FB Standard Wagon

[FbSTDwagon]

I’m either ruining the extractors or improving them…
Jury is out on it…

[Errol62]

That’s a bugger. I would think you could hand file the high spots down to within 0.0025”.


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

[FbSTDwagon]

That’s a bugger. I would think you could hand file the high spots down to within 0.0025”.


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

Yes and that’s what happening now…

[FbSTDwagon]

Well that’s that brain strain sorted.
All flat and clamping well to the head with no gaps, can’t get the .002 feeler in anywhere:

[In the Shed]

Neat work Drew albeit painful for a new product. Unfortunately your initial deviation of 10 tho would cause problems at some point down the track.

Hope your on the improve.

Regards
Stephen

[FbSTDwagon]

Neat work Drew albeit painful for a new product. Unfortunately your initial deviation of 10 tho would cause problems at some point down the track.

Hope your on the improve.

Regards
Stephen

Cheers Stephen, feeling heaps better now.
Still a foggy head and slightly blocked sinus but I’m good enough for a few sheds days ahead!

[FbSTDwagon]

So I have the ‘chosen’ engine block on the stand ready for some loving.

It’s good to be at this point after the run around ive had with getting a motor but as usual if you want it done sometimes it’s best doing it yourself.

So a little history…

I bought this J motor complete with a std bore and crank. Stripped it to inspect and then realised it was a really good motor, too good to do a rough job on so I stored it all away in pieces for my ultimate ‘one day’ build. At the time I had the block decked to clean it up.

I then bought another unseen running ‘running’ J motor, a lot of head aches to to get it to my door step and when it arrived I popped the side plate and timing cover off to change the cam.
In doing so I seen a coolant trail leaking from the head gasket, so I removed the head.
Found #3 piston corroded from coolant and a cracked combustion chamber in #3.
Also pistons were 3.162” aka .100” over size.
Thought I’d get it honed and new rings and it would be good.
On honing the block noticed pitting in the bores so he filled the coolant galleries with Kero over night and you guessed it…
Kero pissing through the bores, so the block had split bores too.
What a nightmare.

So I came back to this good motor I had stashed away and got it bored .060”, new cam bearing installed.

That’s where this story now starts…

[FbSTDwagon]

So I met this old bloke up at Mt Barker that had been building engines for 45 years, excellent I thought- he should know what he is doing.
What my opinion is now is that he has had 45 years of bad habits working for himself…
Or maybe I’m a pain in the arse customer…

Anyways block got sent to him to bore the block, he measured pistons at 3.121” and he bore.003” clearance out to 3.124”

No worries there until picked up the pistons and block and I’m home now doing my own measurements…
I measure pistons at 3.122 and the pistons instructions say that .003 is a minimum and to bore more for a sports application.

I’d like to give my car a bit of shit so I would have thought .0035 would be a touch more suitable… so I’m needing the bores at
3.1255

I’ve ordered a bore dial to measure it all up and I’ll gone it here at home to size if required.

Disappointed to have to do this but I don’t trust what he has done and I need to double check it all.

As mentioned earlier the block was decked and he cleaned it up with what looks like a hard scraper and an orbital sander

And the cam bearings he installed are scratched to shit, and the wanker polished my cam journals down to achieve a good spin fit in the bearings.
Mind you this cam just came back from Clive and was $*#@ perfect.

Everything I asked him to do I looked and and just went WTF is going on here.

Anyways is in my hands now to do it my way.
Big lessons learnt, be careful who you let touch your engines.

[FbSTDwagon]

So I’ll tidy up the cam bearings with some 2000 wet rub and kero and if the cam spins nicely then it will be fine.

The bottom of the bores had sharp edges so I champfered them to stop and scratching on the piston skirts.
Not that I think they run that low anyways but it needs to be done.

[Errol62]

Pace yourself mate. There is no hurry. I don’t know who recommended the Mt Barker guy to you, but I’ll give Lonsdale Engines a plug.

That engine going to be a ripper by the time you have finished it to your satisfaction.


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

[ardiesse]

Drew,

Sympathies . . . commiserations . . . I build my own engines, so when something goes wrong, I can only blame myself. I check and re-check the fit of mating faces, I Plastigage bearings, I disassemble freshly reconditioned cylinder heads to check for poorly seating valves. I've found warped piston rings straight out of the box. And so on.

Specified piston-to-bore fit at room temperature is 0.0015", but here is where individual preference comes into play. I'm a little skeptical of a 0.0035" fit on a new build. It doesn't take much more that that to make the motor piston-slappy on cold mornings.

You chamfered the bottoms of the bores; it'll save a world of frustration when fitting the pistons with rings if you chamfer the tops of the bores too.

Have you had new gudgeon pin bushes fitted? And even so, check your pistons and rods to make sure that there's no perceptible rock in the small ends.

Put a top ring in a bore, and measure the gap. 0.009" - 0.011" by memory.

Rob

[FbSTDwagon]

Pace yourself mate. There is no hurry. I don’t know who recommended the Mt Barker guy to you, but I’ll give Lonsdale Engines a plug.

That engine going to be a ripper by the time you have finished it to your satisfaction.


FB ute fixer upper, EK van on rotisserie

Yes no rush Clay. I found the guy myself and had faith in his 45 years experience but it all tells a story in the end.

[FbSTDwagon]

Specified piston-to-bore fit at room temperature is 0.0015", but here is where individual preference comes into play. I'm a little skeptical of a 0.0035" fit on a new build. It doesn't take much more that that to make the motor piston-slappy on cold mornings.

Rob

Rob I am using JE SRP Flat top pistons and the .003” clearance spec is what they recommend for this particular material growth.
.003 is the minimum actually, add more clearance the more shit you want to give it. Hence why I opted for .0035”
Piston rattle doesn’t really bother me as these pistons grow to size quickly apparently… we will soon see I guess!

[FbSTDwagon]

Have you had new gudgeon pin bushes fitted? And even so, check your pistons and rods to make sure that there's no perceptible rock in the small ends.

Rob

Yes the rods have had new small end bush’s installed and pin bored to suit the new gudgeon’s.
Big ends of the rods have got new ARP studs and have also been resized… happy days.
All balanced up too!

FYI for anyone about to say ‘but ARP don’t to rod bolts for a grey motor!’… well you would be correct in saying that but…

These rod bolts are from Holden V8 and fit perfectly, so winner winner chicken dinner.

[FbSTDwagon]

Lifters have been refaced by Clive but the outside diameters were a bit scrappy and they were not a perfect slide fit in The lifter bores.

Spent to arvo polishing the lifters of any lumps and bumps, and the lifter bores got some TLC too.
Started with the brake cylinder hone in the lifter bores, and finished with 1200 wet rub with Kero.

End result is the lifters just slide beautifully with a touch of oil on them and no tight spots or bind ups.

Dug out the main caps and cleaned them up for a dummy fit.

I actually have an ARP main stud kit but am unsure if I should use it as it has a higher tourque setting of 70ft/lb
Standard bolts are 60ft/lb…

My brain says the caps may distort a touch if the tourque is higher and therefore the main caps would need line honing…
Is this correct or will if be ok to use the ARP main studs?