I am planning to pick up a 4.8L engine next week to swap into my offroad toy. The engine only had 60K miles on it when pulled and was pulled for a 6.0 swap. The killer is the engine was pulled 4 year ago or so, and has been sitting inside a garage since then. Its basically a longblock as it sits, and I plan to pop the heads and pan off just to inspect and make sure nothing has gotten inside anything. Is there anything I should be concerned with on the rotating assembly from sitting so long? Should I rering it regardless, or if everything looks good on the walls, just leave the rings alone? I want to do it right 1 time, but at same time dont want to waste unnecessary $$.

 

I had a '76 Eldorado that sat in my garage untouched and unstarted for 7 years. The oil that was in it had unknown mileage, but was clearly not freash. The engine had about 110k miles on it. Once we got it running, the engine ran just fine with no oil burning, no knocking, nothing bad at all.

I know this is a different engine, but the concept is the same. I don't think the engine is toast from just 4 years of sitting, unless it was the victim of a flood at some point, etc.

 

I would spray some WD40 in the cylinders and turn the engine over by hand a couple times just to make sure the rings didn't rust to the walls and to make sure everything turns over good. Then go ahead a fire it up. 4 years is not that long of a time for a engine to sit, I have started engines that have sat much much longer.

 

Good to hear! Still plan to pop the heads, just want to visually see inside, and may go ahead and do valve seals while in there. Main concern was really with the rings sticking. The cam is out of the motor as are lifters so all those will be new, no worries on the lifter side of things.