Popular Post Unclejake Posted January 29, 2019 Popular Post Share Posted January 29, 2019 If all goes to plan I'll pay for this heap in a few days. The current owner is a good mate who gave up on the truck some time ago. He's offered it to me at a very fair price so I hacked it out of waist high thistles a couple of days ago, found enough wheels to get it in the air, and got the brakes un-seized enough to get it rolling...in a straight line. Hopefully I'll get an ignition key this week which will mean I can unlock the steering. I'll get some batteries and see if she'll run. I know little about diesel engines so this could be fun. She's a 6.5 turbo V8, and despite looking pretty haggard is quite sound in the body and chassis. One of the worst things is the wheel size - they're 16.5 inch. Those are 33x12.5x16.5 tyres on both the wheels you see. The truck makes otherwise big tyres seem small. I'm on an island where WoFs aren't a thing, but I have no tools except my carpentry gear with me so I will be at the mercy of others. So far people have all said I'm mad (the truck has a reputation as a bit of a lemon around here), but they've all offered me gear too. Nice. 40 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Unclejake Posted February 6, 2019 Author Popular Post Share Posted February 6, 2019 The bad news is that the parts needed list is starting to grow. Brakes are shot, brake lines are rusty and about to fail, suspension bushes are well flogged, the ignition barrel is destroyed, the ignition module is fried, the transmission is unknown, but worst of all the engine is almost completely seized. It will turn over juuuust, but I can't budge it with a socket wrench and the starter will only just rotate it. There's another Chev with a similar engine (but non turbo) in the same paddock and I can easily turn that motor over with a socket wrench, so something is bad inside the 6.5 litre turbo engine. 6.5 engine re-build kits are surprisingly affordable (around $1,500 plus shipping) - so I may yet pull the engine out for a better look, but I don't have anywhere to do that yet. There's plenty of guys with Hi-ab trucks here, so the actual lift will be achievable, but finding a dry shed and an engine stand for a couple of months is another matter. I better go to the pub and yarn to some old-timers. BRB 18 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unclejake Posted February 9, 2019 Author Share Posted February 9, 2019 Dear readers, things are not going entirely to plan, but the good news is that I have access to a shed next week, and the weather has been amazing, so I've spent the last couple of afternoons lying on hardened sheep shit and thistles, whilst dropping rust flakes in my eyes, in an attempt to get the motor ready to remove next week. Once the motor is on a pallet and the heads and sump are off I'll make a decision as to what to do next. The big unknown is the transmission. I'd hate to spend three or four grand sorting the motor to find the trans or 4x4 system was no good, but at this stage I have no way of checking. I do have what may be a dumb question wrt removing the torque convertor without draining the transmission, which I'll ask on the discussion page. Be gentle. I know petrol, carbs and manual gearboxes. This diesel/turbo/automatic malarky is new to me. 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Unclejake Posted February 19, 2019 Author Popular Post Share Posted February 19, 2019 Milestone! Finally she's in a shed. Hopefully the engine will be on the floor by Sunday 22 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Unclejake Posted February 24, 2019 Author Popular Post Share Posted February 24, 2019 What a mission! I will have a look inside the engine once we can move it to somewhere I can pull it down. Probably next weekend. I dread refitting it though. It was a bastard to get out. 15 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unclejake Posted March 2, 2019 Author Share Posted March 2, 2019 The first problem found (apart from the normal exhaust studs snapping etc) was this. It's hard to say if the accumulated crud was actually blocking the thermostat when the engine was operational or not, but still...ha! Then I got a bit confuddled by this rotated injector spray guide thingy (whatever they're called) which doesn't seem to lock into the head very well, and by the strange burn pattern on it might have been rotating when the engine was running? Dunno really. I would have thought the head would have clamped the thing down enough to stop it rotating, but it was half out of the head when I lifted the head off the block By the time I got the sump off I was too dirty to touch my phone so no crank photos (sorry), but I found no sign of anything getting very hot, no huge cracks anywhere, no snapped bolts, the pistons slide up and down the bores just fine (albeit with a bit of a ridge at the top of the bore), but almost all of the main and B/E bearings had been spinning. There's bits of bearing jammed inside the crank oil galleries and I'm having trouble lifting out the crank on my own (mainly due to spun bearings I guess), but it was getting dark, the shed has no lights or power and the flies kept landing on my sweaty bald head, so I will pull the crank tomorrow. There may just be more life in the engine yet! I am pretty happy to have found most of the internals intact. 9 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unclejake Posted March 2, 2019 Author Share Posted March 2, 2019 If it looks like the engine is recoverable I might just splash out an a caliper rebuild kit too. Oh, and about a kilometre of brake line, some flare nuts, a few balljoints, a Pitman arm with a BJ that activates the drag link after less than half a rotation of the steering wheel, a hell of a lot of POR15 and about 100 other things. LOL Freight will be a killer, but stuff for these full-sized GM pick-ups is easily available and usually remarkably cheap (compared to Lexus bits anyway). 9 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unclejake Posted March 3, 2019 Author Share Posted March 3, 2019 Three of the five main bearings looked like this. It's the reason the motor was so tight to turn over, and probably caused by an oil line falling off a couple or months before the vehicle got parked. There's no blueing on the crank but the crank journal is slightly scored, as is the crank. The three mains that spun bearings are the three centre ones. These blocks are known to crack at the crank webs of the three central mains, but with a visual inspection I can't see any cracks. I'm pretty sure the bearings are original size (I need to look up the numbers to be certain) I'm off to find a 1,000 litre water container and a petrol water-blaster to try an clean the block up a bit more. The headgasket where the pre-combustion chamber had rotated shows milds signs of soot past the fire ring. I know the previous owner changed the heads some time ago. The engine bolts were either so tight I needed a trolley jack handle over a strong arm to budge them, or were finger tight. There was no in-between. Ha! I need to decide if I'm going to fix this properly (which means sending the disassembled long-block to either Napier or Timaru for a line hone, crank grind, head job and re-bore), or if I'll risk just chucking a fresh set of bearings at it (and not even bother plasti-gauging it) and re-use the existing pistons and rings. I'll ponder than over a beer later in the week 6 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Unclejake Posted March 3, 2019 Author Popular Post Share Posted March 3, 2019 I wouldn't recommend waterblasting a block with the cam and lifters still in, but I didn't have any other way to get it cleaned so I spent 45 minutes pumping bore water onto a ute, then borrowed a petrol blaster and a hose. Gravity feed to the blaster wasn't the best, but at least the block is clean enough to see a bit better, but probably still oily enough not to rust much overnight. The blackened main caps tell a story of no bottom end oil flow and spun bearings. I am not sure which happened first. I reckon I'm going to order a set of gaskets, bottom end bearings, a timing chain and just slap it all back together. 16 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Unclejake Posted March 4, 2019 Author Popular Post Share Posted March 4, 2019 I chatted to an engine reconditioner in Hasting this morning. A line bore (to straighten up the crankshaft tunnel) is about $1.5k plus shipping (so > $2k) so I'm now looking for another block. The re-builder may have a contact for one in Hastings (which would be easy). He'll let me know soon. There's also a short-block rusting away in a paddock here, with the pistons completely corroded to the bores. I better go have a look at it. There's a slight chance the bottom end could be OK. Who knows.... but it's off to a grubby, windy paddock for me. Again! LOL 10 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Unclejake Posted March 5, 2019 Author Popular Post Share Posted March 5, 2019 I give up. I've bought a boring Jap 4x4 double cab from Auckland and am suitably ashamed. It was fun pulling big Yankee iron to bits (well sometimes it was fun), but it's going to take too long to get this mighty beast operational and I just can't wait three months to be mobile in my own wagon (having said that the PoS I did buy won't be here until the end of April) Fuck you AllTorque. You were right, but I'll never admit it publicly. LOL 11 2 2 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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