I sure could use some advice on this one as I priced the cost of the Banks Sidewinder Turbo system and for a tenth of the price I can buy a complete 6.5L used turbo system. Now my question is will the 6.5L turbo system work on the 6.2L and will it provide about the same power increase as the Banks System? Any suggestions from all you old time diesel experts?




1983 Chevy K20 4X4 pikcup, turbo 400 trans, and soon to be 6.2L diesel.

Definitely go with the used 6.5 turbo setup, it will bolt right up.

The power will be nearly identical to the Banks setup.

Use some of the money you saved on the 6.5 setup so you get it done right.

I recommend having the injection pump rebuilt and recalibrated rather than just cranking the leaf spring screw up. Exhanging it for a 4911/4970 would be the 'best' way to do it, but largely the most expensive. If you're due for injectors, get a set of the 'turbo' models set to higher opening pressures.

Check the Turbo real good, but if your not real familiar with them, have some one who is check it out before you install it.

If you have a mechanical supply pump, you'll have to toss it to make room for the turbo oil drain and install an electric supply pump.

Ok, all sounds good now would I get more HP and torque if I upgraded the heads to the 6.5L version?

Better off with the 6.2 heads from a pure performace perspective, becuase they have slightly larger exhaust valves. Longevity wise, some will argue that the 6.5 heads will last longer, but lets be honest, they all crack. If you want to do it right, pull the heads and have brass sleeves installed in the water jackets so if they do crack, you won't dump coolant on the pistons.

There is one hitch with using a factory 6.5 setup on an 80's vintage truck. If you have A/C the turbo manifold won't work. I ran the 6.5 factory setup on an 83 truck w/o a/c and it worked great. When I built my suburban, I wanted a/c and I had to change to a banks manifold and crossover pipe. I was not using the factory gm turbo however, it was a Rajay and was capable of a lot of boost.

If you want your engine to live, limit your boost to 10 psi and don't advance your timing too much. 6.2's weak link is the piston, they crack much easier than a 6.5 piston since the crown is much thinner. Also, limit egt's to around 1100 pre turbo.:grd:

trick to using the 6.5 parts with ac is to use the housing off of a s10 truck. I have gotten to drive mine some but still working on making the ac work. Have to splice the s10 evap cover and stock blower housing together. Once in there if you don't know these trucks you won't notice it.

Since I haver the AC on my 83 chevy and I llive in Georgia, I need to keep my AC working with this humidity we have down here. So I guess I need to order the Banks manifold and downpipe and then reuse all the other items from the 6.5L turbo system and I should be set.