Don't be me! Dumbest mistake I've ever made working on cars

[aaronjbuchok]

Almost thirty years, I've been wrenching on cars. This past weekend, I exceeded my personal record for "oh crap" moments. We're talking about surpassing the Chevy Nova drifting on a dirt road behind the police station incident of 1998 here folks.

I bought a '94 land cruiser for a song a few years back. I knew it had a bad engine but I bought it anyway thinking that I'd just rebuild it over the winter. I ended up swapping in a running engine off craigslist and everything is life is good. Drove it for a year or two and got the rest of it running the way I wanted it to (thanks to the help of many folks on this forum). Then one day, I come out to the garage to see gallons of coolant on the ground, I had a cracked block.

No problem I think (after cussing those fools at Toyota for not making the block stronger). I have the old busted engine that I can rebuild the way I want. I can take my time and do it right and make sure it will run for another 200k miles. So starts my winter of 2018 rebuild. I put a ton of time into making sure it's done perfectly. No shortcuts, full tear down, block got hot tanked and machined 0.020 over. When I pick it up from the machinist, he notes that they cleaned up the block and left the oil galleys open so I can clean it before I assemble it (as I requested they do). I get home and make a new checkbox on my todo list. REINSTALL OIL GALLEY PLUGS.

After 2 months of continuing to build up the engine and get all the rubber vac lines replaced, parts media blasted, painted, etc..... I must have lost track of that TODO item.

This weekend my wife and I went to start it. Man it sounded good. I'm looking at the engine to make sure everything is good. Then all of a sudden, hell broke loose. Turns out that those pesky oil galley plugs need to be installed or all the oil gets pumped right onto your garage floor. I go to Mud to see if anyone else has ever had this problem and I find a description in a thread of exactly what I have happening. Oh crap, I forgot to install those plugs. My garage floor is flooded with oil and I'm looking at a few solid days of wrenching to get that timing chain cover off. Turns out it only took about 5 hours to get down the timing chain cover off. I managed to do it without pulling the oil pans saving me a ton of work and a lot of frustration.

So, the purpose of my thread. Anyone know where to get replacement oil galley plugs for a 1FZFE engine? I'm trying to do it in the car, if I had it on a stand and I could clean up everything, I'd just thread them with a pipe thread and put plugs in. I'm hoping that someone had a hammer in plug or ball bearing source that I can use so I'm not cutting threads.

Thank you.

 

[Indy262]

Well forgetting something isn’t as bad as intentionally doing something you know is bad... like say I don’t know, you keep blowing a fuse in a car so you short it then follow the smoke to the turn signal switch only to find out later the real problem was the hazard switch

 

[MrMikeyG]

I went full gonzo on my egr delete, and now have everything up high all capped and removed and pretty, but the egr pipe itself is still connected down low in the fun to reach place. Since I cut the union nut in half I'm committed to doing it the hard way.

 

[aaronjbuchok]

Just pulled the radiator to start drilling for threaded plugs. It's going to be an issue. There isn't much meat between the front face of the block and a cross drilled hole in the oil galley. If I plug it with a threaded plug, I'm afraid I'm going to instruct flow from that cross drilled passage. Kinda at a loss at this point. Maybe I can lathe out some plugs and install them with some loctite green bushing adhesive.

For those of you who rebuilt your 1fzfe engines, we're you able to source plugs than can be pressed in?

 

[GeoRoss]

I’ve sailed in your boat too many times to count.

 

[Enigma]

Or when changing your oil, filling it back up, only to realize later you forgot to put the drain plug back in.

Or when changing the front pads on your old beater Datsun Hustler 4x4 and then just lose your s^&% on that rusty caliper and beat it to death with that sledge hammer that just happened to be in reach.

Or when tightening the alternator belt on your chevy powered fj40 with a pry bar in one hand and the socket wrench in the other, and the prybar slips and stabs you in the eye.

I take my stuff to a shop now

 

[baldilocks]

I thought you were going to tell a tale of how blatant disregard for safety and/or fsm procedures led to expensive carnage or amputation of your favorite appendage. Instead, I lost five minutes of my life finding out you need a ball bearing.

 

[aaronjbuchok]

My title served it's purpose.

I did gore myself on the hood latch while undoing the head bolts. Very bloody and painful. Seems I picked up some oil on my shoes from someplace but my favorite appendage has been spared for the time being. Now If I don't get the oil absorbant cleaned up in the next day or so, my wife is likely to change that and have it mounted like a trophy buck as a warning to those who would track kitty litter into her clean house.

Only bearing I could find locally was for a 2JZ motor and it didn't fit very well. I pulled it out of the block with a magnet so I'm guessing the press fit was a little light. I'm trying to find a tighter fit ball bearing online right now. From the factory, Mr T put a cup style plug similar to what you'll find on the front the LS family of engines.

 

[baldilocks]

ABSORBANT. Good luck with your ball bearings and lacerations.

 

[BILT4ME]

Call Beno.

 

[LINUS]

Drama queen.

You didn’t even visit the hospital.

 

[mikedamageinc]

So wait, let's go back to the cracked block on the other engine, how'd that happen!?

 

[Wompom]

Most machine shops make em.
When I had my block tanked and decked they use a oversize brass plug and it's friction fit I believe. I'd call around and see if any machine shops can help. Tapping for a threaded plug seems like a nightmare.

 

[surfpig]

Most machine shops make em.
When I had my block tanked and decked they use a oversize brass plug and it's friction fit I believe. I'd call around and see if any machine shops can help. Tapping for a threaded plug seems like a nightmare.

That's what the machine shop did for my newly rebuilt 2F...

 

[shocktower]

I thought you were going to tell a tale of how blatant disregard for safety and/or fsm procedures led to expensive carnage or amputation of your favorite appendage. Instead l, I lost five minutes of my life to find out you need a ball bearing.

Some people can do a task for years and still screw it up . I did lose my safety latch because I sat it on the inter cooler and did did a test drive and it is somewhere

 

[bahamasair]

I had to get Welch plugs for mine. I did exactly what you did and had to pull the timing chain cover. I didn’t know the machinist hadn’t reinstalled the plugs but you live and learn. One of the plugs did end up blowing out again but this time I pulled the head and timing chain and found I’d damaged the Welch plug when I installed it. I put in a new one and double checked it this time then filled the front with epoxy so it is touching the timing chain cover I also peened the plug in a couple of spots and have been good ever since. I’ll try find the size of the plugs I ended up using and get back to you.