About 20 years ago, I bought 3 8BA's from a friend of a friend to build one engine for a '36 3-window I owned. The guy building the engines tore all three down, and used the best parts to build a 276" Merc for me. Today, while I was straightening up the shop, I came upon a box that contained the extra valve train parts that weren't used in the long ago build. I am trying to downsize, so I started to go through this box to see what I had. I threw out all of the obviously bad stuff and ended up taking an inventory of what I have. It turns out that I have more than enough stuff that looks good to make one engine. My question is : Is this stuff worth saving? It turned out that both of the other blocks and cranks are good. I sold one of the blocks and have one left, as well as two turnable crankshafts and a dozen or so rods. Can I use this stuff to build another near stock engine, or am I better off buying new? I realize that these parts are used, but they are original Ford, and I have more than I would need for another engine (e.g I have 13 "Ford" script halves and 9 plain ones). I have valves, guides, retainers (both pieces), keepers, springs, and lifters. At first I was going to toss the lifters, but then re-considered; perhaps these lifter reground might be better than what is currently available. What do you folks think?
You could reuse the valves if the stems are not too worn or if they haven't been ground on too much. Test the springs. Guides maybe not. Everything else yes. If you are gonna toss them, I will take 'em....
Looks like I'm going to be able to use this stuff. Are there any parameters I can use to determine if the valves/guides are good? Like an acceptable measurement on the valve head to the "shiney" part where it contacts the seat? Valve stem diameter tolerances? I can slip the valves into the guides, and I can't seem to get them to "wallow". I should say that from what I know of these engines, they were pulled in the '60's and stored inside until I bought them. Two were pickup engines (8RT), and one was an 8BA.
I never advocate throwing any old ford parts away... if they are in good shape, use them. There are guidelines for valve clearances/margin/angles/etc... They can be reground in most cases. That said, a complete new valvetrain (minus lifters) with new stainless steel valves is about $220. I just used a kit from macs and the valves were all concentric, nice quality. Hardly worth the time/cost to recondition worn parts unless you own the equipment to do so. I wouldn't bother resurfacing the lifters unless they're adjustable type.
Get hold of the shop manual. '49-51 Ford, '48-52 truck, '49-51 merc are all available, all somewhat different, hand you all the specs you need to decide between discard and use. Many people are inserting the bronze spirals or sleeves into original guides now because NOS is about all gone and some of the repros are a little too scary for actual use. From what you have said, it sounds like a lot of what you have will be usable as is, and the original stuff is all USA or Canadian made from the best materials, not cast from Chinese rebar...
Thanks for the advice guys. It looks now like I am going to use these parts when I put together my next engine. I have an engine test stand that I can run the engine on, so I guess I'll go with what looks good to me and see how it all turns out. If I make a mistake, I don't think it will be too hard to correct. I put a couple retainers and a set of keepers into my*********y tumbler this morning, and by 5 O'Clock they came out looking like new. I'd like to run the valve springs through the tumbler, but am unsure if it will cause any problems. Does anybody know anything about this? A few hours in the tumbler with plastic media sure makes this stuff look good! I'm leaving for Florida in a couple of weeks, so I probably won't get around to this until next spring. When I get back, I'll get back on here and let everybody know how things turn out. Have a good winter!
The Jalopy Journal
