So I'm going to be pulling my motor from the bottom due to having a bad piston ring ( horrible oil blowby).

Engine only has 70k miles.

I have never done anything like this before, but after reading a couple of write ups with pics, I feel confident I can pull the motor from the bottom.

Now here is my question ,


My car Is full bolt on, with cam and some light head work.

I'm not looking for some crazy high hp rebuild, honestly I want to rebuild this thing for as little money as possible but still being durable.

I'm guessing the cylinder walls will need to be opened up .020 or .030 if the ring has scuffed up the walls at all?

What is my best bet here? I would atleast like to have arp rod bolts installed on the rebuild, and possibly forged pistons simply for durability in the long run.

 

Quite possible you may get away with just a hone. If that's the case you can reused your entire rotating assembly and simply need rings and bearings. However if you have really bad blowby, it is also possible you have a bad ring land and that piston will have to be replaced, however hyper-u's aren't terribly expensive and they may have one laying around the shop that can be used. That blowby could also be from bad valves/valve guides. Did you just do a compression test or leakdown? Leakdown you'll be able to tell if the blowby is coming from the top or bottom or both.
As far as taking out the bottom, instead of unbolting the strut from the fender, unbolt it from the lower A-arm. It is stubborn as hell to get off, but it makes things so much easier lining up the k-member when reinstalling, and you don't have to deal with sagging A-arms hitting the ground/less weight to move around/etc...
Not sure where you live, but do some research regarding machine shops in your area. If you are in the NE I'd recommend Burtonsville Performance and Machine in Maryland.

 

The blowby is horrible,

Constant smoke from exhaust when idle, driving , anything. If I drive it , it throws the oil dipstick out and shoots oil all over the hood, and when the car is idling if I remove the oil fill cap there are puffs of smoke coming out.

 

Bad valve guides can burn up valves and do the same thing. But yeah, the only accurate way to know a dollar figure is to start tearing things down.

 

If the motor is coming apart, I'd have the heads rebuilt too

 

Op

You are not going to know until you tear down the motor and send the short block to a machine shop. If just one cyl is bad than it will likely need a .030 bore....which means they all will which means new pistons. You can get cheap pistons...but they will be heavier than stock and cheap and engine build is just always wrong

new pistons, Mahle, use existing rods & crank but have the rods resized with ARP fasteners. Crank polished, line bore block, new cam, rod & main bearings. Send the heads to Lloyd Elliott and consider a matched cam since the engine is apart

Given the costs of machine work and parts...buying a rebuilt short or long block often is cheaper & faster. Check out Golen or Blueprint engines. I bought a Golen 383 shortblock for my 96 LT1 and a Blueprint 355 long block for my 67 Camaro and very satisfied with both. YMMV