But we're talking about an engine and tranmission; which when seperated can be stacked on top of each other and the footprint will be smaller than a standard sized pallet.

You are right about shipping something as sizeable as a subframe though. When you get higher in the rate classes, the charges go up exponentially.

I had an engine shipped in 1996 from a company that was about 420 miles away from me. The engine was just installed on skid, but not crated. He used shrink wrap around the engine. The company is still in business now, but charges a fee for crate and handling. I paid $300 for shipping then, and diesel was only $1.18 a gallon. http://www.cga.ct.gov/2006/rpt/2006-r-0556.htm. Just hard to believe that you had a pallet shipped for $200 cross country at today's diesel prices?

I also have a Bowler 4L80-E transmission, which was shipped to me. I have to look up the cost for shipping, but the transmission was on a pallet. Bowler puts a box around the pallet, so you can't stack another transmission on top.

Jeff

I have shipped a load of items via forwardair go to forwardair.com really hard to beat. You cna also check with uship.com and let shippers\carriers vid for you. You can strap an engine and paletize and should not be too much.

Ok, so it's really $220; thats a 500lb pallet from CA to SC.

As to the OP, I second the suggestions of checking out www.car-parts.com and LKQ Recycler.

Thanks again for all the advice. We picked up a donor car for the stuff. It really seemed like the best way to get everything he needs for the swap. It's a 98 Z28 in perfect working order with a little over 115,000 on the clock.

Very cool! Parts the car up, and depending how much you picked it up for you may have a free powertrain. Keep in mind the 97 (on vettes) and 98 is an interesting year, so harness and comps are very different from the other years.

How much did you guys pick her up for?

Gave the guy 6 for it. I was planning on keeping the computer and harness as intact as possible and bringing it all into the Nova. What makes it different? Anything I need to worry about for the swap?

Pretty good deal. I would check on it for more details, but I know the 98 uses a 1 year only harness and comp, so as long as you will modify or the person modifying is doing it correctly shoudl be a non issue.

Option 2, my buddy Mac did a full on swap of the harness and comp as is on his Bird, all sensors etc active, including ABS (his future project), VATS, car alarm and door opener, etc. $4-500 savings vs modifying your comp\harness ;)

have fun with the part out and let the madness begin :)

I was thinking about going the option 2 route. The VATS is the simpler kind, I can bypass that pretty easily. I'm going to have my brother carefully remove everything, label, and take plenty of pictures. The more he can re-use, the better off I think he'll be. We'll see when it gets time to do it.

sounds good, you can probably utilize other items too, big brakes, booster\etc, radiator and fans, on and on. I wish I had kept the steering ram :)