At a crossroad
At a crossroad Well guys I was in process of putting together the motor in my sig and things took a turn for the worst. I bought this motor not knowing condition of bottom end or mileage. I wanted to just drop it in but I wanted to make a few more ponies so I upgraded some parts. After installing cam and turning motor over by hand I felt the rotating assembly binding.I thought it could have been cam so I pulled it back out and turned motor over by hand some more and it still was binding. It sounded as if it was coming from the 2nd and 3rd mains and between rods 3, 5,and 2, and 4. So I started pulling rods until it stopped binding and it seemed to smooth out after removing 4. So I proceeded to pull all rods out now because I had no choice. The motorhad been sitting so there is some noticable rust and bottom of cylinder bores. The crank turned over smooth when rods were out. My question is do you guys think I would be okay to just dingle ball hone the cylinders and buy arp rod bolts, get rods resized and intall new bearings and rings and proceed with build? I didn't have any or this part in budget so I am trying to get out of this as cheaply as possible. I will upload pics as soon as possible but I am poor american who doesn't own cpu so I surf and post from my phone.
If it were me and this means nothing because Ive only had SBC bottom ends apart. I would try to just clean the surface rust out of the cylinders with WD40 or something and then put it all back together with new bearings and fresh assembly lube. (if you use arp rod bolts youll need to have the rods resized for them.) Get it together the best you can and see if it spins free. If not you may have a slightly bent rod or something else bigger going on. Best of luck with it though. Anyone else feel free to chime in if I gave any bad advice
TECH Enthusiast
Joined: May 2008
Posts: 537
Likes: 1
Do yourself a favor and take the block to a machine shop and have it cleaned and honed. If your crank turns well now you can probably avoid a line hone so long as you go back with new stock main bolts. If you upgrade to ARP bolts or studs, you need to line hone. Use new rings, bearings, head bolts and you should have an engine that will last a while. Do it right or you might have to do it again and all the twist to yield fasteners will have to be purchased again.
What do you plan to do with the heads? Make sure valve springs match the new cam or you will have problems
What do you plan to do with the heads? Make sure valve springs match the new cam or you will have problems
Ok so what would be the typical price for machine shop to hone and clean block. All my head bolts are arp and my springs are patriot gold dual springs. The shortblock is the only thing holding me back right now. Im on a budget so I was hoping not to do shortblock but I would rather do it right than do it twice. I tried to price main bolt kits and I actually couldn't fnd them. Maybe a had a bad search day. I have ls2 timing chain and new Melling oil pump.
