So for anyone following my other thread, I have a situtation that has pretty much made me conclude I need a new short block due to a slipped liner:
https://landroverforums.com/forum/di...ood-day-49717/

Well - found a full 4.0L engine locally that a guy pulled to do a diesel conversion. For $400. He promised me it was working perfectly fine when he pulled it but for obvious reasons I do not want to get stuck with two broken engines and a 4000 lb garage decoration ...

The engine is on a stand, so I ask him if I could pull off the heads of the engine to at least inspect the cylinder condition and look at the liners - he said no (fair enough as if I don't buy he would need to get a HG job to sell as a full engine to another buyer). He offered to let me bring a professional in to his garage to do a leak-down test if I wanted to pay for it ...

The offer makes me feel abit better about his view on the engine. He also said he did a compression test and got #s in the 170s/180s (so did I so this doesn't make me feel much better)

Anyway, just wanted to see if I could brainstorm some good tests I could do that are relatively quick (he probably would not want me hanging out in his garage all day) and non-invasive (see above) that would give me a good reason to conclude that this engine (at least the block) are in good enough shape for my purposes...

I mean it seems as most D1 engine blocks don't have the problems and its the heads/HG that die (unlike D2) so odds are its okay to be a block donor but then again - you never know ....

 

Would it help to look from the bottom (take off oil pan, you buy new gasket)?

 

Dude for $400 quite wasting his time, either buy it or dont.
He is not going to let you pull the oil pan, or the heads, or the valve covers, either buy it or dont.
If you want to hear it run then take a gas can and some rubber hose, hook the rubber hose to the fuel line on the engine, raise the fuel tank, hook up the battery and start it.
He should still have the ECU so that will need to be plugged in.
Let it run on the stand for a few min, no you dont need a cooling system, no you dont need any kind of exhaust, just start it, listen, does it sound normal?
If you came into my garage looking to buy a $400 engine and wanted to tear it apart I'd tell you to f-off and go away.

 

Yeah - I hear ya.

If I were buying an engine for a normal car where 90% dnt need head gaskets as routine maintaince and all the other problems, I would take my chances but with these things I feel like odds are the engine is a piece of junk. The low price and fact that I found the VIN number from when he tried to sell before and it told me it failed emissiosn 5 times has made me walk away.

Found another though - this one is 750 though and is in a car so I can hear it run. Has 150k miles though so probably should count on needing a new cam, lifters and timing chain as well as plopping my rebuilt heads on there = new gaskets for the 2nd time in 3 weeks. Maybe my attitude to this one shows I'm just done with this disco. Maybe I should shell out 20k for a defender with a 300tdi so at least the 500 bills are not 25% of the resale of the whole vehicle.

But yeah - both your suggestions are good. And I would tell someone to screw off if they wanted to rip apart my 400$ engine too.

 

Just buy the $400 engine do head gaskets and anything else you think needs to be done while you have it on a stand and then drop it in. How much is leak down test. This would be worth it.

 

To get leak down test done at his garage - quoted about $300 (obviously not worth it).

I would tend to agree with your comment but again - I just did this on my engine and that's what I am in the mess I am in so I am obviously a bit overly sheepish.

 

youre suggesting he run a fuel injected engine on an engine stand by gravity feeding it fuel.

 

It could be done. 30 psi is about 70 feet of water. Of course, fuel is lighter than water. Elevate your gas tank about 100 above the engine, you should be good

 

Good point. Never thought of that.

Another good point - I may end up spending more on hose and ladders than the new engine but what the hell!

The easier option IMO if I wanted to go down this road (which I don't think I do) would be to try and get the stand close enough to the side of my truck that I could plug in to the fuel injector wiring and coil connections from my truck (unlikely to reach, though) as well as the fuel lines (could run some hose from to get the extra length.... Again like you guys have said - the $400 engine seller definetly would not want any part of this.

 

At the end of the day nobody wants to buy a complete engine without knowing the history. Which is why you can pick them up for $400. I say buy it, disassemble it and check it all out. Worst case you need a block - one in good shape can be had for cheap and then with the two engines combined you should have enough parts to build one solid engine.