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Just got my short block back from being assembled, set it up on engine stand and managed to hit the deck and scratch it. What's the best way to get this fixed up at home, can't afford a trip to the machine shop.
It is a turbo engine, using ARP studs, LS9 gaskets.
I'd use a glass block with some emery paper to gently flat sand it, use some high temp epoxy (they sell it to patch burners and wood stoves) to fill the leftover ding and drag it flat with a industrial razor blade, , light finish sand check with a straight edge make sure its clean and about the same texture as the rest of the block. It doesnt look that bad to me, looks like you have some room between the ding and the bore, the water jacket side is likely very un important as long as the surface has no burs to scratch the gasket.. Just my 2 cents thinking as if I was at teh track trying to get a car back on track..
I wouldn't do much to it and end up with more trouble. If it were mine I would only remove any high spots and let it be. The gaskets will seal that no problem.
I'd use a glass block with some emery paper to gently flat sand it, use some high temp epoxy (they sell it to patch burners and wood stoves) to fill the leftover ding and drag it flat with a industrial razor blade, , light finish sand check with a straight edge make sure its clean and about the same texture as the rest of the block. It doesnt look that bad to me, looks like you have some room between the ding and the bore, the water jacket side is likely very un important as long as the surface has no burs to scratch the gasket.. Just my 2 cents thinking as if I was at teh track trying to get a car back on track..
Please don't do this! The gaskets move around on the block, the cement mentioned above will just wear the gasket as the gasket moves around. Best to just clean off any high spots and let it alone.
If it were mine here's what I would do. I would get a NEW small lightweight ball peen hammer. New so that it has a perfectly flat surface.
I would very slowly and very gently tap on the high spots of the metal to get some of it back down and fill the gouge with the metal that came out of it, the metal you tap on is still attached to the block so it won't come off and will be a permanent part of the motor so try to fill the gouge with it's own metal as much as possible. SLOWLY and GENTLY making sure to only tap on the high spots and not create a new low spot. After you get some of the metal back down again slowly and gently smooth the spot with some roughly 800 grit sand paper on a sanding block and making sure to only sand the high spots, checking it very often with a straight edge, this should take a couple hours at least. Go that slow and easy at it and you can make that gouge a lot smaller. Then I would send it.
Or you could just flatten the spots and send it. If you use the proper bore head gasket it will hug the edges of the cylinder liner, and you have a good amount of good flat surface there up close to the edge of the cylinder liner so you should be fine, especially if you use the right gasket.
The best situation is having a good surface and a dry gasket, so I would aim for making the surface as good as possible and skip the fillers and sealers if possible.
Last edited by 00pooterSS; 12-08-2017 at 10:30 AM.
Please don't do this! The gaskets move around on the block, the cement mentioned above will just wear the gasket as the gasket moves around. Best to just clean off any high spots and let it alone.
Yeah gaskets move around while being held perfectly in place by dowel pins and all those head bolts squishing the gasket under thousands of pounds of pressure between two solid pieces of metal.
12-02-2017, 12:27 AM
LS1 block deck scratch (pic inside) 
