LET ME MAKE THIS CLEAR...I AM NOT CREATING THIS POST TO TEACH ANYONE ANYTHING, RATHER POST ALL OF MY QUESTIONS...maybe some day, someone else, just as green as I am may stumble upon this thread and learn from my mistakes, and save face not having to ask the very very basic questions I am about to. Just got my hands on a solid running 8ba out of a 49 Ford. Burned a fair amount of oil, had a little valve noise, but ran strong. I am going to post here all the pictures and a play by play as best as I can. I will have a million questions along the way, most of which are probably very basic to most of you on the HAMB...so thank you in advance with any help you can give me! Day One: Got the motor into my garage and up on the stand. There may be a more graceful way to do this, but I went at it alone...next time I will call for back up. Started by taking off the heads. First the left side. Things went well, no broken bolts. As stated before, this was a running motor, ran 4 days before I got it, so I was not expecting anything to be froze up on me. Took the left head off first, and things looked pretty good. Time for a rebuild for sure. The cylinders looked good, although worn. As stated before, it was a smoker, so this is not at all surprising. When I get it to the machine shop I will know better how much of a bore will be necessary. I figure if I am going to go all out, I may as well do it big. Not sure how big, I have read .125 is the largest you can go...and with this size there is no room for a rebuild later on in life, but really...how long would that get me by...a couple hundred thousand miles on a car I wont drive every day? Think that will be fine.
These pics are of the pistons/valves after the left head was removed. Quite a bit of carbon build up, and the valve furthest on the left is caked with a hard white deposit. To my surprise, with the naked eye, I can not find any cracks! The larger water holes are a bit rough around the edges, but I have been told not to worry about that to much, just have them cleaned at the machine shop, any loose stuff knocked out. Close up pic of those.
Here is a shot with the other head off. Again, no cracks that I can see with my naked eye. This side seems to be a lot better off somehow. While on the other side, all pistons/valves are caked with blackness, this side you can still see bare metal on the top of the pistons, and most of the valves. What might cause this from side to side?
Got the intake/pullys off easy, then onto the water pumps. I was glad to read in another thread to watch out for the hidden water pump bolt...there are 4 on each pump, one is inside the water passage at the bottom of the unit. It is not centered, so get down and look for it.
After removing the water pumps (which seemed to still be in good shape, no play in the pullies, rolled smooth...I noticed that there is a large hole in the block on either side that makes no sense to me. It is where a gasket completely covers the thing rendering it useless...or is it? What would be the point if no water can flow through it? Was this set up for a different water pump set up? They were way out of wack, not circles any more. Here is a pic of the one on the left...should I be worried? The gaskets cover it no problem, just seems odd to me
This is the one thing that is giving me trouble so far (haven't tried the valves yet!) It is the oil pressure thingie (technical term) It is all kinds of stripped, so I will have to figure something out before I take it to the machine shop
She enjoys having her tools and "working" along side me. Mom loves her smelling like dirty oil and black mittens at the end of the day!
Now for another question. I am going to tackle the valve removal next. I know that I need the valve removal tool...pickle fork sort of thing, am I also going to need a spring compression tool of sorts? Again, I am new to this!
I'm just a little less green than you when it comes to flat heads, however when I tackled the valve removal step I ended up using the bit C-shaped valve removal tool one would typically use for overhead valves. Its a bit of a stretch but it compressed the assembly enough to get the keepers knocked out with the actual flathead spring compressor bar. hope this makes sense....good luck
I'm just a little less green than you when it comes to flat heads, however when I tackled the valve removal step I ended up using the bit C-shaped valve removal tool one would typically use for overhead valves. Its a bit of a stretch but it compressed the assembly enough to get the keepers knocked out with the actual flathead spring compressor bar. hope this makes sense....good luck
Looks to me like you have an internal coolant leak that caused "piston wash" and corrosion on that one cylinder. You said you saw no visible cracks, but a lot of cracks are under the valves in the seats and passages. Regarding valve removal, I'd compress the springs, remove the keepers, and pull the valves out. Then spray the guides with penetrating oil and hit them downward.
Good luck on your build. You will do fine just proceed slowly. With that helper you will surely succeed. If you are building a street motor I would use 4 ring pistons.Are you going to port your block? Carcraft or Street rodder had some articles on rebuilding a flathead. One of the tricks we use to do is drill an 1/8" hole in the lifter bore's so valve adjustment would be easy. That is of course you use adjustable lifters.
You will be a lucky man if the valve guides will come out using the pickle fork tool. I have used an ordinary valve compressor as well as a pickle fork to simply compress the springs, flick the locks off, pull the valves out if you can, then take the springs out. The guides will probably be fairly well stuck in the block, but I use either a long socket or the female end of a 1/2 inch drive extension to use as a drift with a hammer applied to knock the valve guides down into the valley. The socket or extension is just to keep you from boogaring up the guide. I tend to view the pickle fork as an assembly tool rather than a disassembly too. Here is a link to a few pictures. I sure need to finish up that series. Retirement is only 52 days away, so maybe then. http://flatheaddrag.com/gpf/gpf8valves.html
Well, that made me want to vomit. Do you say that because of what looks like white corrosion on the far left piston?
The caked on stuff could have also been a blown head gasket. or the reason for the left having all the carbon is because it doesnt have oil blowing past the pistons...the other side might, making it look like less carbon buildup when in reality its just getting blackened. hard to tell by the pics though. looks like a good build thread. ill be watching for sure.
In reality I think that is just a really bad picture. That piston on the far left is actually the cleanest one of the bunch. What looks like white corrosion, is actually bare metal. Hope this changes things!
if that's the case then it looks like you were getting a little bit of a premature ignition on that cylinder. the whole cylinder not being black could be why it might not have ran that well.
Premature ignition. Story of my life. What would cause premature ignition? Sorry for the beginner questions!
You are going to magnaflux the block, aren't you? I am about your stage with my 8BA. Block has been cleaned, magnafluxed okay except for a couple of small indications around the center head stud holes (I think this was a universal issue and generally not a big deal). But I sure wouldn't spend money on rebuilding a motor without getting it checked. I know a guy some years ago that did a 59AB, full rebuild, got it in the car and put water into it and it leaked right out! Suffice to say he was not a happy camper.
No vomiting please. Welcome to the world of the flathead Ford, where some say 85% of the blocks out there are cracked. The white corrosion is from water, now you need to find the source. An engine stored for a long time can accumulate condensation or even rainwater in the cylinders. A blown headgasket, warped heads, or cracked block will allow coolant to leak into the combustion chambers. A piston that is "wiped clean" of carbon indicates to me that coolant leaked into the cylinders while it was running. You would also see rust and corrosion on the valves, the heads, and perhaps the cylinder walls. You need to break it down and send it out to be tanked and magnafluxed, and/or get a pressure testing kit and reinstall the heads and pressure test it. Many cracks can be repaired, so don't panic yet. If you're worried about expense, you're looking at the wrong engine for a cheap rebuild.
Wait, these aren't cheap to rebuild? Kidding. Rather than putting the heads back on, it is getting torn down and taken into the machine shop to be tested. Thanks for all your help everyone.
Pre ignition: the fuel/air mixture lighting off in the cylinder before the spark plug fires. Often due to glowing carbon on top of a piston or on the head. Or a bit of a lean condition in that cylinder. Unless it is going to be an all out race motor I am not a fan of boring the block more than is needed to clean the cylinder walls up such as .030 over standard. That leaves room for it to be redone again if the need ever comes up. On the large holes in the casting at the front of the block. I'd have to think that those were because of the way the casting mold was setup when the foundry poured the blocks. Plus it would give the foundry a bit of a better passage to get the sand out of the waterjackets when they cleaned it out.
It might be a sign of water getting in from somewhere but there is light coloring on the bottom half of each piston on that bank with the rear one being the most noticeable. There isn't any sign of the carbon being washed off the valves or the area around the valves though. I'm still thinking detonation What does the head look like?.
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