My dad broke the engine in his '87 Bonnie recently. Apparently the timing chain went while he was accelerating, and quite a bit of the engine took some damage. He'* trying to decide on the following:

(1) rebuild existing engine (reasonable $ estimate = ?)
(2) swap in a newer (used) engine (reasonable $ estimate = ?)
(3) skip it and part out the entire car. (est $ potential = ?)

Body and everything else is nearly mint. Almost 200k miles on the engine before it went kaput. I believe this engine is unique to '87 only.

Thanks in advance for any thoughts.....I'd really appreciate some good input here so I can pass it along.

Had something similar a few years ago, spun & dropped center cam bearings. Decided not to chance spinning again and having no source for oversize cam bearings, bought a long block (supposed to be complete engine but yard broke almost all sensors they didn't remove first and bent an exhaust module - was drop shipped to me - even so price was right).

Installed five years ago and fine since. Did major tune up (including new freeze plugs & water pump) while out. Would check timing chain also.

If doing for an 87, I'd want to go to the 90 or 91 version of the "C" engine with approriate ECM (has balance shaft & a few other improvements). Anyone know if a drop-in ?