Installing the rear main seal and number four main bearing cap:
The first picture shows why the flywheel housing cannot be removed from the engine block unless the flywheel is removed. The next picture is the OEM rear main seal and the last is the number four main bearing and cap.
I put a little oil on the sealing lip of the seal and got the left side of it over the crankshaft and then rotated the seal clockwise and pushing it into place at the same time.
After the seal was seated, the main bearing got a little shot of oil, the cap had a little sealer applied to the surface that meets the block as per the FSM and the main cap is installed and the four bolts are torqued to 76-94 foot pounds.
So after talking with Mark W for a bit about oil pump modification options and ramifications, I decided to open up the inlet and outlet of the aluminum casting just a little and to flip the oil pump gears over.
You can see the difference in the wear patterns on the oil pump gear teeth, between the teeth that have been in contact with the other gear in the pump and the teeth that have not. The ones in contact have horizontal lines on the teeth and the ones that have not been in contact have vertical lines on the teeth. The main oil pump gear is keyed to the shaft that is driven by the distributor so that one needs to be tapped off the shaft, flipped over and then the shaft tapped back into the gear.
So you can see in this picture and probably in the previous ones that the aluminum pump housing face could use a little resurfacing.
The branch hand tapping tool has a nice ground smooth finish. I put a piece of 240 grit down on it and ran the lower pump housing around by hand on it in circles for a bit to try and clean that face up a bit.
I think that it turned out ok, so I put that housing back on the oil pump. I replaced the Jap Phillips head fasteners with a quality hex fastener, put a little locktite on the thread and tightened them up.
I marked top dead center (the line) and seven degrees before (the dot) with a white paint pen so that they would be easier to see later when working with a timing light.
I like using locktite on the flywheel retaining bolts. I put the flywheel onto the end of the crankshaft and threaded the bolts into the crank by hand.
The first picture shows bolts finger tight and the flywheel tapped down on the end of the crank. The second picture shows a pry bar that is used to prevent the engine from rotating while pulling up the flywheel retaining bolts to 58-79 foot pounds of torque. The third is the torque wrench.
I have removed and installed countless numbers of flywheels over the years, all using the same blue locktite, no matter if it was an F or 2F engine. While pulling the flywheel bolts up with the torque wrench, things just did not feel right, and something was up. I backed the torque wrench off to 60 foot pounds instead of the 75 I had it at, and yep, twisted a bolt off in the crank.
Removed the other bolts, broke out the left handed cobalt bits, drilled the broken bolt with a small bit, and then changed to the next larger size, and that one caught the fastener and backed it up just a bit. I then tapped an extractor into the hole I had just drilled into the broken bolt and backed the broken fastener out of the end of the crankshaft.
I do not ever remember using these bits for anything, and I had to hunt around for them a bit to find that kit, but I knew that I had purchased it a few years back.
It is better to be lucky than good.
I will have me a PILE of flywheel bolts on the way Monday....
Not sure if I mentioned it before, but when they went to remove my flywheel to do the clutch on the H41/Orion install they found 3 bolts that had broken and were "glued on" Had to drill them all out. The last time the clutch was replaced was in '96...so for 10 years I've been driving around with a flywheel held on by 3 bolts....and it lasted till the clutch wore to the rivets.
BTW, the rear main on mine puked a bit on Sat after I added oil...They had told me the line bore was off during the install and to just run it and watch it...so cleaned everything up and still getting a small drip on the bearing cap after running it on the jack stands. I'm just gonna watch it for now and try my best to keep the oil hole on the fly wheel clean and see if I can keep the oil off the clutch...but looks like at some point this year (after GSMTR) I'll be rebuilding and the bottom half and maybe the whole damn thing....