I just got off my second chat with Amazon customer service and they didn't give a ****. Some vague promise of escalating and holding people responsible or something. My BSometer is so finely tuned they use it to set the clocks in Greenwich and I'm sure nothing will come of the chat. I'm returning it all and anything else I can find from Amazon that hasn't been installed, used, or eaten unless I make use of it tomorrow. I order an average of an item a day from Amazon for three businesses and my rover crack habit, but paying extra for items with prime shipping and then waiting five days is not okay. There must be some recompense, even if it is just the satisfaction of a silent F U.

I pulled the heads from old reliable and the cylinders were BLACK. I could chop that stuff off and grill steaks over it. No head gasket leak there. Running way rich. In truth I just gave up on that engine and its issues months ago. So I cleaned everything with gas and now I smell like Goober on the Andy Griffith show.

I guess tomorrow I will swap the heads and relocate the coils. First thing, I am going to recheck the compression on every cylinder so I have a baseline, then disconnect the MAF and O2s and see what happens. If nothing good happens I'll swap the heads even though I'm not sure why since the compression figures are high.

I checked the flex plate, though just for a moment because I kept thinking the cats are going to explode with so much gas in them. I couldn't see any wobble. I have another y pipe and yet another one that lacks cats if it comes down to it.

My injectors spent all of about five minutes, at most, out of their spots in the fuel rail and lower intake. I can't imagine that they would have developed an issue. Should I try harder to imagine it?

I'm also going to look back over all of the posts here. But please, if anyone has a suggestion... tomorrow is the day that I burn gaskets.

 

4 and 7 are on the same coil. Same pair. I remember Number9 mentioning something about that.




I do have a spare coil. Hmm.

 

I have no words.

Just pictures.







You know when you think a bolt might have fallen down the intake but you find a bolt or decide that you were wrong?

See above.

I post the good and the bad.

This is bad.

 

So I see nothing wrong with 4 and 6. I got new coils and am going to just put it all back together with a different set of heads.

On the coil relocate I did pull the coil connectors and wire from my old harness. Then I opened the new harness. I find the colored wires easily but the shielded wires are spooking me... There are about 6 identical shielded wires. I looked at this before I took the heads off so I have easier access now but my thought at the time was that there was a high probability of me cutting the wrong shielded wires. That's out.

Tomorrow, in the light and without the heads in. I may just pull the coil connectors and their wires back to toward the passenger side, meaning taking the loom apart. It sounds harder than it would be, unless the wires cross other wires. The whole thing (loom and wire bundles) are held together with electrical tape. I'll shoot some pictures tomorrow. Maybe everyone already knows this stuff but I've never looked inside the main harness.

Fingers crossed.

 

Charlie, why don't you start a new thread on the coil relocation project. I have been thinking of doing something very similar, my idea is to add two new coils and mount two coils on each side off of the engine. It would be great if we could find a male connector that matches the factory ignition coil female connector then we could just plug into the existing wiring harness and run new wires to the 2 new coils.

 

Just to bring this to a conclusion. I am going to start a coil relocation thread. I couldn't upload pictures from my phone but I will try with a laptop.

After swapping the heads all is well except for a strange knock that sounds like it is coming from the middle of the engine, back. I bet my rod bearing took a hit from that bolt. The bolt mystery deepens because if you look at my pictures, it did not strike that many times. The engine has been installed, pulled, reinstalled, and run both times, so I would think I'd see more strikes. Anyway, it now runs like butter except for that sound. My plan is to pull the oil pan and inspect the #7 rod and bearing and replace whatever needs to be replaced from underneath. I just need to find a freaking single pair of .010 oversized rod bearings, and possibly a piston/rod. I hope I don't need the latter because I would have to pull the heads again and that would drive me insane.

Thanks for the many contributions to this thread! I think it is safe to say that if your intake looks WAY too clean on certain tubes and you have a misfire and rough running, and gas in the oil, then you have a bolt in the piston. Kidding. Then you have a stuck intake valve.

The inestimable Abran is doing some swapping with me and I will have a new piston and oversize rod bearings sometime this week.

I should also add that a VERY short run time with a severe misfire watered my gas BIG TIME. Anyone driving around with a flashing SES or long term misfire problem should keep that in mind. My oil was like water, and the truck never even left the driveway. I'd say 4 minutes run time.

Best,

Charlie V

 

It ain't over til it's over.

I swapped the bearings on the 7 conrod and it got slot quieter. But it isn't quiet. So in the awesome rain I am going to change the rest of the bearings. I mean conrod and main. At least it isn't raining under the rover.

I finally got a dealer account at the parts store. Took half off the box on my brake cleaner.

My theory is that 7 got sloppy because of the bolt and the new bearings improve the slop, but the slop must extend to some other bearings too. I'm not willing to consider hat it could be the crank itself. I watched some videos of horrific bearing damage on YouTube today, so it could be alot worse.

Also today I say armyrover discuss his new 99 expedition tow boat, and that reminded me that I had the exact same vehicle. In 2000 I took it in for warranty work and the DEALERSHIP dropped a bolt in the intake, resulting in me getting a free, brand new engine. So thanks armyrover; that recollection makes me feel better.

I'll report results.

 

You think that's all it is? Would it speed up as I accelerated? If that's all it is I am pretty happy...

 

You can buy an engine in my state for less than $200 at the upullits...I often wonder why people do all this engine shop/rebuild on something that isn't worth it.

 

i often wonder what you get out of pissing on everyones dafodils