Many many hours are spent by our office staff every week quoting Hemi conversions for prospects. Very rarely do these time extensive quotes eventuate into bookings and subsequent builds.
In the interest of guiding consumers and enthusiasts alike through this process we opted to create a cheat sheet covering off most of the common pricing questions around engine conversions and power plant transfers into various Jeep platforms.
Please note that at the time of documenting this, our team has only successfully carried out one of these conversions. However we are well networked with other experts in these fields that have succeeded in some of the platforms we have yet to try.
The prices below are all in AUD and are all starting points, these are estimates. Prices can fluctuate depending on many factors such as if you already have a hemi ready to go, and if that engine is any good or requires repairs and in the case of the 5.7 or the 6.4 MDS Delete costing needs to be added onto this.
For more info on the Hemi MDS delete see this link
MDS Delete, what is it and why i need it?
This also assuming that this conversion is not a DIY job and that you will be paying a workshop to do the conversion.
The prices below are based of the assumption you already own the vehicle but not the engine and need to buy a brand new engine to do your conversion.
WHAT DOES IT ACTUALLY COST?
Upgrading an existing V8
WK2 5.7 upgrade to a 6.4 Starting $40,000
WK2 5.7 V8 or 6.4 upgrade to a 6.2 supercharged starting at $60,000
Converting a JK Wrangler
Best starting platform is a petrol JK. If you have a diesel additional parts and labour required to swap out the diesel fuel system.
JK Wrangler 5.7 conversion (5.7 are difficult to source currently if you want to do this a Ram 1500 donner is the most likely candidate) starting at $40,000.
JK Wrangler 6.4 conversion starting at $40,000
JK Wrangler 6.2 Conversion starting at $60,000
JK wrangler 8 speed conversion with any of the V8s 10,000- $15,000
Converting a Gladiator
Gladiator 6.2 conversion Starting at $100,000
Gladiator 6.4 conversion (yet to be done to the best of our knowledge but if the 6.2 can be done the 6.4 can be for a fraction less) estimate starting at $80,000
Converting a XJ Cherokee
XJ Cherokee 5.7, 6.4 or 6.2. This would be a fully customised task, to the best of knowledge this is not a common modification like the other chassis platforms. Whilst enthusiasts across the country have successfully done this from time to time this would be a one of a kind build. Depending on the engine and transmission package we estimate this would be starting at $60,000 and going all the way up to $100,000 depending on how far you went.
WK2 Diesel to Hemi Conversion ????
The sort answer to this question is it would be far to cost prohibitive to bother. The Diesel WK2 Jeep Grand Cherokee runs a completely different body harness, engine management system and subsequent control modules. to successfully do this conversion all of the vehicle electrics would need to be converted to a Petrol V8 starting platform as well as the fuel system. Effectively you would need to buy a V8 WK2 then swap it all over estimated hours would exceed 80 hours of work before you even looked at purchasing and dropping the V8 in. If you already had a V8 WK2 starting platform to do this, you would be best off using that as your base platform.
WK2 V6 petrol to V8.
In theory this one is a bit more cost effective as the fuel system does not need changing. However this has yet to be done by anyone we know of and we suspect the wiring harness problem is going to be applicable here too. Having said that the JK conversion kits take the same base platform petrol V6 and make it a V8 so this in theory should be achievable. Estimate starting cost here $60,000.
