How not to do an engine swap (my 12 valve Cummins into 97 F-350 thread)

[marvgarr]

When you pulled the cam looked to me like the cam bearings were wiped looked like pure copper. Maybe I was looking at it wrong?

 

[yARIC008]

Anyone know what these are for? I’ll be mounting a fire extinguisher here.

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Pretty sure these are mag-lite flashlight holders.

About the head, if he didn't pull the head and replace/check everything then he's insane. Who knows what else these dudes left out of the engine. Perhaps a couple missing bolts on the crank bearings? lol

 

[TWeatherford]

Engine painted up and ready to go in.

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Core support prepped, primed, and painted.

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Engine in. There wasn’t too much drama getting it in. I tried to get it in without dropping the transmission. Messed around with it for 3 hours one evening without success. Rented a jack for $30 the next day, spent about an hour prying the transfer case and transmission apart because some idiot glued the two together with some sort of glue/gasket stuff. There is no sealing needed between the two, there are inner seals that do all that.

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Since I don’t have a press, I put the fan hub bearing in the freezer and the hub itself in the oven. Slid right together. I didn’t want to use a hammer on a nice new bearing.

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This was my power steering return line. In order to hook it to the Dodge power steering reservoir, you have to cut the Ford end off. Well, this was his solution. I can do better than that (although I can’t take a good picture of it).

Before

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After

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[TWeatherford]

Made a tube flaring tool with an exhaust clamp and pair of vice grips. Worked pretty well. This is one of my intercooler tubes. I made it up with 3” aluminum pipe and siliconintakes silicone fittings and t bolt clamps.

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Intercooler mounts, really high tech here.

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Most people mount the intercooler a bit higher than I have. I did a lot of measuring and careful cutting to remove the smallest amount of metal possible from the core support, as well as retain the four radiator mounting points. The result is that the bottom of the intercooler is just above the bottom row of the radiator core, and I didn’t have to modify the hood release cable.

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Silicone turbo drain line, 7/8” ID.

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[TWeatherford]

Got a buddy to weld some beads on the ends of my lower radiator pipe to prevent blow off. Ground with a grinder and then dremel to remove sharp edges, then painted.

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Wiring. This is the best way to hook in extra electrical splices. No need to fuse anything.

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I picked up a blank manual truck faceplate for my gauge cluster to get rid of the PRND2L.

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I guess the fuel drain was leaking. Solution, put a self sealing screw in it. I guess that’s fine for getting home, but it wasn’t good enough for me. So I bought a new drain/WIF sensor, and wired another plug to it so I can a WIF warning in my dash.

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Here’s a good one. If you need a hole in your dash to run brake controller wires, the best way to do it is to heat up a bolt red hot, and punch it through. Just make sure to destroy your remote lock/unlock module while you’re at it (in case there is any question, I did not do this).

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I don’t have pictures of all the rest of the wiring fuel shut off, grid heaters. I’ll try to do that later. I just temporarily mounted the gauges to my dash, till I figure out where exactly will be best to put them. I’m thinking overhead shelf, but I still might try to squeeze them into my dash, and go with an aftermarket tach and speedometer/odometer at the same time.

Gauges are exhausts temp, oil pressure, water temperature, boost, and fuel pressure. All have low and high alarms that close a relay, which I have wired to an alarm with a switch so I can shut the alarm off (for startup, since obviously it doesn’t have oil pressure instantly, also if something goes haywire on the road and I want to ignore the alarm if I know something isn’t a problem).

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[TWeatherford]

First start up went well. Started easily enough. Lots of white smoke. First time out of the garage in 7 months under its own power.

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I drove it about a hundred miles. Starts pretty well, a revolution or so at 50 F with no grid heaters used. Runs well. Need to fix a vibration problem where the exhaust is hitting the cab occasionally.

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Well, it runs good, but I kept losing oil. I figured excessive blowby. Then I did a blowby test. Cummins spec is like 11-12” H2O with a 15/64” orfice plugging the RDT. I have about 16-18”.

So, next step.

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I’ve got a pretty good groove in cylinders 5 and 6. Cylinders 1-4 look good, and all the rings are unbroken. I couldn’t even get the 5th and 6th pistons out because there is a cut into the wall, which the rings catch on and prevent them from coming out. I got 6 out by sneaking a feeler gauge past it, and pulling, but haven’t been successful with 5 yet. I got a ridge cutter from autozone, but I’m not using that piece of junk tool on my block.

Having to rebuild it is a bad deal. I certainly would have done a blowby test before buying if I knew about how easy and fast it is, especially compared to a compression test. What bugs me is that this guy could have thought that hack job he did was good work, but he knew it needed rebuilt. I lost 3 quarts of oil every 40 miles of driving. He knew that, and straight up lied to my face.

So next up is I’m finding a machine shop, and going to see if the block can be bored. I’ll get a new head or get a valve job on this one. I’d love to go back together with studs and/or o-ringing the head, but the $$$ are really adding up. I’ll have several hundred just in new rod, main, and head bolts. I’ve never rebuilt an engine before, so I’m looking forward to the learning experience.

 

[TWeatherford]

Holy bawls... what a hacked up mess.

Did you end up pulling the head and replacing the gasket? As far as peak boost is concerned... much over 40psi on stock torqued bolts is pushing it... at that point, its wise to go with studs.

Looks like its come a long way.. keep up the good work.

No, I did not. But I obviously have now. I've got some thinking to do. If money were not an issue, I would do a lot. I would really like to do a Colt Stage II cam, studs, and o rings, fluidampr, and a few other things and be ready to run forever. But I'll have to figure out what I can spend, and then not push more power than I can because the most important thing to me is reliability.

 

[TWeatherford]

When you pulled the cam looked to me like the cam bearings were wiped looked like pure copper. Maybe I was looking at it wrong?

I agree. Never noticed that before. I guess I should have measured to see if it was in spec. I'm doing that now anyway. I am planning on all new bearings anyway. I appreciate the input.

 

[jwalterus]

didn't want to comment last year when you picked up the truck, glad to see you're getting it all fixed up how it should be

the reason I didn't want to post originally......
I KNOW THAT TRUCK!!!!!! I recognize the engine mounts

the swap was done by a high school automotive tech class

 

[FordGuy100]

Sorry to hear about the engine, man I can only imagine the let down when you came to the conclusion that it needed to come out. Bummer bud.

 

[FordGuy100]

didn't want to comment last year when you picked up the truck, glad to see you're getting it all fixed up how it should be

the reason I didn't want to post originally......
I KNOW THAT TRUCK!!!!!! I recognize the engine mounts

the swap was done by a high school automotive tech class

That would make sense I can see myself doing some of those things back in HS. What shop teacher would let that stuff fly though?

 

[theguruat12]

It's good luck to heal that poor truck's soul the way you are, sir. Yeah I can see that being an HS autoshop class' work. What a pity. In any case, it's looking MUCH better with your fixes and such. That's going to be a sweet truck when you're finished!

 

[TWeatherford]

Quick update - the block is toast. Its already been bored .020" over, and cylinders 5 and 6 are scratched so deep another .020" won't clean them up. I could sleeve it, but my machinist didn't recommend that because they wore to one side. I do not want to have to pull this apart again. So I'm looking for a block, or an engine, or a whole truck. I looked at one with 315k on it and was impressed, so we'll see. I'm torn between putting some money in a well used engine, or just biting the bullet and putting more in a quality rebuild.

 

[TWeatherford]

Thought you all might enjoy seeing how I got the block to the machine shop. It was surprisingly easy actually, I can load and unload it with no damage to the car in about 2 minutes by myself (this is my Jetta TDI).

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[jwalterus]

That would make sense I can see myself doing some of those things back in HS. What shop teacher would let that stuff fly though?

Well, just to give you an idea, they haven't had the same shop teacher for 2 years in a row for the last 10 years, they are actually taking applications right now for the next school year. I threw my hat in the ring, I doubt they'll take me with no degree, but at least I know my way around a shop.

Quick update - the block is toast. Its already been bored .020" over, and cylinders 5 and 6 are scratched so deep another .020" won't clean them up. I could sleeve it, but my machinist didn't recommend that because they wore to one side. I do not want to have to pull this apart again. So I'm looking for a block, or an engine, or a whole truck. I looked at one with 315k on it and was impressed, so we'll see. I'm torn between putting some money in a well used engine, or just biting the bullet and putting more in a quality rebuild.

I'd check if it can be sleeved, but as far as you're saying, I'd go for the quality, it's not like you're going to be getting rid of the truck anytime soon right?