Did I waste a lot of money?

[Putter]

Forged pistons need a bigger hole, check what their required piston to bore clearance is, nominal size, and your bore size before dropping them in, otherwise you may have an engine that stops turning when it warms up.

[turbo_lebaron]

I'd have no problem having a machine shop bore it out to .030, it's just the whole process of taking the engine out, and puting everything in right that bothers me. I'm in a fairly fortunate situation right now where money isn't TOO big of a problem... within reason anyway

[UltimateBaron]

Dude,

If you disconnected the throttle body vac hoses, injector electrical hoses, etcc.. and pulled off a head then let me tell you something... the block is MUCH EASIER. It's just an annoyingly heavy blob of steel with a few parts. Nothing electrical, nothing delicate. If you can figure out a way to put it on the back of a pickup truck and vice versa then you're fine. Block boring and reassembly shouldn't cost you much, relative to the $400+ pricetag of the pistons. Here in IN, boring is about $40 and reassembly (with clearance checks) is about $60. If you disassemble the block, just make sure you mark the bearing caps & rods so that you can identify where they came from.

Another 2c (that's 4c already!!)

[ebola]

I never ever leave bores, cam, crankshaft,brake discs or anything cast iron naked in the air. Always use grease on "black" iron - just disasembled it should be covered with grease.You wouldnt believe how agresive thing water is. It is capable to get into iron in molecular levels, and ruines surface with speed wich depends on PH of water.Soft water washes all sulubles in any material. Hard isnt that agressive.Once some time ago I burried couple of hundreds AK machine gun bullets in the soil, and with intension to get them back some day, I put them into melted parafine, hoping it will protect them from oxydising. After seven years all bullets were rust and damaged. Water got them thru few inches of candle parafine!

[turbo_lebaron]

i just went up to autozone, and the guy told me to use green brillo pads or something... he said they are the soft kind, and won't hurt anything. should i do that, or what?

[Moparmonster]

As long as you don't bear down on it hard, it'll be okay. The problem is that you're gonna get debris from doing so, no matter what you do. That crap in the piston rings isn't going to be good. I still say use the Marvel Mystery Oil and let it loosen up on its own.

[turbo_lebaron]

where can i pick up some marvel mystery oil?

[omnivore]

Put it up on jack stands Ed, pull the pan, and mark the rods 1-4 for each cyl. Then pull the rod caps, and remove the rod/piston assemblies carefully. Get some WD40 and a ball hone on a cordless drill and wet ream out the bores till they are clean. Should only take a minute or so each bore. Replace the rings and re-assemble with lots of oil.

[Chris Faulk]

Quote:

Originally Posted by omnivore Put it up on jack stands Ed, pull the pan, and mark the rods 1-4 for each cyl. Then pull the rod caps, and remove the rod/piston assemblies carefully. Get some WD40 and a ball hone on a cordless drill and wet ream out the bores till they are clean. Should only take a minute or so each bore. Replace the rings and re-assemble with lots of oil.

Best summary of advise here. Again...you should take the extra steps NOW to save yourself a huge headache later on.

[Putter]

I wouldn't go as far as to run a hone in there, but a green scotchbrite instead...removing any more material than necessary is bad.

[turbo_lebaron]

well... that sucks :\ but i guess i gotta do what i gotta do. I appreciate all the advise guys.

This is kinda gonna be my first bottom end experience... so any tips? what to lube with what and when? or the easiest way to put the oil pan back on without having the gasket fall off? What all with I have to replace? And last but not least.. how long do you guys think this will take from start to finish?

live and learn... and learn...

Thanks again guys,
ed

[turbo_lebaron]

anyone?

[Moparmonster]

You should be able to find MMO at any auto parts store and maybe hardware stores, too.

[Phreakish]

its REALLY easy to do - if I can do it, so can you.

First, I'd turn the engine over (if you can) after lubing it up with something like PB blaster, or Marvel mystery oil (you can get it at autozone).

Drain your oil, drop the pan, mark each rod cap. Remove each rod cap - put 'em in a plastic bag, maybe a bit of oil.

Tap on the rod bolt lightly with something non metal (screwdriver head, etc) to push the piston up in the bore. Pull the piston out, make sure the rod doesn't score the bore on the way out (just be careful not to ding anything, its not hard).

Clean each bore (using plenty of lube, with oil pan off for now) with the scotchbrite pad, dont use lots of force, as it CAN leave marks in the steel, just go lightly. Also, goto walmart and get some campell heusfeld air tool oil - it dissolves rust before your eyes and leaves iron CLEAN, and I mean cleaner than my machine shop got my block!

If it comes clean, great - get new rings and rod bearings and your engine will love you for it. If there is excessive pitting/damage from the rust (deep rust) then I'd pull the block - temporarily reinstall the pan (with just the rubber end seals, dont seal it back up or anything, and just the bolts on the corner of the pan are enough) and drop the engine. Support the engine on a jack. Unbolt it from the tranny, unbolt the passenger side mount, front engine mount, lower the engine on the jack, and use another to jack the car up. Some muscling might be needed to get the tranny to come loose from the engine.

with the engine out, and your pistons out, there are very few parts in the engine still. Just the block, crank, oil pump/pickup, flywheel, clutch, pressure plate. Thats about it. Put the block into a BIG trashbag (after oiling ANY surfaces that look like they aren't gooey0 and wrap it up tight. Take it to the machinist after your forged pistons arrive

anyone know if it'd be possible to just measure the bores and get pistons custom made to the right size for the correct bore-piston clearance?

[mo' parts]

Quote:

Originally Posted by turbo_lebaron well... that sucks :\ but i guess i gotta do what i gotta do. I appreciate all the advise guys. This is kinda gonna be my first bottom end experience... so any tips? what to lube with what and when? or the easiest way to put the oil pan back on without having the gasket fall off? What all with I have to replace? And last but not least.. how long do you guys think this will take from start to finish? live and learn... and learn... Thanks again guys, ed

if you need a hand or advise, give me a shout.
614-774-0451
dont have alot of free time, but i'll do what i can.