201 engine assembly

Thought I would start a new topic just for the engine portion of my WC resurrection.

Start with a nice clean line bored block, sitting on my tractor table downstairs behind the furnace, where I can work day or night in a climate controlled environment.



How am I going to get a complete engine out of my basement, you ask? Don't worry, we'll cross that bridge (or, climb those stairs, when we get to it).

Lets start with the cam bearings. Got a set of 0.002" undersize cam bearings from Norm Meinert.



I've been told when installing cam bearings, as long as you have half the hole lined up you should be fine. As OCD as I am, that will never happen. (By the way, it should be called CDO, that way the letters are in the correct order).

So, what I do, is to take a square and draw a line through the holes in the block and the holes in the bearing. That way, you just align the lines and drive them home, so the holes line up no matter what kind of goofy angle you are driving them from.









O.K., all set. Pop them babies in the freezer for a half an hour, and they will slide right home.

Per the manual, the middle bearing gets centered in the web of the block. I drew that one in with the puller. Oil hole location came out good.



The front one should be flush with the front of the block. This one came out good too.



The rear one should be flush with the expansion plug bore. Oil hole looks good.



Picked up a 2 1/2" welch plug. Use a Q tip to put a little anaerobic sealer on the plug and the bore, being careful to keep it away from the drain hole. If you inadvertently plug that drain hole, I'd imagine the oil pressure would hydraulically pop that plug right out.



Tap the plug into the bore, then give it one good whack to distort it a little, should be good.



I couldn't get a picture while I was doing it, but I looked in from the front of the motor and stuck this wire back there to make sure the hole is clear- O.K.



Couldn't find a spec for lifter or bore diameter, so in they go. I have been told that Lubriplate will clog an oil filter, but I have no idea how long this engine is going to sit before it runs, so I will use it sparingly. Probably going to run the engine up to temp to set the valves and will change oil then anyways.





So there. Enough for now, I set the block on corrosion resistant paper, throw a layer on top, and cover it with plastic when I'm not working on it. That damn OCD, I mean CDO.



Thanks for looking!








Edited by littlemarv - 22 Aug 2017 at 10:06pm

Looks like you are going at it right, keep up the good work and post more on your engine rebuild.

Nice work.  Good job getting the kids involved.
AaronSEIA

Love the attention to details there. And getting the youth involved.thanks for the pictures

No, they definitely do not slide in by hand! Just a figure of speech that I guess maybe I should not have used. With anything press fit, throwing the inner part in the freezer makes things go a little easier. I think if a cam bearing ever went in by hand, it would spin pretty quick once the motor was run.





Edited by littlemarv - 21 Feb 2016 at 8:34am

It probably don't matter on this engine but those liners should be clamped down to measure projection.

Tried my hand at safety wiring, looks O.K. I guess, without having a pair of twisting pliers.



Brought home my good gauges, so I can measure things properly. Crank end play came out at 0.004", so good to go there.



Flipped the block upright, plunked the liners in with no O-rings. I'm getting 0.005" or 0.006" protrusion. Hmmmmmm.

After a conference call with Don(MO), I scraped the counter bores with a razor blade, actually got a little crud out of there....

Much better.



Put Vaseline on the lower lead in chamfers, put canola oil on the O-rings. Should be a slippery enough combination.



Put the liners in, give them a spin at the end to ease the O-rings down into place. Hopefully these liners have found their new home for the next 50 years or so....



Thanks for looking!

Edited by littlemarv - 23 Aug 2017 at 3:39pm

Junior taking care of a little body work,



"Connecting rods with Courtney"





And the old man on pistons.



Found a universal ring compressor that should work. These are Conformatic aluminum pistons, no long bosses, and no arrows. Well, they have arrows now, so the pistons all go in the same way.


Got the pistons on the rods per the manual. Kind of neat how you do it, depending on which number cylinder it is, you push the pin to one side of the piston, then push the rod the same way. Torque the pinch bolt to 35 ft. lbs., then slide it away about 1/8". Then the pin is pretty much centered when the rod is offset.










These were the first wrist pins I have ever installed that didn't have snap rings, so I was a little worried about keeping the wrist pins away from the cylinder walls. Cause if you make a mistake there, you are starting all over. But, looks like it should work.





Here's where I really could use an engine stand. Put it up on blocks a little higher, made a disposable drain pan out of tinfoil, and stuck some towels under there to catch all the drips.






My teacher in overhaul class at tech school taught me to soak pistons completely in oil prior to installation. You can't get much more complete lubrication than that. It is a bit messy, but its the only way I've ever done it.








Just snugged the rod bolts with a ratchet for now. I'm going to let it drip overnight, then I will flip it up so I can torque the rod bolts.





After I got them all in, just for kicks, checked the rolling torque. I don't think there is a spec, but we can file this away in the "useless info" category. Averaged 250 inch pounds, more or less.






Ironic- the torque wrench probably cost more new than the tractor....





Edited by littlemarv - 02 Sep 2017 at 8:51pm

Looking great, just a couple points- you should not put any oil or petroleum based lubricants on those o-rings, it will cause the rubber to swell and actually distort the liners believe it or not. Clean the bore and sleeve to an inch of it's life and use a little dish soap only, it is plenty slippery and when it dries up it actually causes them to stick to the sides of the bore sealing them better. I'm a bit concerned about the safety wire on the left, doesn't look like it's tied together?? The proper way is to do a figure 8 between the bolt heads so if one bolt loosens, the other bolt turns the opposite way and tightens. Not trying to be critical, just don't want anything to ruin that beautiful rebuild  

Going from memory reading the service manual a few days ago. I think the castle nut rod bolt are supposed to be torqued to 70ft/lb and the newer self locking nuts are 40ft/lb

Well, I guess I will have to do a little research, cause rod bolts are something you need to be sure about. 70 sure sounds like a lot for those little bolts..

No, with having it line bored and the rods sized to eliminate shims, theres nothing I can do about it anyways....

littlemarv wrote: No, with having it line bored and the rods sized to eliminate shims, theres nothing I can do about it anyways....

think i would check with plastigauge just to make sure the machine shop did there stuff right.ya just never know when some body can have a bad day not getting things right.hopefuly not on your project.

You are doing it right but one thing is bugging me.  How the heck do you get it out of the basement?

Well, after doing a little research and talking to several people on the connecting rod bolt torque, here is what I have come up with. This is a theory, NOT fact.

The castle nuts got torqued to 70 foot pounds. They were cranked down so tight because the rods were shimmed with soft brass shims, and if the shims ever fretted out and your rod caps start clunking around, all hell was gonna break loose pretty quick.

With the introduction of sized rods and precision insert bearings, the self locking nuts could be torqued to 40 ft. lbs. only. Really, there isn't any stress per say on a rod bolt, other than actually pulling the piston down on the intake stroke.

I think 70 ft. lbs. is a lot, even for a new 7/16" fine thread fastener. I'm not going to put that on bolts that are this old.

So, here's what I did. Pulled the cotter pins out, loosened the rod bolts, torqued them to 50 foot pounds, and turned them whichever way was closest to get a new cotter pin in.

Installed the timing cover seal, I always pack the backside of the seal with something if it has a garter spring in it. On axles you can use regular grease, on engines I use Lubriplate.



I was going to make a sleeve to locate the front cover like Don said in his video, but since I can flip the engine up, I just installed the seal in the cover, and slid the cover into place, it should be about as centered as you can get...




I happen to have two covers. Took the cam plugs out of both. One is stuck tight, the other one moves but has no spring tension behind it. Took them both apart, and took the best pieces to make one good one.







Tightened the plug down, back it off 3/4 of a turn, and lock down the jam nut.

Cleaned up the head studs and put them in. Waiting for the machine shop to give the head a once over. I took the valves out, they look pretty good, and the stems measure good.






With every part I bolt on, I grin a little. Two reasons:

1. I'm getting closer to driving a tractor that I built.
2. Gives me more room on my bench for more junk! (Carb and mag both need a good going through)

Concerned about how I'm going to get the engine out of the basement, eh? Oh, don't worry, that little spectacle won't go undocumented, trust me.


Edited by littlemarv - 02 Sep 2017 at 8:59pm