Finally Bought my first CRUISER!

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I love the clutch, but it lacks colour, red is fast, green is racing colour. I bought a pink one.

Pics or I call bull :censor:! Ha


Why the rust over '3B'? I wiped the oil there so it stands out. Thinking at bare minimum I am pulling the head to replace the headgasket
 
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Little further down the rabbit hole.
Head gasket was cracked under precups on cyl 3 and 4. All precups are cracked. #3 and 4 are mildly proud of the head. Good time to get er fixed up!
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Some more progress. Coincidentally princess auto had valve spring compressors on sale for like half price!
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Cyl #3 exhaust is the worst of them (lining up with the rusty imprint on the head @3b). I will try to shine these up tonight to see what I have to work with.
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First impression is the seats look ok. Again I need to do some massive cleaning.
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What does concern me is the cam lifter bottoms. Wear and tear? Sacrificial part I hope?
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The worst on cyl #3
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How hard is it to remove the cam shaft???? Think you mentioned this @Cruising Canuck
 
Well, at this point, Cam shaft is easy to remove!
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Unfortunately several lobes look like this
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Some further reading..... I will be looking for ZDDP oil additives in the future!
John Maher Racing » Flat cams and pitted lifters (part 1)


And also found a couple cracks in the head today. Right between intake and exhaust valves.
Pondering my options at this point.



Today, Ive had the beast for 1 year. What a journey!
Not much mechanical I havent rebuilt now. Just the diffs (but I have rebuild kits already and waiting... for lockers. Hopefully)
Engine, Im not too sure now. Compression test was pretty good???

May have a line up on a inexpensive bottom end. I potentially can steal the cam shaft and lifters and get my current bottom end in a ready to go condition. This would also give me a core to rebuild in the future at my leisure. The head, im not too sure yet.
 
Bummer, sorry you have this "while there" mess.
Can you fix the head with pinning stuff and just put it back together, it was fine when you did not know about it.
 
Bummer, sorry you have this "while there" mess.
Can you fix the head with pinning stuff and just put it back together, it was fine when you did not know about it.

Definitely got what I asked for... a project truck. Kinda cursed myself right from the beginning.

No regrets though. I have learned so much about my rig. Am also now confident in being able to fix nearly anything I may encounter with my Beast as I have already been there once before now!

My kids are also watching the progrss.. This sets a standard, a frame of mind, and a goal for my kids to look at and attempt to achieve one day, I hope.
Im also a little stubborn, and not about to let her get me down over some piddly mechanical stuff! I will tame and :steer: THE BEAST!


I may use the head as is. I know in the back of my mind I will always thinking of the cracks though... Cast iron does not forgive, and cracks tend to propagate (grow). Especially in thermal cycling, vibrating applications.

IF the crack is terminated completely the casting integrity should theoretically return to near new condition (minus some small amount of material). Just drilling or removing the crack would leave the valve seats unsupported in areas and not good long term. I would never trust a pin to stay in place long term here either.


But I was thinking...:worms:
I could potentially set up the head on the CNC mill and bore both valve seats and remove the crack between the valve seats.
Bores would be deeper than the crack removal groove so as to ensure intake and exhaust streams stay where they should. Something like this
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And the insert replacement would look something like this, interference fit and pressed in place.
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(not to scale)
OEM Valve seats would be installed in the new bores.

Anyone have a thought or opinion on this? Why how to do/not do this?


ground a small puller from 1/2" threaded rod and a large socket. Simply insert
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And tighten the nut.
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Finish er off with a quick shot of where in interior is at.
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Prepping for heart surgery
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Transplant doner + extras... 270,000kms old.
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Getting stripped down
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New to me cam shaft looks awesome compared to old. Havent measured yet but expect no issues.
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Lifters are not perfect, but again way better.
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I will drop the pan, replace all cam and bottom end bearings, install donner cam shaft with donner timing gear set as it was also tighter than my old girls. At least the plan is forming with light at the end of the tunnel.

Need to put together a list of parts/gaskets and get them moving my way...
 
Tried brake clean, sea foam, muriatic acid, acetone, and finally, only lemon fresh oven cleaner cut the carbon on the heads. That and some fine scotch brite.
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Liners are in resonable condition. Mild ridge at top of stroke but cant catch with a fingernail.
Bores are round within .0015" and .0020" taper top to bottom on average. None showed excess wear compared to others. All good! I think.

Wear over the stamped original size is .002 to .003" According to the FSM I have another 10 thou of wear before we hit the limit if I reed this correct.
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There is some discoloration approx 2/3 into the cylinder on a couple heads. Also a couple vertical scratches, but very shallow.
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I guess Im a little past the point of no return now.
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More stuff to clean!

Will probably give the cylinders a quick hone to clean them up. Maybe new rings? Cam and Crank and connecting rod bearings. Oil pump gears.. The list is growing.
Just dont tell :princess:
 
:wrench:while I am there and past point of no return combined :bang: :clap:

What size are the donor cylinders, maybe they are what you need?
Hone and overbore are now very very close and easy, maybe get it done?
 
little more cleaning while I wait for parts to arrive.

By far, the heavy duty Easy Off oven cleaner is the best at removing baked on grime. Then simply rinse with water.

I will do some reading up on the injectors. I probably should take them apart to clean/check internals as well.
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And I went ahead and 'fixed' my head. Im out on a limb here so appreciate comments/opinions. The saying 'he knows just enough to get into trouble' has crossed my mind....


At the last minute decided to change the original design and go with aluminum insert.

Set the head up on the CNC and dialed in on the valve seats to get exact positions. Drew up the valve seats and a peanut like profile between them to cut and remove the crack. The idea is to remove the crack completely from the casting and then fill with a mechanically interlocking and interference fit.
I ground a 1/4" dia cutter to an approx 1 degree negative angle so that both the hole and insert will interlock kind of like a dove tail joint, only about 10-12 thou difference from top to bottom but enough to ensure it can not fall out. From the ground face, I milled 0.300" depth.

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Idea behind the peanut shape is to mechanically hold the casting in the axis it was cracking (either stresses are greatest here or casting is simply weakest at this point). The profile is about .010" wider in the bottom than at the top.
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And the insert. I last minute decision went with 7075 aluminum vs steel. My thinking is the 7075 is as strong or better than many steels, but greater thermal expansion rate than steel. This allows insertion (by freezing the aluminum and heating the head) and double ensures interference fit as when at operating temperature the aluminum will grow more than the hole it is in.

The top face here is .010" wider as it is cut with the same endmill and will become the bottom of the insert. The backing is left for strength and rigidity for insertion and will be milled off after.
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I froze the aluminum in a freezer, and heated the head to about 200F. Set it up in a big ass vice and gave it a squeeze. Have to go quick before the heat transfers! Nice and snug.... And then back in the mill to remove the backing material (I need to grab a smaller piece of scrap next time).
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I then peaned the cast iron to create even more interference shoulder (triple insurance)and hand ground the curve between valves to match the original profile (could still use more polishing). This still needs to be surface ground so as to clean up this face and peaned peaks.
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And then I decided I would not put this on my rebuilt bottom end.


And my concerns are the aluminum is nearly (and possibly directly) touching the valve seats in one location only and thus creating a localized thermal sink. I'm not concerned of my insert falling out, but that the valve seats may crack over repetitive thermal cycling/uneven heating.

The other thing I was thinking is that my aluminum insert may stress the cast iron negatively by growing mainly on its long axis, actually pushing the casting apart where the cracks were originally.

What do you guys think? Would you put it on your engine?


So I bought a new head, straight from China on aliexpress. 420USD delivered so will be an awesome deal if it shows in reasonable time and good quality. My backup plan is to repeat this procedure, except stay with my original plan this time. Using steel not aluminum, and bore and replace both valve seats as part of the insert.
 
I would not use dissimilar metals. The head is just cast, I think the thermal cycles would cause it to crack in no time.

Engine Australia has pretty cheap prices for 3b heads. I believe they cost somewhere around 800 bucks shipped, with precups and valves installed.
 
I would not use dissimilar metals. The head is just cast, I think the thermal cycles would cause it to crack in no time.

Engine Australia has pretty cheap prices for 3b heads. I believe they cost somewhere around 800 bucks shipped, with precups and valves installed.
I hear ya.. and thus why I would not install as is. Hind sight is 20/20 and I had my reasons for changing my mind in the moment, regardless of the right decision....

Thinking though, If I milled out my original plan, plus this 'peanut' profile and replaced as one steel insert, as I originally planned to do :bang: I could bore new holes to accept valve seats and wolla. As long as a good/acurate mate of profiles I think this *could* be a good permanent fix to broken heads.

BUT
So I bought a new head, straight from China on aliexpress. 420USD delivered so will be an awesome deal if it shows in reasonable time and good quality.
 
I spent the afternoon cleaning my injectors. Cleaned them up on the outside prior, but once opened up there was a lot more cleaning to do!
This was the worst of them, but I needed to put a chunk of hose on the end of the plunger and pull (while turning) to release from the sleeve for every one. All were very snug and tight, while now cleanly pass the 30º drop slide test!!! Not sure of spray pattern or pressure but 100 times better than it was already.

From this
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To this
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Seafoam was the trick to getting the plunger to drop in the cylinder cleanly and repetitively.

Also, Cyl @2 injector had 2 brass seats (Part #2) ???? and None of the injectors had the crush washer seal at the end (Part #1)??? Glad to get this all right!
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Waiting for parts to arrive and putting in a little time to The Beast every day on something.

Got my flex hone in and hope to hone the cylinders this weekend. Thinking I may need to remove the hood to get at the last cylinder?
Also bought an aftermarket oil pressure/water temp gauge and hope to get that installed for piece of mind.

Pistons are finally clean! Bamboo 'shish kabob' skewers, easy off oven cleaner and elbow grease! Perfect combo to keep these unscratched but clean them near spotless.
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Piston rings and bearings have shipped so hopefully see them early next week! Head is still processing.... hopefully will ship soon!
 
Impressive, you're doing great! Do you have equipment for checking the injectors? Correct opening pressure and good spray pattern?
I'd do that! :)

All this downtime will be so worth it when you fire up that strait four again!!
 

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