Restoring Rusty

[hatzie]

I'll be captain obvious here... They need to be throughly clean as well as the anti-rotation indents in the rods and caps clear of crud.
You also need to be sure the oil holes from the main journals to the rod journals are clear of crud. If you get any siginifcant crud from the rod journal feed holes you may need to pull the block so you can remove the crank.
Install them with assembly lube not dry.

If the cam or main bearings are loose the oil pressure will drop.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by Marshy

Clean them with brake kleen then use engine oil or assembly lube, your choice, can't go wrong with either. Dry is not a good idea IMO. Also not checking that you have the right bearing could mean another trip back into the engine and another replacement. Plastigauge is a sound method for checking journal clearance. How about those main bearings? If the rod bearings needed replacing then the mains did also. Might want to check then while your in there.

Rod bearings did not need replacing the rings did

[Marshy]

Originally Posted by Gregski

Rod bearings did not need replacing the rings did

Why did you replace them then, just because you were there when honing?. The only thing you did in the lower end was replace those bearings. If you need 10 under bearing and put standard bearings in then that could explain your sound. Also having one or more not torqued properly would too... just saying, easy check. GL, hope your figure it out.

[Gregski]

thank you all for your feedback, coming up are some visuals

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by Marshy

Why did you replace them then, just because you were there when honing?.

yes the old ones were out so I thought might as well put new ones in, it's like when you take the old water pump off to do the timing set, you put a new water pump back on, even if the old one was still good, just cause it's such a P.I.A.

[Gregski]

#1 this one is bad (don't mind the tiny specs of dirt on it now I got that on the bearing whilst pulling it out) but something else could have been in there before, who knows

[Gregski]

#2 also bad/loose - I'm beginning to think there was some crud on the #1/#2 crank journal

[Gregski]

#3 was good

[Gregski]

# 4 was good too

[Marshy]

You definitely has some garbage going around in there. It likely the mains look the same now. How does the rod journal look on the crank?

[hatzie]

Originally Posted by Marshy

You definitely has some garbage going around in there. It likely the mains look the same now. How does the rod journal look on the crank?

Agreed. Looks like you got some leavins from honing the cylinders or just plain dirt in there. If you're darn lucky it just contaminated the lube holes between the mains and rod journals and the lube oil washed it into the rod bearings.

What does the #1-2 rod journal look like? For that matter 3-4, 5-6, & 7-8 too...

I've done rod and even main bearings in-frame but if I had to get into the cylinders with a hone and-or ridge reamer the block got pulled so I could wash out all of the leftover crud with Kerosene and DAWN. The tiny pieces of stone and cast iron gets airborne and goes everywhere. You can't keep it out of the important parts.

The metal and carborundum dust is same reason nobody uses their good lathe for toolpost grinding you use the cheap one that had a rough life instead.

[Gregski]

Well let me show you how the other half lives

[harley87ta]

When you were honing the cylinders you seemed to be pretty careful with the deflector thingy you had.

[Gregski]

# 5 was ok

[Gregski]

# 6 was ok

[Gregski]

# 7 was horrible the worst one of them all, and I suspect the source of the rattle

[Gregski]

# 8 was ok

[Gregski]

but that's not the end of it, I found water in the oil pan and when I removed the oil pan water dripped on to the floor from the inside of the block somewhere, now I say water cause after the heads came off to replace the rings I filled the radiator with water only, common practice when you first reassemble the motor, in case you find a leak or need to tear it apart again, anywho it appears it is running down the back wall of the engine block, the wall that butts up against the fly wheel, but keep in mind the front of my truck is jacked up on jack stands to make for easier crawlability under it

so yes at this time it appears we are polishing a turd

[Gregski]

but since we was pot committed and because I am a complitionist by nature I bought three new standard size bearings and replaced #1, #2, and #7

I torqued them down to 45 foot pounds in two stages this time, first to 30 foot pounds then to 45 foot pounds (by the way my new China made Craftsman torque wrench is a piece of complete garbage, the plastic handle jams and feels flimzy, I hate that tool)

also this time I did not grease the back sides of the bearings and allowed the juicy special sauce on the crank to self lube the fronts

well another 9 hour day spent working on the truck, at least I can't say I didn't have the time to work on it

finally my day culminated with a start up, rev up to 3000 RPM for 1 minute, a 10 minute warm up, then a nice 50 mile drive, streets and finally highway

no noises yet, but we will see what happens after a couple heat cycles, ie start and drive the truck, then let it sit there cool off, then start and drive it again

last time it lasted 100 miles, lets see if we can beat that, LOL

but I do see a roller block in the near future, Rusty get ready for a transplant!

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by harley87ta

When you were honing the cylinders you seemed to be pretty careful with the deflector thingy you had.

Yes I even wrapped the crank in plastic garbage bags

[Marshy]

The water could be explained by any number of things. Leaky head gasket, intake manifold gasket, crack in the block or when you removed the heads it got into the motor. It seems quite possible some remnants from the hone job could have caused that bearing failure though. Did you lubricate the hone at all? It seems like if it was lubed it might run down the inside of the block and get all over. If it was dry then stone and iron dust would get air born and go all over. Hopefully you have it straightened out now.

FYI
Last time I pulled my heads I used a 1/4" house with a large tapered tip from my might vac kit to stick in the head bolt hole at the rear of the engine and syphoned the water jacket down, worked great, didn't get a drop of water in the cylinders.

[Marshy]

Double post.

[Tiger Joe]

I would have liked to seen some side by sides of your old bearing vs new. IMO none of those look very good for only 100 miles.

Also, gotta imagine if its tearing the rod bearings up, whats it doing to the cam and mains.

[pontgta]

Ok greg... the suspense is killing me is Rusty alive? ��

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by pontgta

Ok greg... the suspense is killing me is Rusty alive? ��

Ha ha I love it, thank you for asking, Rusty and I have piled on over 200 additional miles since we replaced the three ugly new rod bearings, The Greg is trying to go one whole week without wrenchin' on his truck, remember its running with the stock exhaust manifolds and the LMC Truck 2 1/4 pipe dual exhaust with some type of chambered mufflers, but we got plans for the weekend