top-end overhaul (pt2!!)

Just spent an hour and a half cleaning my spare lifters, turned out they were all stuck solid!!
They've just been sitting in the head I took off in december until today, had to stand on the head to pull one of them out thanks to the sludgy oil. They were all stained from the old oil, so I just gave them a little clean with some 1000 grit wet 'n' dry, and re-assembled with a smear of fresh oil, I can now squeeze against the spring just with my thumb, quite a difference from having to use a hammer to take them apart!! They are now sat in an old baby milk tin full of fresh oil waiting for me to swap the head back over.

Also managed to get the head cleaned up with the good old wire wheel in the drill, it still didn't look clean enough though so I ended up priming it, and gave it a coat of star silver(thanks to my brother for leaving a can lying around).

Hopefully I'll get some pics tommorow, and get all the mating surfaces cleaned up. Going to be re-lapping all the valves aswell when I get the gasket set, and I might even be attempting some light porting too.:thumb:

Sounds like some good work.
Is this head to go on the 1300 bottom end that you thought had worn rings?

Yeah its the one I took off it, the compression test results pointed to a problem with the valves, and the engine was running perfectly well with this head on so it's kinda a backward step but hopefully for the better. The main reason for the quick overhaul at christmas was to get the worn camshaft replaced with the piper.

Ah right.
Is Star Silver a good match colour for the cleaned and polished effect? Lol
I started trying a polish a few bits up, but then got bored and just sprayed them silver lol

Spraying bits silver is the easiest way to get them looking good imo, I was lucky to find a half used can sitting on the shelf, with money being as tight as it is at the mo I wasn't prepared to buy some! Painted the thermostat housing whilst I was at it, looks 15 times better than it did!

Just a little worried now 'cos the top-end of the engine's gonna be the best looking bit of the car when it's all back together!

And the flipping mot reminder turned up in the post this morning, so that's another ?40 I'll have to find.

MOT reminder :confused:

Yeah the local garage actually send their customers reminders for mot's and major services, A nice little touch that helps them stand out from the usual bodge merchants.

Ahhh right.
Never heard of that before.

nice touch that!

Some of the main dealers round here do it aswell, but only until your warranty runs out on a new car. The garage we use now is just an independent, family run business, they are allways busy and they even put up with me as a college trainee for a few months about 8 years ago.

Just spent another two hours doing a good job of lapping the valves in. Surprisingly they were in pretty good condition to start with, leading me to think that this head has maybe had some work done before. I only had to use fine grinding paste to obtain a 3mm band of clean material on every valve and seat, so hopefully this will ensure no leaking valves unlike the head I put on in december. Forgot to charge the camera battries again so no pics still, I'll have to leave a note next to the head for when I get the new gasket set, as i haven't put the valves back in due to not having any new stem seals spare.

I think I may have a pin-hole leak in the thermostat housing where the top hose sits, Think I might have to drill it out and get some chemical metal on it, or I might just see if it leaks when it's all back together!

Really all thats left to do is fit the stem seals and put the valves back in, then make sure I've got the right gaskets and the attack will commence!!

I was thinking of cleaning up and painting the spare cam carrier this week, But I'm not sure if I should be swapping a freshly run-in cam into a carrier that had a very worn cam in it? Any advice on this would be welcome.

Finally got the gasket set today:D . Started off sticking the valves back in, then decided to attack the car!
Couldn't see any damage to the bores (still got some honing marks on them!), the valves on the temp head look ok too, I'll have to pop them out I think.
Spent a little time screwing the inlet manifold studs into the head I've been working on properly, I hate it when they only half go in.
Bolted the inlet to the head while I had it in the garage, it is so much easier to do it off the car, my back certainly doesn't feel as bad as it would have!
As I write this the current situation is head and cam box back on, tightened down (40lb/ft/90deg/90deg/75lb/ft), carb reconnected, dizzy refitted, belts on. All thats left to do is get some bolts for the exhaust manifold (the studs were all knackered) and get that back on, a slug of anti-freeze and a new jubilee clip for the top hose (:( ), and she'll be up and running again.

Oh and here are some of the pics I promised!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6.../HPIM1699b.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6.../HPIM1698b.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6.../HPIM1697b.jpg

Hold that camera still lol

Sounds like good work :)

Woah, super-size my pics! Think I'll resize them later. The camera I use is about three years old, just a basic kodak thing with hardly any features on it, that must be the 5000th pic I've taken thats ended up blurred, will have to sort out the button as it takes a good press to make it take the pic.


Edit, pic size sorted.

All back together and running now. Checked the compression after running it until the fan came on, all cylinders at 170psi, but it's still running stupidly rough unless I give it either a touch of throttle or choke.
Can't afford to take it back to Boggs at the moment, so can anyone think of anything I could try to get it running smoother?

er a rough guess use some redex in it then after that try tweaking the mixture screw a little

If it needs choke then is it running a little lean?

if it gets hot quick then it will be running lean