I've been thinking about this lately given how similar these engines are from what I have gathered so far and I wanted to see what people may know on here.
GM tends to run similar designs in terms of engines I've noticed, take the 3100 and 3400 series V6. The 3100 makes 160hp and 180tq and the 3400 makes 180hp and 200tq. Now these basically are the same engine minus the displacement and a few key points. Those key points are the better flowing heads, intake manifolds and a slightly larger throttle body. GM in 2000 decided/discovered that if you put those better parts on a 3100 you can bump the power to 175hp and 195tq. So you can basically do a top swap to add 15hp and 15tq.
So my question is why is there roughly a 28hp and 18tq gap between two very similar engines as far as I have read? Or is there something different mechanically I have missed? Or is it tuning. Any thoughts?