www.ColoradoClassicBroncos.com

Nothing really sticks out, except for whatever is sticking out of the oil pickup.

It's a random piece of pan gasket. Unless one of my kids put it there, it was in there when we pulled the pan.

Probably fell in during a timing chain replacement. How does the chain look? Much slack?

Yup. Looks to be 1/2 inch of slack or more. I'll measure it when I get the timing cover off.

The teardown continues. Got the intake and one head pulled this evening. Other than all the crap in the #7 cylinder, the wear looks OK to my vastly untrained eye. Curious to know how that much junk got into one cylinder but not the other three. Given that I know nothing about building an engine, I'm pretty happy with how this is going so far.

My guess is it was stored with the water pump facing up. Rain entered the intake and the #7 intake valves were open.

Oh yeah. Duh. Pic of the worst part of the cylinder wall that I can see without scraping the inside of the wall. How aggressive can I be about cleaning this out once I drop the piston? Don't want to scratch the walls.

I like green scotchbrite pads. They're made of plastic and will disintegrate before they could ever tear through your cylinders.

You don't need to worry about scratches. That hole is not going to be usable in its current bore. There are going to be pits in it.

OK, thanks to both of you. Anything I need to pay attention to when Im taking out the pistons?

You might be better off dropping that bad piston out of the bottom. Hopefully not too much pitting from that rust and you can have it bored out.

That's the plan. Am hoping to take the snow day to finish disassembly.

Not sure you'll be able to drop it out the bottom. Typically the piston bores are in line with the rod, not the center of the main bearings meaning you will run into block before it comes out the bottom.

Got the other head off the engine. So far the #7 cylinder appears to be the worst one. Hope to get the rotating assembly out in in the next few days and get things cleaned up a little.

Strip it. Hot tank it. Paint it. Turn it into a coffee table.

That's the plan if it doesn't turn out to be usable.

akaFrankCastle wrote:Strip it. Hot tank it. Paint it. Turn it into a coffee table.

I'm moving furniture today....Can I borrow a Cherry Picker, or can I get 3 of you guys to come help me move my Coffee Table 3 feet to the left PLEASE!?!?

just put it on a dolly

problem solved

I was thinking of a dual use Chandelier Hoist!

Greg,are you saying I play with dollies?

Justin wrote:Greg,are you saying I play with dollies?

Well I hadn't considered that - but your daughter did help you tear down that block, I figure you've got some payback time attending tea parties and playing dress up... Dollies is not that far a leap...

None of her princess dresses fit me, thankfully.

Finished getting the engine torn down. Cleaned out the dirty piston bores as best I could, but had to hammer out the stuck pistons. Overall the walls look better than I expected, but we'll see what the machine shop says. Tried cleaning them up with a green scotchbrite as suggested, but shredded the pad with out making enough progress to get a clear sense of what I'm dealing with.

On the down side, it looks to me like the crank is shot. Jason, you definitely called the spun bearing. One of the rods had about 1/8" of slop before I loosened the fastener and there's a meaningful ridge in the middle. I'm guessing the damage is more than can be machined out?

Quick question-is it standard practice to remove all the little sensors, allen-head plugs etc.? I'm assuming anything with a bolt head should come out before I take it in, but that he'll deal with the freeze plugs.

Time for a stroker! Crank is likely too far gone to use. If they can only turn it .010 you would be okay but any more than that and is garbage in my book. The way it looks it is far more than .010 though. Stroker kits are cheap now. You'll likely need at least one new rod so the stroker makes even more sense.

You're better off removing everything you can before it hits the machine shop as you bay never see it again. Don't worry about the freeze plugs or the cam bearings. Also, I wouldn't pull the Allen head plugs.

I threw a micrometer on it. Surprisingly, there's only about .07 difference between the bad section and the rest. I'll still be stunned if it's salvageable, as there's a visible difference. Time to start a budget stroker thread...

Justin, I know you don't need a .060 kit and I don't know enough here, but the guy has a crank in the picture. http://denver.craigslist.org/pts/5370942877.html I don't know what a crank costs either so take this with that knowledge.

Thanks! I shot him an email. That's definitely more budget friendly that most of the options I've been looking at. I've been pretty happy with the power from my 302, so a fresh stock 351w will be fine. I'd love to build a stroker, but it's only something I'd do if the cost difference wasn't that big.

Thanks to those who posted up the craigslist ad for a bunch of 351w parts. I ended up picking it up on the theory that I'd be able to part it out if I couldn't use what I got. It looks like the crank has been turned as the rod diameter mics at 2.302. There is some minor scoring on a couple of the rod journals, so hopefully it's still good. The rods appear to be stock Ford and the pistons are cast Sealed Power stock replacements. All in all, if I have to go .060 on this block I should be set. Probably ought to have waited till I knew what I was dealing with on the block, but....

If you wanna just get it going and carb it I have 2 edelbrock manifolds for sale.

Appreciate the offer. One of the main goals of this is being able to install all the efi stuff while it's on the stand.