Rebuilding Without The Machine Work????

[Moparmonster]

Moparzrule: you need to look into other local shops. The guys you're dealing with are morons. The machine shop I used to do the very same work on my '84 360, including the heads, took a week and cost me $1250 with a complete kit (pistons included). They also balanced the reciprocating mass. The average charge for overboring is usually about $10 per cylinder. I'd recently been wondering if my 2.2 could be rebuilt at home, but I know that I have to take the engine to the shop for hot tanking and cylinder honing at bare minimum. I can do everything else myself, but I always have the internals balanced of every engine I build. I did, however, already have the crank turned, but that only cost me $80 through a local crank shop.

[glht_omni]

we have a shop here that is really reputable and reasonable
he told me 35 for hot tanking, 40 for magnafluxing, 75 for crank turning, 80 for bore and hone- no extra charge if i rent a torque plate, he doesnt have one. 150 for a head job and another 125 for port and polishing with a 5 angle valve job, 20 for decking

just some good prices to compare with

[RSTURBO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by moparzrule I jokingly said the truck rusted away already, he wasn't amused

LOL.....so true...

[moparzrule]

^I finally got my 360 back from them that 3rd week after they called and said a week, the bill was pretty high but they did good work.

[GLHandGTS]

The bill on labor/machine work alone on my new shortblock is over $700.

Bore/hone, hot tank, resize rods on both ends for new pins/bearings, polish crank, new bearings all around, new freeze plugs, int. shaft nushings, "0 decking" meaning assemble short block rotating assembly and measure piston-deck clearance to assure same compression in each cylinder, file fit rings to pistons... probably some other stuff I'm missing too.

I don't plan on having to do another shortblock, so I don't mind spending the money. TD's get to be expensive when you get to a certain point of speed, don't let anyone else tell you differently.

Aaron M
'86 SC
13.4 @ 114, 2.5 60'

[15w/ashelby]

When I rebuilt my engine this past winter I did it all in the garage. New Pistons, Rings, used rods, bearings, everything. The only things I had done was getting the head checked for straightness and cracks. Engine has no internal noise and has 155PSI on every cylinder. My engine had 170,000 when i did all this and it was starting to lose compression on each cylinder slowly.

[GLHandGTS]

Oh man you still exist! Is Crestline anywhere near Lima? I go to school down there now.

Sorry about the off topic.

[omnivore]

Depends what you expect from your motor really, as far as I am concerned. If you are gona freak out if it breaks, then have a shop do it all right. If not, and you wanna save some coin at the expense of a possible failure, then try it without the machinework.
I took my high mileage (250,000+ km) T2 motor.... and inspected the bores-there was crosshatching still visible, no ridges at the tops of the bores or imperfections that I could see or feel. I dropped in new pistons, rings, oil pump, and rod bearings, and intermediate shaft. Ball honed the cyl bores for a minute or so each with a cordless drill, cleaned and reassembled it all with fresh gaskets. Didn't measure a thing. That was 2 yrs ago, and I still have great oil pressure, no noises, no oil loss or consumption. But of course if it failed now, I wouldn't be one of those people to get all pissed off about it...after all, I did do a half assed job of the rebuild, so I have to accept responsibilty for a failure should it happen.

[supercrackerbox]

^^^^^

I'd say that about sums it up.

[Roofy]

My rule of thumb is, if there is a ridge in the cylinder wall, get the block bored. If the rod bearings look OK and are wearing evenly, and the main bearings look as if they are wearing evenly also, just get the crank polished and use standard bearings, but make sure that you use plastigage to measure the clearance. If the cylinder bores look ok, and have no ridge(or just a carbon ridge) you can usually hone them and put new rings on the pistons. As long as the milled oil grooves on the pistons are still visible, you can generally reuse them.


DO NOT reuse rings, bearings, gaskets, head bolts, ect!!! As cheap as these are, it would be completely asinine to reuse old parts and hope the engine holds up well: especially with boosted engines.

You can probably get away with reusing the old oil pump, they very rarely fail, but with 200,000 miles on the engine, I'd go ahead and replace it.

You can reuse the cam if it's not scored and worn. The cylinder head cam caps and saddles can be "polished up" using VERY fine grit sandpaper (1000 grit) if slight scoring is visible. My rule is, if there are any grooves deeper than the grooves on the side of a quarter, get the head overbored and put in bearing inserts or an oversize cam. I recommend replacing lifters, but followers are usually still good.

I get the head machined on every engine I rebuild. Even if just replacing a headgasket, I recommend getting the head planed flat and a valve-job.

New timing belt, spark plugs, filters, fluids, ect are used.

[Putter]

If it aint broke, don't fix it.

[Dan Culkin]

If the bottom end is quiet, compression is good, oil consumption is reasonable ... Why the heck are you going to rebuild it?

If it's boosting to 12psi, but doesn't have much power, do yourself a favor figure out why. Timing belt could be off, clogged cat, etc.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Viper9087 I was told by a fellow TD fanatic & some other people that you could take a smooth running engine with high mileage & change the bearings & rings without having it taken to a machine shop for work... How wise is this & will it work??? I recently purchased another 89 Shelby with 175/200mi on original block never rebuilt but the car has no power or "boost" although it boosts 12 1/2 lbs. Anyway I'd like to fix this as any TDer would But before I do I want to strengthen the block to avoid a breakdown. Now the engine is quiet as a kitten no noises, knocks, pings, smoke or anything but has almost 200K!! . I was told to pull it apart clean the surfaces with an emery cloth & install new STD size bearings, & give I a quick hone job & install new STD size rings. Can this be done on a perfectly running engine without going to the machine shop & getting a REAL rebuild? & how much life could I expect out of it? I'm on a budget if u know what I mean. & I'm only looking for 2 or 3 years of life out of this engine that will be beaten & raced I'm not looking to hack it together, I want a decent job but I want an honest opinion of whether or not this could be a waste of time. Thanks!