I finished pulling the engine apart today. Number five cylinder has a broken ring and a broken piston. Some of the broken pieces are stuck in the top of the piston. I don’t see any contact on the bottom side of the valves. That’s the only piston that has problems. It’s cylinder has absolutely no markings indicating there was a problem. None of the cylinders have any scratches that can be caught with a fingernail, and there are no raised edges at the top.
The main cap bearings look outstanding. The rod bearings have some copper showing throughout. The crank looks really good, no markings. It was a new crank back when we had the machine work done originally in 2010. Looks like 010 bearings. So a turned crank. I guess.
The cam and lifters show 0 sign of issues other than a little discoloration on the lifters. But all the lobes are there.
So other than the broken piston and the broken lifter, no real issues that I see anyway.
I’ve had a few gearhead friends that I called tell me they’d do a good hone on the cylinders, new rings and bearings, and roll with it.
What would you do? I don’t see anything that really warrants machine work, at least for a low RPM cruiser. I decided I want to go roller cam and I’m going to call a cam company tomorrow. I’d like to do the obvious cam, lifters, push rods, rocker arms, springs, and seals. I looked up a video on how to lap the valves with a battery drill on low speed and some compound and it looks easy. My friend has a ball hone for the lifter holes, we had a little bit of trouble getting them out easily, but he said we could hone that out.
I guess I need to figure out pistons. You don’t just replace one piston do you lol? So I will need new pistons and wrist pins. I just noticed that my rods don’t match. You can tell by the Rod caps three of them are different. But they all came from the machine shop like this and I don’t remember what the reason was or why. Maybe that good wrench crate motor had them in there like that to begin with. I just don’t remember. I’ve heard horror stories about those. The important thing is it was all board and balanced as a kit from the reputable machine shop that we had in town. He has since passed away.
Should I buy a whole damn new rotating balanced assembly? You can get the whole kit with the one piece rear main seal like I have, bored 030 like my block, for $1200. I would still have to buy the cam kit. A roller cam kit for these is like $1000….not to mention the rocker arms (I just want better ones than stock like 1.6?) and whatever else.
If I do the whole rotating assembly and roller cam I’m probably looking around $2500. I can already use all the accessories, front cover, oil pan, etc. off the 283. I will need center bolt valve covers, but they don’t have to be expensive. In my mind that gives me a solid engine that will last me decades if I want.
On the other hand, do like my friends say, new pistons, rings, bearings, a good hone, do the roller cam, and send it. Which means I’m probably still in it $12-$1500.
Of course, I could just do the hone and the re-bearing, and re-ring, in a decent flat, tap it cam, and on my way. Or, the rotating assembly and a flat tap it cam, and save the thousand dollars for the roller.
Basically what I’m asking is for direction lol. Based on these pictures and the info, I have given you, what would you do if you have this engine out right now and wanted to make sure it lasted for a long time.i have the money to do this now. I just don’t know.
