Kenny's 1990 740 GLE, goin' for 9's

little by little. Only spent about 45 minutes in the shop last night (as myriad things conspired against me - this is the norm really), but I took the opportunity to knock out the #4 piston and come up with some rough times: 3 minutes per valve, with about 10-15 seconds of 'backwards' time every minute (so roughly at the 2 minute mark, and again at the 1 minute mark), and then about another minute or so on the diagonal valves that are on the "right" side of the piston (as facing the engine from a given side, so on the exhaust side it's the forward valve, on the intake side its the rearward valve) so.. roughly ~ 15 minutes per hole.
Some things to take in mind:

1) 1.5ah batteries are not likely going to pull their weight for the full deal (it doesn't take much to drop them and you'll know it because the drill slows down a bit), I have not applied the 4ah battery hammer yet, but I don't think it will significantly change the time. I started with a fully charged battery and swapped it out between sides.

2) it will depend on your drill setup. I'd probably start on low speed running it for 2 minutes, see if the depth is what you want, and then go from there.

3) it's actually fairly quick, however the setup is what will ultimately soak you on time.. I went ahead and pre-cut the rough squares for the remaining pistons (and hopefully some extras for cleanup/just in case)

so far, I'm fairly pleased with the results. I'm going to hit em all with a fine grit sand roll to smooth things out a touch (not really any sharp edges, more of a just in case) and then pull the pistons out to make sure everything is clean and no grit is down in the ring land area, drop em back in and torque things down. Hopefully I can get that done tonight.. shouldn't really be any reason I can't other than the ever-present "million other things up in the air"

reliefs finished (aside from some light cleanup)


also drilled and tapped a hole for the oil return, only to discover that I'd drilled and tapped one npt size too small (lol). oh well, 85%, and the threads looked like poop anyway.

shaping up for a weekend assembly-fest, much excite.

Will be doing the following:
- removing pistons/rods (to clean the ringlands and make sure none of the sandpaper grit and none of the aluminum from the pistons gets in there and sticks the rings... been there, done that)
- re-installing pistons/rods, torquing stuff down.
- finishing oil return drilling and tapping
- oil pump/new transfer o-rings/front and rear main seals and aux shaft seal/oil pan gasket/yoshifab breather adapter
- cometic and arp headstuds
- assemble head
- seat valves
- new stem seals
- springs/retainers
- clean head halves & wipe down with acetone
- install el cylindero headero
- knock out front oil port for turbo oil feed

on the list of things to fix:
- cracks in header (****ing wastegate ports keep cracking. may take this to someone who's better at it than myself)

parts (hopefully) in transit:
- cams
- exhaust manifold gaskets from erie (I think? I'll have to check)

those items are not deal-breakers per-se, I have a box of stock cams so I can get the engine assembled enough to drop in the car, and attaching the manifolds at that point isn't a big deal. Not saying the engine will be in the car this weekend, but it could be dangerously close. if I can actually cram it in the car, fret not, there's not enough junk in the back to allow it to run without some amount of shenanigans (and I'm not going to go through the hassle of timing it up and sealing up the valve cover, etc if the cams aren't here yet), and I'm just not that worried about it yet.

If I can get it to that point, it'll give me the opportunity to replace the fuel lines with the new E-85 rated stuff, drop the fuel tank out of the car and de-funk it, and work out how I'm going to handle the fuel situation going forward.

progress, I guess.

*fake edit. Tasca. Ordered on the 9th, no word. :-/

heyy half a million views, cool. Got ahold of tasca today, they blamed volvo. I'll provide further updates in that thread in OT. tonight was date night, so no car work, tomorrow AM when I retrieve the fomites from my parents, I'll pick up a new compressor for the shop and get all that stuff working again (it'll probably temporarily sit somewhere in the shop until I can get the wire run down the far wall and through a hole in the side out to the adjacent storage building.. so I don't have to hear it, but it'll be out of the elements). progress will resume on the engine as well. If I'm real slick I'll have whatever afternoon football games are on that I care about going on the dyno tv and I can work on getting this all worked out.

bottom end is back together after coming apart and getting cleaned up, next up is the cylinder head. should be able to do that today and maybe even get'r all bolted down. handed off the exhaust manifold yesterday to greg for repairs, he'll be test-fitting a volvo turbo manifold here soon as well, look for that to pop up for sale before long

showing obvious disdain for the stock pistons



and all torqued down and sprung up.


I haven't gotten any video lately, figured putting valve springs in a head, lapping valves, and things like that are pretty boring and likely better documented elsewhere.
tonight I reckon I'll get to cleaning on the intake manifold and work on that stuff. may go ahead and push the car into the shop, weather is supposed to be wet the next few days. I'd like to have the thing sitting in the car before next weekend even if everything else is still a work in progress.

You runnin a th400 behind this again?

yep, going right back in the gold car.

gotta go drum up some fuel pumps and figure out the best way to do that I reckon.

linuxman51 said:

yep, going right back in the gold car.

gotta go drum up some fuel pumps and figure out the best way to do that I reckon.

Click to expand...

Think it'll still be together for SE?

it'll be near running or running running in about 2 weeks if all goes reasonably well

gotta brief video to edit together real fast and upload, nothing really new or different from the thread. Tonight I pushed the gold car into the shop and got it up in the air. I did not wave it like I don't care. dropped the fuel tank, which was empty and dry. I'll hit it with some simple green or something to that effect and hose it out just to get the trash out of the bottom. I am missing a sending unit I think. I seem to recall having to grab the one out of the race car and use it with the 940 for one reason or another, so I may be on the hunt for one of those along with the gasket and ring (dammit).

So far, as may be predictable, the vast majority of time is spent tracking down parts that have been moved around several times since the car came apart. May just about be out of the woods on that, but that's where it's at currently.

anyway, pics!
fresh dent in the rear door (whoops. backed into it with the truck :-/ )


goop in the remote oil filter lines. those will be hosed out.


in case anyone was wondering about the rear end


modified subframe. So I took several pictures of this since I couldn't really find any from when I did it.


there's also a bit of a discussion about it in the video when that gets posted (probably the only thing of real value in the video)
'dog bone' replacement:


plates


cross pieces up top


weather is supposed to be inclimate over the next few days so I brought most of the sh...stuff in. lifts are so awesome, I needed this in my life like a decade ago

the video. I n00b'd it up and clicked the remote while talking, so a little bit is missing. nothing really pertinent though.

https://youtu.be/n0k8PpXTCho

running down a couple more bits. new tensioner for the belt setup, new studs for the hot side, little odds and ends that always seem to creep in, that sort of thing. Cams should be here towards the end of the week along with most of the other stuff, so I should (realistically and optimistically) be looking at installation friday night or maybe saturday. Much Excite.

Did I miss you putting in rods and pistons?

yeah I didn't video that, it's messy and there's nothing special about it really.

linuxman51 said:

yeah I didn't video that, it's messy and there's nothing special about it really.

Click to expand...

What'd you end up putting in?

Are you going to build another half filled block too?

stock na pistons, hbeam rods. not filled, not shooting for y00ge power, going to try and work on the short time while getting the big engine and the other car ready. I had more than enough power to ET faster than I did, so that's going to be focus for the time being.

Cams and fuel pump showed up last night, still waiting on a couple other odds and ends (well, sorta waiting, more on that in a minute). should still be good for install this weekend, unlikely to have an initial start though this weekend. I mean, maybe... but probably not.

Progress however waits for no parts, and such is the case the past couple of days in the shop.. started running the stuff for air weds night (and ran the wiring for the compressor and started running the piping), realized I was missing a few things and had bought the wrong things, fumed about that a little, ran by HD last night, returned the wrong things, picked up the right things, and have run 2 drops so far.. one by the dyno (air brake) and one by the middle bay door. I'm going to use what I've got for the time being and see where I want to run pipe to next.. I don't use air for a whole lot anymore, but the things you want it for you pretty much gotta have it.

Wired up the new compressor last night, it's quiet.. so nice. can't wait to finish things up this afternoon and pressure test it all tomorrow. Broke it in last night, 30 minutes run time with no load on it (i.e. no pressure build up), oil still looks good, I'll probably change that in a month or so (basically, after about 5-10 hours of use give or take).

Hopefully I'm done with 'big' purchases for the shop for a while.. it's nice to have the new stuff but it's blown the hell out of the shop's discretionary fund.

Someone mentioned something the other day in passing that got the gears rolling (no puns intended or implied), while I'm thinking about it I'll list the "modz" for this particular iteration, as well as the cost if I have one available..

street ported 16v head -$? already had it. stock valves, so.. what's a 16v head sell for these days? 300?
b230f block, pistons
ebay Hbeam stock replacement rods (~$250 or so depending on where you get them and what bolts you use)
MLS hg - $106
arp head studs - $200 (already had these though. Would recommend with the mls gasket, otherwise elring hg and stock bolts and maybe don't lean on it as hard as me lol)
yoshifab 272 cams - $500
yoshifab CAS adapter - $200? (I don't remember anymore)
yoshifab timing belt tensioner setup - $200
yoshifab billet crank gear - $175iirc
custom intake & exhaust manifolds - $? no telling
Hx-52 - $175 (no rly)
ford modular springs from BTR - $100
tool steel retainers from PAC - $100 (or there abouts)
bosch 2200cc injectors - $270

this is just for the engine, everyone is going to have their own preferences when it comes to drivetrain, etc, so I'll leave that out.. the short of it is th400 tastefully modified and upgraded with the requisite adapters, welded diff, 3.54 final drive.

A few words on this, the whys and wherefors and "but you said in _______ thread that _________"...

-generally I do not recommend running an MLS gasket with stock pistons.. this is still the case. Why am I not? well, do as I say.. but really, I planned on using the head studs anyway and the stock headgasket didn't have issues on my other 16v setup (the 940's), it roached the #4 without issues, so I figured why not. TBH, the temptation was great to re-use the mls gasket from the gold car previously (I still have it), there was nothing wrong with it per-se, but.. it'd be a real pain in the ass to put it all together and then have to turn around and take it back apart due to being cheap. you may question the use of stock pistons, and that's fair, there was definitely some scope creep on this project (As I've found most to have lol)

-Billet crank gear. this has been a go-to for me for a while now. I've been fairly lucky with my 16v stuff in that I've never thrown a belt or broken a crank gear, so my valve bending escapades are fairly limited.. miss-timed the engine once really early on with adjustable cam gears.. put it back to straight up and drove it around for a little bit, everything sealed up fairly well (i.e. it didn't really hammer the valves). Threw a lash cap on the big engine once when I didn't have my launch limiter set low enough.. not sure that ever actually made contact, but I will say that upon disassembly after the block cracked, there were a coupe exhaust valves (including the one that got stuck partially open) that didn't quite seal up real well anymore, so who knows. I've talked to a couple people who've had issues with stock crank gears, my advice has been and will continue to be the same: ditch the stock gear ESP if you're going to be running an interference setup (be it 8v or 16v), really much past ~300-350hp the crank gear becomes a liability, and your margin of error can be reduced to zero. I have had folks disagree (or be unwilling to spend the money), obviously ymmv and what not, but in my opinion it's cheap insurance that you're not likely to lose or wear out across several engines.

-non stock ford springs: little bit extra to help with the added boost this setup will see can't hurt, esp with the cams. probably not required (I'd at least replace old springs with new springs), but a bit extra spring pressure normally doesn't hurt.

Other incidentals: steel dowel pins on the cams and aux shaft, you haven't lived until you've tried to troubleshoot a performance issue that you finally track down to timing drift and discover that the aux gear dowel pin sheared off and it's slowly slipping every time you wind the motor up. For the same reasons you don't want to shear a roll pin on a cam on a 16v setup, so yeah.

think that covers it. I explained why 2200cc injectors in an earlier post, and the new in-tank walbro will be an interesting test case. I'll set things up to leave space for a second pump if the need arises in the future.

my weekends always seem to start out the same: one attempted step forward, trip and slide downhill backwards.

first pressure test of the shop air system revealed a small leak by the dyno (no biggie, this is not the fall I'm talking about lol), fixed that, went to move the v8 wagon.. predictably the battery was ded (well, ded-ish), jumped it off with the new 940...wait hold on, let me back up.. when I popped the hood, there was a rodent nest on top of the intake. horrors filled my mind while I went back to the shop to retrieve gloves to toss that crap out. No such horrors were revealed, however upon starting up a new problem had arisen: the cheap **** SS braided line that came with the fuel rail kit had finally given up the ghost and there was a steady spray going over the turbo side of the car from behind the intake manifold. No big deal, this had already happened once (And I thought I replaced both pieces but I guess not), I have the good stuff on the shelf and it's all of about 8 inches of hose going from the back of the rail to the pressure regulator.

Then a 45 minute fight started, and ended in frustration and no progress. I cleared my mind with a trip to the hardware store, and now have eaten lunch. Let's hope the afternoon goes better than the morning lol