So my oil pump locked up at 4k miles it seized the drive rod in the pump housing, nothing jammed in the gears at all. Engine had a knock after I towed it home and changed the pump. This engine is all forged, K1 rods, JE pistons very ported head 2.02 8mm valves, Harland sharp adjustable rollers, trick flow pushrods. 9.8 compression, all ARP studs, Lunati solid lifter .528/.544 and tuned very well. Plan is single turbo if I can get it to stay in one piece.....
What I am trying to figure out is I have zero bearing damage but had a killer knock. The #6 piston is scuffed into the wall on one side only. The piston shows no sign of running hot/lean and the bore is not scored enough to feel with your fingernails. Piston is trashed but I hope the bore will clean up with a hone. So why did this happen only on #6? The piston rocks freely on the pin etc. Anyhow thanks for any thoughts, its going to the machine shop tomorrow.
Hey thanks for the reply good to chat with you again. Not certain if you recall but last year when I built this one I asked about the forged piston rattle that sounded like a marine diesel until it warmed up. I have had several forged motors over the years but this one sounded much more aggressive than I expected. Kinda makes me wonder what was up with this piston from the beginning or is this just from the loss of oil pressure and least amount of cooling so it swelled up and grabbed the wall?
Correct driver side which I believe is the thrust side. I talked to Randy at Race-Tec (Spinoff of JE) who made the pistons for me. He saw the photos and said it looks like this was the source of my excessive piston rattle when cold from day 1 with this build, and that likely the oil pump failure finished it off. What I flat out cannot believe is the bore has NO gouges at all, literally run your fingernails/fingers over it and its smooth. Granted you can see where the piston was rubbing it and worn the crosshatches down but it shocks me that the bore is not just complete trash. I have only 1 reputable machine shop in Austin that builds 1000+HP engines on a regular basis, he has done work for me in the past on other projects. They cant accept the job until Jan 6th they are backlogged big time. Ill know sometime 2nd wk of Jan if the bore can be honed and re-used. If so then Randy at RT will custom make 1 piston for me to match the other 5 and if needed add the .003 or .00x additional to it to compensate for P/W clearance from the hone process. (if needed) Reality is one piston being .003 or whatever larger than the others wont be noticeable in any way. Still cheaper than another block and set of 6 new ones at 110ea.
Yah your right it is.. and thats the side that took the brunt of it. (engine block was inverted on my stand rofl) Honestly if I didnt have so much coin into this stupid project I would scrap this entire engine and torch in a Chev LS 6.0 & 4L80E and be done with it.
How many out there do we know of that are running strokers that have lasted 100k without internal issues? If they are done right it would seem it would last a long time. I know SilverXJ (i think thats his screenname) had gone through a few iterations like me but for different reasons (distributor gear failures if I recall). I just hoped that once all said and done this engine would have provided me with everything I was after. 1. Reliable,clean,good power,decent mileage, and ability to buy off the shelf repair parts.
In my WJ i am just really leery of cutting into the frame rails (uni-body) then patch/plating over it and hoping the truck still has a strong chassis and safety during a front end impact. Making an LS fit is only a part of the equation.
superstingray77 wrote:How many out there do we know of that are running strokers that have lasted 100k without internal issues?
Mine's done 74k miles and is still going strong, though I had to swap my stock cam back in with new lifters after 34k miles when I had one flattened lobe on my Crane 753905 cam and two bad Crane lifters.
Did you dissect your pump to see why it seized? I am currently building a stroker because my 6 month old melling oil pump seized and snapped it's drive shaft just like yours.
