My Titan is on its last leg....

[AlexTJ]

Well its only a matter of time now... My titan stroker is burning oil like crazy, making all kinds of noises and has me quite depressed about my jeep.

First noticed it was burning oil when I heard it maing a terrible noise and found it was 3.5 quarts low with no leaks to be found. Filled it up and my friends and I noticed it wld put out blue smoke only when I let off the throttle. Started out just a little smoke, now its much worse.

Haven't figured out the exact cause yet, not alot of time with me working on my mech engineering degree. But, before I knew it was burning oil, I did a compression check and had some cylindrs at 190 psi while others were just around 130 which I suspected was too much of a difference at the time.

now to the point. Jeep is DD and I don't have alot of time or money so here are my ideas:

Plan A: pull a 4.0L outta the junkyard and start slowly building it up so I hopefully have a good, new stroker by the time the Titan quits.

Plan B: pull the junkyard 4.0 and swap it in immediately and rebuild the titan.

Plan B would really only be a better choice if it will save me money, ie don't have to have as much machined, and can re use parts. But that depends on what parts are reusable and if they should be reused.

anyway, any input would be much appreciated

[lafrad]

I would do the "easy" things first....

Check the PCV valve, make sure its not faulty or puking oil.

Check the breather... make sure IT isn't overloaded with oil.

Pull the valvecover and see if there is any abnormal stuff going on under there.


You may (possibly) just have a problem with something easily fix-able... several people have commented about PCV and Breather problems on stroker installs... just make sure thats not the problem, first.

[AlexTJ]

Both the PCV valve and the breather have oil in them (past the valve cover)

I have replaced both of them multiple times but it still happens

[lafrad]

Have you performed a leakdown test to see if there is a ring seal problem at all?

[AlexTJ]

I haven't yet going to do that now actually.

Just talked to Chuck at Titan, he seems very nice and willing to help me figure this out. At this point I don't know if this is an engine defect or something I did but I'm going to do a leak down test and a wet compresion test tonight and see where that takes me.

Everyone I've talked to about it so far seems to think its not the rings, seeing as it doesn't smoke all the time, just when I let off the gas and even then its not 'alot.'

[lafrad]

Well, smoking at points of high vacuum just sounds like problems with crankcase ventilation systems...

Rings CAN do it too...

Maybe valveseals? they experiance a vacuum too...

[AlexTJ]

Well, smoking at points of high vacuum just sounds like problems with crankcase ventilation systems...

Rings CAN do it too...

Maybe valveseals? they experiance a vacuum too...

I've replaced both pcv valves mor than once, is there something else to people run into problems with in the pcv system?

Havent done the leak down test yet, brother remembered the tester but forgot the air compressor... Rescheduled for tomorrow

[AlexTJ]

Wow....

I never knew that the front and rear pcv valves were different on my TJ.... I 've had two rear ones ( with the tiny orfice) on for the longest time.... The front ones look to be completely open....

I must have done this sometime in high school where I broke both of them and must have replaced them both with rear ones and never bothered to figure it out when I replaced them later...

Just ordered a front one

[lafrad]

one of them will be completely open and run to the NON-Vacuum portion of the intake tract.. this is the path that allows filtered, ambient pressure air-flow THROUGH the engine, to allow the Vacuum side with the PCV valve to draw out any blowby and misc other things that are unliked.

Putting a PCV in both sides makes that path fail completely, and could very well cause the problems you are seeing.

[AlexTJ]

Exactly. It seems rather obvious to me now and I really can't understand how I've run it like that for years and never learned there was a different elbow for thr front. It totally makes sense and this mistake has most likely cost me a ton of money and time in the past and in my current situation. I know that after I replace it when the part comes in tomorrow I still have a messed up engine from it running like this for 18k miles...

[lafrad]

Might not be messed up.

After a few miles of use it may just be able to clear itself up.

[AlexTJ]

Sooooooooo....... Its been months....but its been hard to find Jeep time between my mech engineering major and crappy weather. Ifinally pulled my motor and got the head off yesterday.
This is what cylinder 5 looked like:



Notice the pitted center as well as the chunk missing. The tops of all the other pistons look ok but all are completely covered in carbon, sometimes think. The motor only had 20k on it..... Looks like I'll need a new set of pistons and maybe bore it to .060 over due to the wall scuffing from that chunk missing. The rest of the cylinders look and feel very smooth. Anyway, anyone have ideas on why #5 would be the only damaged piston? I need to figure that out so I don''t do it again after the rebuild.

[lafrad]

OUCH.

That cyl was definately running VERY hot.

I would suspect that its running lean. when one cyl runs lean, the others all end up running richer due to the O2 sensor readings... so you end up with 5 "sooty" cyls, and one that is HOT. that ring land is just melted. sorry for that diagnosis. I would get your fuel injectors cleaned and inspected, and then make sure that you REALLY pay attention to making sure the intake manfiold seals PERFECTLY on re-build.

[dwg86]

It could have been running lean because of the vaccume port for the PCV is above number 5 cylinder. Sucking oil through the pcv into #5 causing a lean condition.

[AlexTJ]

It could have been running lean because of the vaccume port for the PCV is above number 5 cylinder. Sucking oil through the pcv into #5 causing a lean condition.

Interesting......

Isn't there that shield like thing in the top of the valve cover that would negate the PCV being right above 5 though?

So far I'm thinking it was my PVC issue that gave me oil leaks. Running low on oil gave me piston ring wear and cyl 5 got the worst of it. '

Oh yeah, all of the pistons are very wiggly and a few, especially 5, will rock. Pretty sure they're not supposed to do that ideally, correct?

Wiggle is identical to this guys: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNCqZXjY ... _embedded#