Re: hornet project disaster

["Jim Blair" <carnuck@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

A: One other thought: No intake gaskets!


From: Tom Jennings <tomj@xxxxxxx>
To: AMC List <mail@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: hornet project disaster
Message-ID: <20050527132352.Y1488@localhost>

My engine is junk. Bought it as a "used motor", that allegedly ran
strong in some jeep, friend of the person I bought it from. Had to
change oilpans, bottom end looked OK as reported earlier (didn't
take bearing caps off).


Today was fire-up day! Not two hours ago. Primed oil, static-set
spark, etc. Filled with plain water, got fuel, air, spark, etc no
firing... some odd belching in the radiator...  a few minutes
later water AND oil pouring from the back of the block/head!  This
is without firing once. All the water ended up in the crankcase.
Took off the manifolds, water coming out all (int, exh) ports.

It's like it was assembled with no headgasket or something. Even a
bad gasket/cracked head doesn't leak in all cylinders, all at
once! Since it never fired (didn't get that far) it's got to be a
huge (if simple) problem.

So now it's sitting in the yard with oil+water in the crankcase,
and the soonest I can pull and disassemble it is probably Monday,
journals will rust (if they were any good to begin with) so I'll
probably need a full rebuild, which I don't have the money for.

I had hints of trouble along the way... it wasn't stored right,
and had a lot of grit in the valve train area. THe block was
recently boiled out (water jacket spotless, new freeze plugs,
crankcase clean), the bottom of the bores perfect, clean,
crosshatching, but there were some minor buggered bolts. Paint is
all flaking, under the silver is an ugly (but well-adhered)
yellow.

I didn't notice any oil leaks after spinning up the oil pump
(w/old points distrib minus the gear), but when I took the
manifolds off, many long oil drip runs down the block! WTF!

When I got this motor, I didn't pull the head or retorque because
it was alleged to be a recently-rebuilt running motor. There was
paint over the headbolts (I looked). All I can figure is it's
owner lunched it somehow or it was thrown together with spare
parts to sell off.


Total f'ing disaster.