In reply to RacetruckRon :
I'm happy to report:
In reply to RacetruckRon :
I'm happy to report:
Been chipping away at the engine pull and tonight my buddy Dave came over so we could remove the low compression 5.3. Time to switch over the cam and valve springs. And clean the garage.
Pulled the drivers side head off the "low compression" motor and now I'm second guessing myself again. Do you think this would cause low compression? You can see where the water sat, but it just doesn't look that bad. Maybe I should get a new compression tester?
Rings lost tension. Or it's cracked the second ringland.
In other news the head gasket looks really corroded.
This pic doesn't look like much, but I can't tell you how much work I had in cleaning up the long block. It was a ton of wire wheeling, scraping, and digging with a screwdriver.
Next is swap the cam and springs from the bad 5.3 and then paint the long block.
Isn't it just quicker to power wash the engine to get the grime off?
Just kidding...I'll see myself out
In reply to nsogiba :
I deserve that.
Hell. That's what I went through to get the last of three broken exhaust studs out. The stud would not take a weld. Had to weld on flat stock that finally stuck and then has to spin it out with a screwdriver and a hammer.
In what would be a surprise to no one, I made another mistake. When I got the exhaust stud out with a welder, I didn't put a spark plug back in and filled a cylinder with weld splatter/slag. So off came the heads to clean it all up.
Not too upset about it. I cleaned up one head, lapped valves, and put in the valve springs. The valves were nasty and the intake ports were also pretty caked with goo. Tonight I started on the second head. Going to reuse head gaskets and head bolts to stay cheap and stick with the sloppy theme.
I chickened out and bought new head gaskets from RockAuto last night. I just can't bring myself to reuse the stock headgakets being as filthy as they were. It's documented on Sloppy Mechanics that hundreds, if not thousands of people have reused them with no issues. I'll just feel better about new head gaskets.
In reply to Scotty Con Queso :
new head gaskets? Look at Mr Moneybags over here!
I kid. In my mind, the sloppy "recipe" makes sense if you don't ever pull the motor apart, much less so if you start dissasembling things anyway. No real reason to not put it back together with good new gaskets
I was going to say, I'm shocked you could reuse the headgaskets!
Come on man, you let the magic out!
It's probably not a bad idea to freshen it up with new headgaskets. Just leave the bottom end alone! That's where issues come up once people start messing with them.
In reply to nsogiba :
It pained me greatly to open up the new engine as I know, like you said, I've let a lot of magic out. New head gaskets inbound and I'll get it back together next week with any luck.
Way easier to do the cam and valve spring swap with the heads off. I probably wouldn't reuse mystery mileage head gaskets either but once I've put a fresh set of MLS gaskets on an engine I'll reuse them if the heads come off again just gotta keep the copper spray stocked up in the garage. I hope you didn't get too fancy on us and buy new head bolts too.
After cleaning up the 706 heads, I have now come to understand these are the crack-prone Castech 706 heads which almost always seep coolant. Maybe this is a non-issue, but maybe it will be. So I'm going to clean up the 862 heads that were on the low compression 5.3 and use those on the good engine. At least I keep learning things with this endeavor. Even if it's learned the hard way.
Painted the block, heads and a few other things over the weekend. Not fun painting in the cold. Heat the garage up to about 65 degrees. Metal is still cold. Heads in the basement by the furnace along with the paint to warm up. Space heater by the block to get it above 50 degrees. Spray paint then open the garage door and leaf blower to get fumes out of the air so the house doesn't stink. I need to paint the valve covers and that's it. Not sure if this was all worth it.
I put the lifters back in with new trays. Next up is slapping the heads back on.
Hey look at that. The sludge puppy 5.3 cleaned up decent but it's not worth it I swear. If this thing fails I won't go through this effort of clean up again.
Got the clutch and transmission mated to the block. Ready to drop in the truck now. But I'm going to knock out some other tasks like cleaning injectors, pairing down the stock harness, and re welding the exhaust before I pull the truck in and lose a good bit of space.
When I "built" the exhaust a couple of years ago, my welder was a flux core splatter machine. Poor leaking welds produced this abomination:
Luckily I've been able to upgrade my welder to the finest cheap welder on Amazom. I have a 220 capable welder with gas that I got setup today. Night and day difference welding with gas. Planning to clean up the exhaust tomorrow.
That transmission is begging for cleaning and paint
What brand adapter plate did you use between the 4l60e bell housing and the AR5? How do you feel about this setup in normal driving?
In reply to madmrak351 :
Fabbot Fabrication. Seems there are lot of cheaper versions available now. No complaints. I really like the remote speed bleeder.
Ive hardly driven this thing, but 1st gear is an on/off switch and not very useful. The rest of the gears are good for driving though. This will eventually be swapped for a th400 but that's much further down the road.
Yikes. Tried to mig over this using gas but man between the flux core and aluminized coating, I had zero luck. There was only one actual exhaust leak I found so I patched that up. I'll tell myself this is temporary since one day this truck will be turbo. I will however weld the other places that were held in by a clamp.
As long as it's strong and doesn't leak, send it.
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