked us just before Thanksgiving if driving with low tire pressure could harm her vehicle.

Susan, most people drive around with under inflated tires. We’re reminded of this by environmentalists and conservationists concerned about the hit this causes to gas mileage. Barack Obama even mentioned properly inflated tires as a method to reduce our dependence on foreign oil during his first presidential campaign. That got mixed reviews.

To answer your question is technically “Yes.” Driving with proper tire pressure can give you longer engine life. We’ll look at it logically. The “easier” you are on a car, the longer it lasts. If your tires are under inflated, we know you burn more fuel. The reason is that your engine has to work harder to move your car. Working harder strains the engine.

For this to make any practical difference in engine life though, you would essentially have to drive on flats for extended periods of time. We urge you to not let this happen, and recommend you always fill your tires to the levels specified by your vehicle manufacturer to get better gas mileage… and nothing else.

Thanks for the question, Susan.

If you have a question you would like one of our writers to answer, send an email to blog@123lme.com.

If you need an engine we sell used engines and remanufactured engines. For a fast free quote, please call us at 800-709-9233.

Popularity: 55% [?]

This question was asked on Twitter. The answer isn’t cut and dried.

First of all, you need to make sure your engine is bad. If the driver kept going after the pump went bad and the thermostat indicated overheating, then the engine will require replacement.

If the vehicle was stopped immediately, you could try replacing the water pump.

If you determine you need an engine, I would recommend contacting our company, Low Mileage Engines. We sell used engines with an excellent warranty and can deliver to the mechanic of your choice. We also offer excellent remanufactured Jeep engines with great pricing.

Popularity: 57% [?]

We’re very thankful for what has been a strong year for our company. Low Mileage Engines has been able to serve more customers this year than any year before, and in this economy, that makes us very thankful!

Here are a few tips that will help you make sure your car doesn’t go down before you head out of town! These things should be done well before you get on the road!

1. Check your oil level. You don’t want to overfill your oil, just have it slightly below the “full” indicator on the dipstick. If you need an oil change as determined by your owners manual, get one today!
2. Check the coolant level in your vehicle. Make sure the vehicle has been off overnight before doing this! For most vehicles, this means you should just check your coolant reservoir. If your vehicle is low on coolant, you need to add more, and figure out what is causing it to be low! Remember, your radiator is what keeps your engine from getting hot and “blowing up.” It must work properly. Period.
3. Check your tire pressure and tire wear. The owners manual of your vehicle recommends tire pressure that will give you the most comfortable ride. If you want better gas mileage, add 5psi above what is in the manual.
4. Check your brake fluid (this should be flushed every two years).
5. Check your air filter. This should be replaced one a year or every 12,000 miles. More engines wear out due to dirty air filters than dirty oil filters, and a dirty air filter can destroy your gas mileage. Since gas isn’t cheap, we think $10.00 for a good filter makes sense.
6. Check your transmission fluid. For most vehicles, you should run the car for five minutes before checking transmission fluid, so do this last.

We hope this list helps. Sadly, we know that our phones will be busy on Monday morning, because vehicles are machines made by people and they break down. If you need an engine, we’re very sorry for that – but we’d like to help. Give us a call at( 800) 709-9233, and we’ll be glad to help.

Popularity: 57% [?]