94 Ford Beast-350 OBS CCLB - Motor is done, need to sell, questions-please help

[OrionStang]

Sounds like you got a plan. Should be able to flip that thing for enough money to get some nice goodies for the new truck.

[scooter99]

I sure hope so man. I'm seeing them go for $7-10K and not in as good of shape as mine is, and with out the extras. Not that I have a whole bunch of extras, but the motor has alot of new parts on it.

[car_lost]

Any updates?

I never posted in your threads, but I always kept up with them because they're so interesting and detailed.

[scooter99]

Sorry nothing to report. It's still apart in the backyard. I'm in a cast so it's tough to go out and work off of a ladder on it. 2 more weeks of this cast and I'll get back at it.

The driver side head is off, and I need to take the passenger side head off and then clean them up. Then, I'll start putting it back together.

I got my 06 F250, and I have a plan, but nothing really started on it yet. I'll start a new build log once I do get started. But it'll be most of th civic equipment in it, with a couple of additions and a couple of changes. Still a ways off from that though. My wife would kill me if I start another project before I finish the beast! Lol

[magillaru]

A little late to the party but tuned the hell in!

Cut that cast off and get to work!

[scooter99]

Nothing I'd rather do than to get out of this thing. But after 16 months I need to get it fixed! I have to get back to being active and running again and loose weight.

HOpefully I'll have something very shortly for you guys.

[scooter99]

You know what, I just realized I never uploaded the rest of what I had before. I'm uploading them now. I'll post in a minute.

[scooter99]

Ok so here we go. Not a ton of pictures but this is where I left off with the truck.

When I last left, I had removed the timing chain. Now it's time to get to the insides of the beast! First, I had to loosen the headers from the heads. Kind of stinks since i just put these on not too long ago. Oh well.

Then it was time to start removing the rockers and rods. These all look like they're in pretty good shape considering. I'd love to put some new ones in but since I'm selling it, I'm not going to go through the expense.

I made a stand for them out of a Summit Racing box I had laying around. Numbered them so they're all in sequence for when I go to put them all back.

Next I removed the distributor. Again, something I just put in.

Then it was time to tackle the fuel rails. Now, having never done anything like this before, I was very nervous about this. Was afraid to break an injector, bend the rail, anything. But it turned out ok. After some careful book reading ( I have three manuals now), some youtube videos, and some texts back and forth with Billy (Dog24fret), I finally got it handled.

Now normally, from what I understand, you'd remove the rails from the fuel lines. However, I tried to get the clips off the lines in the back, and it was a no go. So next best solution, was a few zipties, and it's up and out of the way for the most part.

You can see back here the mushroom head looking things, those are the fuel line clips. These hoses needed to go too so I could get the intake off.

[scooter99]

Now, let's get that intake unbolted and out of there. Lots of bolts.

Almost there!

And boom, she gonnne!! So this is where I first noticed an issue. I don't have anything to point it out, but you can see about in the middle on the right side inner wall of the valley, there are three streams of oil and a little pool in the corner there. Das no good. But it is good really because it's confirming what we thought it was originally which was a blown head gasket. So let's keep moving.

Upper view. And really for as filthy as the intake manifold is, this thing is pretty damn clean inside. Or at least I think so. Course I've never done this before so who knows, but it feels like it's clean to me.

[scooter99]

Next up is the fun task of the actual heads. Let's get unbolting. There's 10 left, 5 right down the center and 5 over the exhaust ports on the bottom. The other outside bolts were removed when we took the intake manifold off.

Ok, and with a big screwdriver on the edge, She broke loose! Now, I was again, kind of nervous because all I've read about on forums and in books etc, was how heavy these were and you need a cherry picker or a second set of hands to get them out of there. But look, I'm no slouch at 305, OK OK 315 lbs, and I've been told I'm pretty strong so take this comment with a grain of salt, but I lifted it right out of there and really didn't even grunt. SO I don't know, maybe I'm missing something, or maybe I was just so excited to have gotten this far with my own two hands and minimal help that I was just pumped up. Either way, it's out.

I actually panicked a little bit because #8 cylinder has all that antifreeze in it. But realized when I pulled the head, it all drained out of there. WHEW!!

So here's what we're looking at. Pistons need some cleaning of course, but at 108k on the original motor, I'd guess that's normal. The #7 and #6 pistons were the main problems. You can see in #7 (3rd one down) that it has some oil in it. This was part of the testing to make sure we didn't have any blow by on the rings. So that's ok. Just wanted to make sure I mentioned it before anyone said anything about it.

Some pretty good build up, but not terrible as far as I can tell.

Then we look at the bottom of the head. WOW! Look at #7!!! (3rd one on the right). That CAN'T BE GOOD!! But more importantly look below it. See the two little cross sections there. See the gunk on them. Well there's where the problem lies. That's where in the pictures before I told you all there was some oil leaking down the inner wall of the intake valley. This is what it was from. The gasket failed right there. How did this happen? Well when I was doing the headers a few months prior, I pulled that plug and it didn't look too good. I had to pull all plugs, I don't want you all to think I just pulled that one just because lol. But that one looked bad. So before I put it all back together I bought a new one. Well I didn't have the plug with me when I got the new one, so I just asked for a 94 F350 with a 7.5L gas motor. Apparently it was the wrong plug and was burning too hot. Which would explain the reason why the gasket failed which would explain the reason why #7 is so dark! There you go. Always double check and triple cross check your stuff before putting it in the car. My mistake for not being more cautious.