Engine Bandaid: Will it blend?
 

With a full time job running me 70-90 hours a week and my absolute inability to make a decision I've been looking for a quick and CHEAP solution to get an engine back in my POS.

Some of you might know last spring my motor let go from some sort of lubrication failure. Link. Never fear, I have a complete engine in my garage that I bought off craigslist and I'll slap it in. After removing the valve cover (Dumbass!) for the first time in 2 1/2 years since buying it, found the camshafts were rusted. The engine wouldn't even turn over. Fail.

Trip to the junk yard and ripping an escort engine out (again) for more frankenfailure fwd/rwd nightmareness and 120$ later I've got an engine in the garage. Valves are cooked. Swapped over my "good" head which has less than 20,000 miles to find the valves on it are badly burnt, but the shortblock is leaking a lot more than I want it to.


Since I can't make up my damn mine what I'm going to do engine wise and really would like to drive the car before it disappears into dust from all the rust.... Have been thinking about ripping the motor apart, cleaning the block, running a ball hone through to deglaze the cylinder walls, buy new OEM size rings, new bearings, gaskets, and throwing it back together. The question is... would the rings seal to the point where it'd be worth the time/effort/cost? If I have to fully machine the block, buy pistons, bearings, etc then its a complete bust and I'm not doing it... Just need something to get me by a year or two until I have some time.

Input welcome? :makeout:


tl;dr: Indecisive retard wants to know if he'd be wasting money to replace rings in junk yard crap motor.

Wut??????

Dude just buy a good longblock

The point is I just want to drive the car. Every dollar I waste on a temporary motor will take another dollar away from what could be a $5000 swap...

then short block it... arent kia blocks cheap?

For the record, I'm not putting down the suggestion... but...

Piston Rings can be had for little as $30.00
Bearings can be had for little as $20.00
Gaskets can be made out of soda boxes
Head gasket can be had for $40.00..

Are guaranteed good condition low leakage shortblocks falling from the sky and that cheap??

Do it. Worst happens is it has shitty power and burns some oil. But it should run and if it fails early, you're out 100 bucks.

agreed. pull the trigger.

Right.

And how long will it be before you save up that $5000?

I'm a 'doer' not a talker. The money is there, the desire and time to commit is not. I said it *COULD* be a 5000$ swap. Have you priced an LSx lately?

I've done ring swaps without any honing or machining, although mine has been machined in the last few years. I've never done a compression check, my car runs on hopes and dreams, not hard numbers.

TL;DR: Ball hone and call it good.

There's nothing wrong with not having the money. I don't have $5000 at hand for a swap myself.

I am guessing your LSx pricing question was rhetorical but I don't know the answer. What's the pricing like pray tell?

Okay, gonna go for it.

I've seen people asking $4000 for JUST the engine... Doing a V8 swap into a car which was never offered is a significant amount of work, cost, and parts changed. Everything from the cooling system to the drive axles have to be changed out, some of which the vendors are asking WAY too much money for (like axles).

For example, out of the box parts you can buy from Bossfrog:
K-Member: 1200.00
Transmission Mount: 400.00
Differential Subframe: 500.00

Nothing more than 3 driveline MOUNTS you've already dropped $2100.00! Still have to buy the axles (700.00), driveshaft (500.00), radiator, headers (600), clutch hydraulics (225), power steering (175)(no.. lol)... Buying all the stuff in the list from Boss frog you've already spent 5000$. Still need all sorts of misc little shit, hoses, an engine, wiring harness, pcm, differential, transmission, clutch...

My brother is a machinist and fabricator by trade so maybe with some luck he can help out on a few things. Drive shaft and axles will be manufactured by a local shop (I estimate $100 for a driveshaft and 400 for axles).. We'll have to see, though. At this point I can't justify the extra cost for an aluminum motor, so its looking like it'll be an LQ9 truck engine which can be had locally with harness and pcm for around $1200.00.

Either way I'm not going to have any time to mess with this until probably this time next year, and its already been 12 months since I've driven the damn car.. :mad:


Thanks for the input all who contributed.

Do an L33. Mine was $650. Aluminum 5.3 that can be punched out to the same 3.905 as you can the 99+ LS1 block for a 347ci when the 5.3 gets boring. Look at V8R for the swap kit. If you don't launch it at all, I don't see why a 3.6 Miata rear can't hold up.

if your not on slicks digging it you can run a stock 1.8 rear end, similar rear found in s2000s hold up to 500+whp they just dont slap slicks on em and try to pull wheelies. defiantly go for the l33 its higher compression then the ls1 i do belive and it really does not make enough less power to make the difference, especially when you slap a fast manifold on it. If your dead set on putting the miata motor back in in the mean time i do think that oem replacement pistons are very very cheap, that is if you even need them. I have seen first hand a motor go together with a groove in the cylinder that you could hide a toothpick in and it still ran good and it did not smoke enough to cause maor concern, said motor was a ford 4.6 4v and it was turboed.

Thanks for breaking it out.

With my new power goal being 600hp I'm considering USA rear end options. It would be nice to launch without breakage.

L33 was a considered choice, however I can't seem to find one?? Have a source? Will gladly pay 650 for an aluminum 5.3.

Honestly, the 5.3 won't get boring. What gets boring is constantly fucking with a car to make it quick as it should be in the first place.

Uh? I've seen < 200hp motors blowing factory 1.8 miata torsens apart... There is no way in hell I'm leaving that in the car!

I'm not so sure about this v8r stuff as I'm reading...

like i said doing highway rolls you wont break it, autox and drag racing puts much more stress on a rear end because it takes more to get the car up to speed then it does to accelerate more once you are already there.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUFFudEJnjk
if the hel he just put that diff through did not break it i highly highly doubt that a stock l33 or even ls1 is going to either, i can also post vids of a 300hp miata doing 1.7 60's with a stock torsen over and over again. I am quite certain that if your not doing modifications to the motor tha te best diff option would prolly be an rx7 clutch pack diff in a 1.8 housing. all direct fit nothing custom needed.
the diff behind the ls1 in stock form is only a 7.5" diff ad though they do break sometimes they are moving a 3500+lb car not a sub 2500lb one.
Edit: if you cannot find a l33 i would go with a lm7 over the lq9, i say this because they are more available and cheaper and they make about the same power as an ls1 my friend has a tahoe with an lm7 and with nothing but a k&n drop in it made 284whp on the dynojet at the shop i was working at, keep in mind thats after it gets through a massive automatic truck transmission.

http://car-part.com/cgi-bin/search.c...ey=&userPage=4

The cheap axles keep stock outers, which are the weakest link.

Glad you think you won't be bored. I'm ready to pull my cammed 5.3 to turn it into a 5.7 and work the heads over. Addicts can't keep at the same dose forever. Thats why I didn't start with the 347 from the Vette.

Finally had time and nice enough weather to get back working on my block. Bought a ball hone a while back and this is my first attempt at using it. Forgot to take a cylinder measurement before I started on cylinder number 4 and I'm afraid that I might've let it run too dry. Book says to use 30 weight motor oil but I'm just not sure how much.

Ran out of daylight before I could move past cylinder number 4, but this is what I have to work with:

Order is 4, 3, 2, 1 in the pictures. 4 Looked like 3-1 before I ran the hone through, so I have some hope, long as they're not too far out of round or taper. I think.

http://jugrnot.com/IMG_7663.jpg
http://jugrnot.com/IMG_7664.jpg
http://jugrnot.com/IMG_7665.jpg
http://jugrnot.com/IMG_7666.jpg


Buying rings after I'm done, plan to file fit them. I hope.

I've rebuilt blocks looking a lot worse than that. You should be fine.

#4 isn't bad, but get that hone moving in and out more to get a better crosshatch pattern. More oil, and keep the hone moving at all times. It only takes a few seconds, you're just honing the surface, not boring them out.