My bro-in-law has spent his engine in his triton, whcih is a 16v SOHC 4g64 and the prices on 2nd hand engines are huge compared to the cost of the car itself so im asking whether a 2.6L 4g54 bottom end can be easily swapped in? i mean if its not a direct swap ill drop the idea rigt now.

I guess before we go this far we will make sure we know why his original engine failed, which im thinking was headgasket BUT we have now found the oil is fine, a little low after a massive overheat, and the coolant is bone dry. Prior to this the car ran great, used nowater or oil. Im assuming blocked radiator or thermostat causing massive overtemp situation and the oil has then started to burn off. The engine still cranks but wont fire since the sparkplug leads have melted off the plugs in the sparkplug tubes. Massive PITA to get out.

I know nothing about 4G64 but will try to add some insight with knowledge of the 4G54.

You're going to run into issues straight away with the orientation of the engine. To my knowledge 4G54 was only fuel injected in FWD cars. When putting fuel injection on a Sigma/Scorpion there are clearance issues with the throttle body against the
firewall. This can be resolved by cutting the plenum and swapping the ends of it so that the throttle body is at the front of the engine when the engine is rotated instead of up against the firewall. The plenum is aluminium so you'll have to take it to someone who can do aluminium welding.

The engines are a generation apart, so I'm unsure of whether or not they'd mate up to the same trans.

4G54 came in wide block and narrow block. Narrow was mostly used for auto Sigmas while manuals had the wide block. Scorpions mostly had the wide block, and I think most Magnas had the narrow block but don't quote me on that. Wide block and narrow block mate up to different trans. bolt patterns.

hey thanks for that insight. i would hazard a guess based on other engines and say the difference in rwd and fwd format is the manifolds and mounts, with the actual blocks being the same. Im only hoping for his sake as its a cheap fix. If nothing is to be done i pass on the message to suck it up and get a genuine replacement.

umm also had the efi 2.6 starion rwd, (single point )
and no you cant put a 54 bottom end in they are two different motors ,
look into the l300 late model same engine

The aus spec starion only came with the sohc 4g63 (2.0l) not the 2.6. It was the jap/usa starions/conquests that came with the 2.6 which would obviously be hard to find in aus.