Engine coming apart

Yeah, I have no patience.  I have an excuse, I want to reduce the weight on that engine stand by getting the intake and heads off of it.  But that means it needs to be mostly disassembled.  I'm sure by that point I'll want to take the short block apart, too, but I'm going to try to resist the urge, the heads and intake look like enough work to clean up at this point anyway.  

Took some more stuff off of the intake manifold... and I wanted a reference shot before I went further.  

This was supposed to be a shot of that bracket in the foreground right behind the oil dipstick so I know what it is and where it was before I took it off... then I didn't take it off yet anyway.

 Cleaned up the distributor contact and marked it with a little 'chisel' (aka: regular screwdriver...)

Here's the carburetor. 

 Here's where the distributor used to be.  I get it now (how it connects with the camshaft and everything)

Distributor and mounting bracket with bolt. 

 Lookee here!  The intake manifold!  It's filthy!  That must mean that the engine's 'open'... I'm very excited.  

Look at that!  Camshaft, pushrods, intake ports on heads, water jacket holes... um... is that hole in the middle supposed to be packed solid? 

Close-up... this doesn't look good... something tells me there were some cooling issues, possibly the reason why the freeze plugs blew out?  I hope nothing's cracked.  

This is the opposite-side port.  Looks better.  

I'm going to chip away at those deposits with a screwdriver and hope that they can be cleaned.  I haven't even looked in the intake port yet, I got called back in the house to herd toddlers.  At least none of the pushrods look bent or anything, right?  Next step: more cleaning and getting into the heads...

Motor's out.

Last week I picked up a couple of chains for pulling the motor, one for the motor and another to hold up the transmission.  I was getting everything ready for pulling on Saturday and realized my chain was too short to go from frame to frame (it's only 4 feet long).  Probably should have a 6 foot chain for that.  Anyway, I jacked it up with a block of wood under the trans oil pan and it worked fine.  

Here's the rented hoist in the back of the van... 

...and assembled.  Rated to 1500 pounds, $18 4-hr rental from Ruddy Rents... an outstanding deal, assuming I only need it for four hours...

I was waiting for Mark to get back from his errand, so I rolled it in and lifted the engine just a teensy bit.

After some fighting, she came out no problem.  I had missed a big bolt down by the oil filter, had to take the oil filter off and get that bolt out (5/8 inch).

I had a lot of bad scenarios playing through my head, like will the lift be high enough for the block to clear the car and not too high to clear the garage door... it was just fine.

With the new vantage point and better light, an Asian beetle infestation was revealed.  Also, it's cool seeing the exhaust valves in there.  Filthy... like looking in a chimney... which makes sense, I suppose.

Photo op with Nathan, who was interested to see the engine pulled and really needed a haircut.  The hoist wheeled really easy also, it was great.

Nate wrenching the engine stand bolts onto the block.

And there it is.  It's not a very good engine stand, but it was free. The oil leak at the front of the crank kept going, so I replaced the Crate and Barrel cardboard with the oil pan and have since drained the oil from the oil pan (as best I can... the angle means there's a good amount in the pan yet.

And here's the engine bay with all kinds of room for me to climb in there with a scrub brush.  :-)  I still have to figure out how to remove the shift linkage for the transmission so I can pull it.

Since then I've continued attacking the block with a wire brush to clean things up and took off the carburetor. I also picked up a 'way on sale' stick welder and 4-inch grinder from Northern Tool so I am primed to start some serious work, hopefully... assuming I don't electrocute myself.  With the engine block there and the further work planned, I'm kind of assuming that my car will be parked in the driveway from now on in order for there to be decent room for the van (for Sarah and the kids).  It's cool, it's almost spring anyway.  

I'm going to practice weld chunks of the exhaust pipe to start out and start carefully cutting away the rusted body panels with the grinder to get at the underlying structures that I need to cut pieces of steel to replace.  I'm hoping I don't 'need' to get a band saw for cutting sheet metal, but we'll see.  Also (like I said), need to disconnect the shift linkage to get the transmission out, clean up the engine compartment... then get the car set up so that I can remove the k-member and get set up to replace/repair the frame.  And while I'm at it, proceed with cleaning/disassembly of the motor.  It's good to have something to keep me busy. 

Pulled a body panel!

I never did post anything about the exhaust manifolds.  I've cleaned them up some, I think I've located a car wash I can degrease them at so I can paint them.  

More clean-up inside where I pulled out the rear seat belt.  It's not as bad as I thought it was.  Then again, I don't really know what I'm doing so maybe it IS as bad as I thought it was, or worse, and I'm just ignorant to the horror.  I'm tempted to start wire-brushing away flaked paint and rust, but I'm not cutting that out and fabbing new pieces anytime soon, so I let it go.  Once the motor and tranny are out I want to wheel it out of the garage and really clean it out.

I don't know what the body panels are named, I'm sure I could learn with a proper service manual.  Anyway, I got the first body panel off today, the one that goes from fender to fender on the front top there.  Took out the headlight mounts to get it out... they're pretty dirty and rusty.  I wish I had a blasting cabinet... and nice air compressor, 60-gallon tank, etc....

Passenger-side with the stuff gone.  I want to get the fenders off to fix and clean up/repair everything underneath... and make it easier working on the frame and all of the suspension components.

I can just cut those rusted parts out and weld in patches, right?  Right.  :-)

The removed piece that I don't know the name of.  There's a nice furry surface of rust inside there.

My shelves of parts and baggies.  The rest are in the trunk.

I still can't figure out how to disconnect the shift linkage.  Of course, I also haven't researched it, I just lie there on the cold floor and look at it, maybe cleaning it up a bit with shop rags.  I loosened the transmission mount bolt, also, so that's ready to pull out once I figure out how to disconnect the shift linkage.  The tranny fluid cooler lines are still there, too, I'm going to replace them though so I'll just cut those out when I'm ready to pull it.  Also have to disconnect the speedometer sensor/sending unit, but that's a no-brainer.  (famous last words?)  

The passenger-side floor plan should just be replaced, also.  I can see a constellation of little pinpricks of light coming through the floor on that side.  Might as well make the floor more solid.  While I'm at it, the passenger-side rear floor is dented up pretty good, not sure what happened there.  It looks like the car was dropped on a boulder or something.  

Slow boat to somewhere

Yeah, I wouldn't say I've been 'busy' with the car... but I lean on it and look at the engine every once in a while.  ;-)

Seriously, though, I drained the transmission fluid and cleaned up the trans cover.  I know it doesn't sound like much but it looks better with that clean pan under there.  I had hopes of painting it to practice my painting 'skills' but didn't.  I've been trying to locate a car wash with the manual wands and whatnot that I can take parts to for degreasing rather than in my sink, haven't found one yet.  I have a line on one, though.  If I want to paint the transmission after I have it out and cleaned up, we'll see about it then.

I kind of attacked the exhaust manifolds with a wire attachment on the drill, ostensibly as prep to paint it silver.  I read further and I'm going to hold off until I can degrease them in a car wash instead.  No rush.

I finally caved and just cut the wire to the oil pressure sending unit so I could have the wiring harness totally disconnected from the engine.  Then I found where the last wire was going, it was connected to the transmission, so I got that disconnected too, wiring harness totally off.

I ground out some rust on the interior, pulled off another seat belt and attacked the foam holding one of the rear seat belts in place... turns out that's about all that was holding it in, it's totally rusted solid and just came out.  I'll need to weld in a nut to the sheet metal I fabricate for those corners in order to have something to bolt the rear seat belts into... and added the rear belts to the 'need new parts' list.

I was going to disconnect the shift linkage from the tranny but... I can't see how to do it.  Where it looks like it would be convenient to disconnect it, there are no bolts or nuts or screws, it's just what looks like a sealed ball joint kinda thing.  So I laid on my back, cigar smoke wafting through the rusted hole in the floor, gazing at the shift linkage and then up through the floor at the underside of the dashboard.

Back topside, I took the ignition coil and choke off of the intake manifold.  The coil has a crack on it... another 'replace this' item.  The choke has a bimetallic coil in it that's all rusted.  I wonder how much that costs... if it's like ten bucks, I'll replace it.

Now that so much is taken off, I look at it and think 'what was there?'  I have great faith that when I'm putting everything back together (hopefully next spring), I'll either remember or figure out what order to go in... ;-)

Whoa, updates? Not much... :-(

Been doing a little bit here and there.  I've been attacking some rusty surfaces with wire attachments to my drill and it's been generally good.  Cleaned up around some rusty areas of the trunk lid, hit the lock bolts with liquid wrench (be great to be able to close the trunk and open it without a screwdriver).  Started de-rusting the driver's front wheelwell... not pretty obviously... and while I was at it, hit the frame rail some more.  While I was under there, I decided it was time to drain the tranny fluid in prep for pulling the transmission.  For the record, one of my least favorite vehicular maintenance tasks is draining transmission fluid... so many bolts, so messy.  I think I got it all caught in my pan, though.  While that was draining I started hitting the interior rust with the drill/brush.  It's funny, I'd thought it was moderately non-filthy in there... now there's all kinds more dust/dirt flying around.  Good times.

Had to come back and herd kids but still, good to get some stuff done.

I also finally acquired the correct bolts to pull the motor and bolt it up to the engine stand.  I first went to O'Reilly with a sample bolt from the bell housing (which matches the bolt holes in the heads which is where I plan to attach the chain for pulling the motor) and according to the bolt/nut size display, said it was a metric bolt... which surprised me.  I bought two (they didn't have any big enough for mounting on the engine stand), went home... they don't fit in the holes.  Last week I was at Ace Hardware and did the same thing... Ace's display said it was a standard fit bolt.  On faith, I got four long ones for the engine stand and two short for the engine lift... they fit perfectly.  So... kudos to Ace.  I still need a chain and the engine lift, obviously.  Maybe in January.

Also hoping the welding kit I'm looking at stays on sale at Northern Tool into February when I should have money for it.  Not holding my breath.  ;-)

oops

I've been, I think, fairly careful in the disassembly up to this point.  I realized something the other day, though.  I was relaxing with my Haynes manual, reviewing the 'pull the transmission' section when I realized that 'remove all of the bolts from the bell housing' came AFTER 'support the engine with a block of wood under the oil pan and use a chain to support the transmission.'  So... I need to do those things, I think.  Of course, rather than do them, I did a few other things this weekend.  Got another seat belt disconnected, swept out the interior a little more... then I did something really fun... I jacked up the rear end and took out the driveshaft.  It's surprisingly easy to take out... just four little bolts off of the U-joint at the rear and and then pull it out of the transmission.

Of course... I was supposed to mark the orientation of the driveshaft on the pinion so I could put it back the same way... <sigh>

Also came across this interesting bit... I have no instructions that say 'drain the transmission fluid' before pulling the driveshaft... however:

So that's great.  So much for my 'clean' garage floor.  Of course, the entire transmission is coated with coil and crud, so when it comes out that'll be nice anyway.  What I'm wondering if this means that the rear seal on the transmission needs to be replaced... of course if I'm going to have it out anyway, I should replace that seal as a matter of course while I'm at it.  Hoping to pull the engine this weekend, maybe I'll take the tranny out before that, we'll see how busy this week gets.

Here's the rear end.  I'm hoping the 'after' pictures look better... ;-)

back in the saddle?

Life's been pretty busy/crazy the past couple of months, not much time for the car.  Been doing little things here and there and just got some good time in the past couple of weeks.

I got a little hand-brush to clean the dust and everything out from the inside rather than using my broom.  I wouldn't say it's 'clean' but it's certainly 'less filthy'.  Took out some more seatbelts, too.

Hopefully before it snows this year, I'll roll it out of the garage one last time and wash the inside with soap and water, some scrubbing, etc.

I got both of the engine mounts unbolted so it's ready to pull the engine out there anyway.  Yes, it's filthy.  In some places, inches of crusted dirt and oil deposits.

Passenger's side engine mount.  Up and to the right you see the fuel pump mount (had to remove it in order to get my wrench on the engine mount) and the water pump.  The K-member here is where I scraped a lot of crusty dirt out.  Lovely.

Took the torque converter cover off to reveal the flywheel and whatnot, got the four bolts out connecting the flywheel to the torque converter.  I'm impressed by how clean it looks in there.  Actually, now that I look at it, I see a fair amount of dirt in there... hmm.  Anyway, it's exciting to be looking 'into the guts' of the drivetrain.

Disconnected the throttle cable and the transmission kickdown lever.

 Looking up at the bottom of the engine and the bell housing.  Note the rusty hole to the left where there SHOULD be a freeze plug.  Same issue on the other side.  This was why my brother stopped driving the car... I can only imagine what the waterfall of coolant was like.  Anyway, I'm looking forward to seeing what all of this stuff looks like once it's clean.

I know I'm not doing anything with the frame right now until I can afford some things (like... frame rails and a welding setup), but I wanted this reference shot of the shift linkage mounted on the frame rail.  Looks like I might need some new bolts...

 Looking at the front of the engine.  The bottom pulley there is on the crankshaft, it was very exciting to me to turn that in order to rotate the engine to get the flywheel bolts off of the torque converter.  It turned pretty easy, so that's a good sign, I think.  Also, that pulley was so packed full of dirt, I couldn't even see the bolt in there.  I took a few minutes to chisel out the crud with my screwdriver.

So this is the front of the left-hand cylinder head.  That shiny bolt hole is where the negative battery cable attached... I'm thinking of putting a new bolt in there for attaching the chain to pull the engine out.  I can't see any better place to bolt in and I think it'll be strong enough... right?

My twisted pile of filthy seat belts.  I should have labeled them, it's going to be fun figuring out what goes where, I know.  Oh, well.

So this is the torque converter plate cover... I don't know why there's a little 'window' on the bottom of it, because considering airflow and whatnot, I would think that would just let flying rocks, gravel and small animals just get scooped up into the bellhousing.  I don't think I'll be putting this one back in, I'll get an 'aftermarket' with no 'window' in it.

The plan as of now is to keep cleaning and whatnot and Mark is going to help me pull the engine on Oct 29th.  With the engine out, I'll clean out the engine bay and want to pull out the tranny and driveshaft so it's as light as possible to roll out of the garage and do one last hose/clean before winter.  Then I'll break down and clean the engine and all.  I'd like to start 'work' on the trunk lid too, kind of to practice sanding down to a good surface and whatnot.  I'll probably start my welding/patching practice on the trunk lid, too... but I really doubt I'll be buying anything like a welding set until after the holidays are done... (February).  Until then, I'll keep cleaning and disassembling.  Plenty of that to keep me busy right now.

I would like to try to bend the roof supports back up, though... some lumber and a hydraulic jack... I may try that one of these days when I'm bored.  :-)