Wynona the wagon's resurrection!

[DRIVEN]

Nope, not enough cracks in the manifold to be a Jeep.

[HRH]

I do like Jeeps! Boxy is better. The annoying part is this engine work wouldn't have been necessary if I would have just used my head and been happy with one win. Oh well. At least I'll have better valve springs and more power now. And a 5 speed. If I had a 4th gear in the auto, this also wouldn't have happened. Probably.

[Taterhead]

Oh Betty, how I love thee.

[wayno]

Oh Betty, how I love thee.

He is getting married to Rose, don't be mentioning Betty.

[flatcat19]

Betty is about to be ignored. Placed on CL to afford a married couples Doritos addiction.

[HRH]

Oh boy, today was a wonderful waste of time. Had big ideas, none of which happened. I didn't like the crank bolt holes. Originally they said we'll put 3 inserts in, I'm like ok, 3 holes are ok. Get all the stuff back and my engine builder says we only did one insert, the rest looked ok. And so I'm like, alright, maybe I was just being over-critical.

So today I start getting the crank ready and I look at the holes. They look shitty, minus the one insert. So I take a bolt and run it in the automatic crank. Nice and tight. Then I run it in my crank. Wiggle wiggle. So I called the machine shop, which is in the process of moving buildings, so after waiting an hour (like these guys, but you know every once in a while) I call Joe my Datsun guru and drag a helicoil kit and the crank by his shop.

So we make a drilling device by mounting an old crap flywheel to the crank, then welding a thick piece of round stock to a hole to be used as the drill hole. This makes for really nice straight holes as once you drill into the crank, you're pretty much committed. So we made that, bought Joe lunch, then came home. The next 2 hours, I attempted to put the helicoil in without lube. Bad idea. Tried to cut off the tag edge sticking out, kept screwing up the profile and the bolt wouldn't thread in. So I finally yanked out that helicoil. The next 2 were substantially easier. Still ruined 2, the plastic tool seemed to start screwing up after a bit. The last one was a little tweaked at the end, had to grab it with pliers and lift it one crevice back, then it was happy.

Now I have 4 inserts in the crank, 2 regular holes that hold enough to tighten to 108 ft lbs. So TOMORROW, I will start installing the crank and now I won't have to worry about being under the car tightening the flywheel and having it strip threads. At least now I actually have the crank ready to go. Definitely a not very productive day.

[HRH]

Nope, Betty is getting cut up. Saving all the good stuff, the shell will go to scrap, but not for a bit yet. Leaving wheels on to be able to pull her around to the front. I'll steal everything else off and squirrel it away for use later. Probably even going to remove the windshield since I put a new one in when I got her. That's always tricky, but if I take my time I should be able to cut it out without cracking it.

[HRH]

Did you get the rod ends checked with the ARP hardware? Ive read some reports on other Nissan engines of the ARP bolts making the rod ends not perfectly round, though that was probably on applications where torque spec was increased.

I owe you one there Laecaon! I put in the ARP rod bolts tonight in preparation for the pistons going in, and it says right on the instruction sheet to make sure you re-circle after installing new rod bolts. Particularly ARP. So I called my engine shop and they said the same thing. So tomorrow I'll get my butt up there at 8 am and have that done, then go about installing.

For now, the crank is in, quite happy about that. Thinking I'll go start tearing the motor out of Ugly Betty since I'm stalled on the wagon at the moment.

[DRIVEN]

+1^^^

[Laecaon]

No problem. Glad I could add some insight. I research a lot of things, specifically trying to find reasons to not do it/ buy it, and any work involved to used said product.

[Taterhead]

Oh Betty, how I love thee.

Nope, Betty is getting cut up. Saving all the good stuff, the shell will go to scrap, but not for a bit yet. Leaving wheels on to be able to pull her around to the front. I'll steal everything else off and squirrel it away for use later. Probably even going to remove the windshield since I put a new one in when I got her. That's always tricky, but if I take my time I should be able to cut it out without cracking it.

[HRH]

Sorry Ross. I shed a few tears last night, but I assured Betty she would live on in Wynona. I really am using just about everything. Suspension, probably keep the doors, all the glass. By the time it's done, all that will go to scrap is a metal box. And she's most definitely rusty. There are no rear quarter panels anymore. They're being held together with expandofoam. Have for the last 2 years.

As for the rods, after installing the ARP rod bolts, only one needed to be resized, the rest were all still fine, so that's good. Have the rings on the pistons now, just about ready to go out and install in the car.

As for cams, now I'm wondering about using the 260z cam in place of the stock Maxima cam as it will be a bit better, but not anything that should have trouble with idling, etc. However, I need to ask my Datsun guru because the Maxima head is through oiling, the 260z has a spraybar. But I'm thinking the cam isn't drilled. Debating if I can use it regardless and just put the spray bar in. We shall see.

[Laecaon]

My friends 240z is through oil. I assume that the spray bar is in addition.

[HRH]

Yeah, I talked to the guru about that, says with the spray bar on the 260z it will only work if I use all the cam towers off the 260z head and using both those and a through oiled cam is just plain too much pressure for a street motor. They apparently did that for the race car and still had to glue to valve cover gasket in place because it was pushing so much to the top end. I think I'll just put the stock cam in it and call it good.

Pistons are in now. Now I have to find a 50 mm freeze plug for the back of the block. The big one has been oozing for a while I just realized. Had to go grab the automatic plate and check it, sure enough rusty in a circle. Thought it might have just drained back from when I yanked the head, but figured that much rust, probably not.

[HRH]

Motherfucker!! The rear freeze plug in the back of the block is off. That's why it was leaking. The new 50 mm freeze plug I got matches EXACTLY the dimensions of the old freeze plug, which I removed without destroying. Measuring the hole, it's about .003 too large, which explains why a 50 mm plug is too small, barely seals, and a 2" plug is too large. Must have been that way from the factory, but it didn't spit out because the trans plate covers that hole on the back of the block. Looks like it just rusted in.

So off I go, being interrupted again. Fuck! Harbor freight has some barrel sanders I can put on my 90 degree whizz wheel so I can gently massage out the opening to accept the 2" common freeze plug. It almost fits now, not quite. Nissan cut that wrong from the factory without a doubt. Bastards!

[HRH]

Lowes has some better barrel sanding kits, including some 1.5" one that do a bit better for such a large opening. However, I cut a little too much out. The 2" freeze plug does fit tightly, but not as tight as I'd like. Probably only has .003-.004" press fit. Found one for a Chevy that's .016 larger, so I'm going to get that and yank the old one out and install the Chevy plug. An additional .008 per side should be tight as shit which will make me feel much better considering I really don't want to yank the transmission back out to seal a water leak after I just finished putting it together. If it doesn't fit, there's still plenty of material to (carefully) rub just a little bit more out with the fine sandpaper barrel.

[DRIVEN]

Good lord, man. That's a lot of hassle over a stupid freeze plug.

[HRH]

Yep. The .016 larger really wasn't .016 larger, so I had to hog it out a bit more and a 2 1/16" freeze plug now resides where the allegedly 50 mm freeze plug was. Really wish I had the block out of the car, this would be a lot easier to work on. At the time though, there was snow and the garage just isn't long enough. Good news it the rear crank sleeve is on and the rear main is installed. Now I can actually get around to the timing set and yanking the motor out of Ugly Betty for the transmission plate and then put on the clutch and flywheel, etc. Slowly, ever so slowly, but at least I'm past most of the hurdles...I think.

[HRH]

Ugly Betty's heart is out. I took pictures but I'm tired and watching a Bond film with a beer instead. I'll post pictures tomorrow. Freeze plug is good, crank sleeve is on, rear main seal is in. Smashed my finger doing that. Not completely black, but there's a nice stripe down the center. Ugly Betty's motor and trans assembly is behind the wagon but in the garage. I'll be looking at installing the transmission tomorrow I think. At least getting the flywheel plate on and then the flywheel.

I'm probably going to run into another expense. The staked driveline with carrier bearing for the driveshaft. Both shafts are great except the rear u joint is a little notchy and hard on both. So, I may see if I can replace with an appropriate one piece driveshaft from one of the many other Datsuns I have squirreled away. But I'm better not. Going to try the 720 one first, it has replaceable u joints. No carrier bearing.

[HRH]

Captain's Log, stardate 7,000,003. Finally got the timing cover on after having to drill and re-tap an oil pan bolt hole. Gasket went off sideways, had to take off and reposition, I REALLY hope it's going to be happy and seal or I'm going to be severely annoyed. Had black rtv sparingly on both sides of the gasket. Of course, when I went to put it back on, I forgot half the bolts I pulled out were rusty as hell, so I was back and forth at the wire wheel cleaning them off. Bah. I need to catalog the bolts needed for L motors and get a shitload of new ones. Wish I could get them with the proper size head though. Not the 13 and 17mm head 8 and 10 mm bolts because aftermarket suppliers don't get how metric fasteners work.

Anyway, going to go clean up the oil pan and put that on. Then I should be able to reattach the crossmember and at that point put on the transmission, then finally the cylinder head. The wagon may get the lumpy cam after all because I'm just not excited to go about changing it. I guess we'll see how annoying it is at idle. I may just leave it until spring and then go for a little less in the cam department.

Oh, and ran into the L26 flywheel I had resurfaced has no pressure plate dowel holes. As in, they aren't drilled into the flywheel. Never seen that before. So I'm running the Maxima flywheel, which is lighter anyway. Didn't have it resurfaced, but it should be fine. Oh yeah, I still have to bleed the clutch too after I get the trans in. Balls. I have a shitload to do. Back out to the garage.