cracked everything?

[bobracing]

Had a friend tear down an 7.3 engine (92 with an ATS turbo) this weekend and found eight cracked pistons and two cracked heads, heads were cracked in different places on both heads.
What would cause this much damage. Overheating?

 

[flareside_thun]

On the pistons, it can look like cracks but sometimes it's casting lines. As for the heads, I can't tell you how many I've seen that crack between the valves.

 

[icanfixall]

Usually overheating will crack the heads. Also removing them the wrong way can create so much stress that they crack. Running too hot on the exhaust gas can overheat the pistons and cause small stress cracks too. When you say the pistons are cracked what do you mean. Can you post a pic of the pistons.

 

[bobracing]

I'll see if I can get a picture, not planning on being out there until next week some time. I'm running on second hand info but one head was cracked inbetween the valves and not sure if they were hair line cracks or broken, but I do know the engine had LOTS of blow-by. Not sure if the blow-by was a resent thing or came that way.
The engine was in unknown condition when bought, ran fairly good but always had a heating problem.

 

[jaluhn83]

I put 3 cracks in mine between the 2 heads from serious overheating, all where between the 2 valve seats across the narrow section. I lost all coolant (blew a freeze plug) going uphill at about 2700 rpm and 7 psi of boost. Took about 2 minutes to realize it was that bad (thought it was a temp gauge issues at first) and when I pulled over the motor stopped immediately as soon as stepped on the clutch. No scoring or piston damage though.

Never seen piston cracks.

 

[racer30]

Both my 94 turbo engines had most of the piston cracked, one engine shatered one piston and kept running untill it wore a 1/4 inch grove in the cylinder from the rod and rist pin slapping around inside the cylinder. Heat kills pistons.