199 Sucking Oil

["Bruce Hevner" <scramblr@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

>A: Redoing the head on a high mileage engine isn't the best thing to do. I
agree on doing >seals w/o taking the head off tho. Air pressure or soft rope
down the plug hole.

Read a study by one of the piston ring Mfgs. They claim that the old "doing
a valve job on a high mileage engine will cause it to use oil" is not
necessarily true. They say that most often what happens when the head is
removed is that anti-freeze enters the cylinders. This anti-freeze seeps
down around the piston causing the rings to stick and thus oil usage starts.
 It stands to reason that this indeed might happen. I have posted many times
before that by far the BIGGEST reason I saw for oil usage in the hundreds of
engines I took apart in my shop was STUCK OIL RINGS. 
 So what's the answer?? Have rags standing by and immediately use them to
soak up any anti-freeze that enters the cylinders when you remove the head.
Next I fill each cylinder with enough Kreen (kanolabs.com) to cover the
piston and let it soak the rings overnight. This will help to flush any
anti-freeze from around the piston AND remove gum from the rings helping
them to free up and remain free. Once you have it all buttoned up and ready
to start, change the oil to remove any crud that might have dropped down
into the pan and add a pint of Kreen to the new oil and every change
thereafter. 
 I have tried ALL the supposed "motor flushes" and cleaners and have found
this one to be the best, NO CONTEST. I have been using it for 20 years. The
closest one would be Sea Foam. It's not bad but I like Kreen better. All the
rest appear to be either oil based "Mystery" stuff or a blend of Kerosene.
Pretty much useless for cleaning your engine.
A good idea is to do a leak down test ahead of time to check the condition
of the compression rings (this test will NOT reveal the condition of the oil
rings). If you find the rings are bad, and decide to do a "in car rebuild" ,
I HIGHLY recommend these rings- deves.com. They are absolutely the BEST I
have found at oil control. If the cylinders are in reasonably good shape I
don't even hone them.
But hey,,,, that's just ME!!!
Bruce Hevner