Never meet your heroes! '86 Grand National

[dynoman]

s not reusable and needs to be swapped out regularly. Have you noticed quick loss of effectiveness with glass?

I've never swapped it out , I have just added more to the bin . It get pretty fine and gets sucked out the vacuum hole . As far as effectiveness , it seems to work about the same as fresh beads , but I haven't blasted to many badly corroded / coated parts . If I did I probably would use aluminum oxide media .

 

[Jon Early]

I've never swapped it out , I have just added more to the bin . It get pretty fine and gets sucked out the vacuum hole . As far as effectiveness , it seems to work about the same as fresh beads , but I haven't blasted to many badly corroded / coated parts . If I did I probably would use aluminum oxide media .

That makes sense! Thank you! I plan to use a dust collector so it sounds like that will help me with maintenance.

 

[dynoman]

That makes sense! Thank you! I plan to use a dust collector so it sounds like that will help me with maintenance.

I'm thinking of using a Dust Deputy with the shop vac because it doesn't filter out dust very well just using the shop vac alone . I have to vent it outside .

 

[TurboTGuy]

Did any of this thread look fun or something? I hate this car.

Welcome to the Club!!!!!!

But when they run right........ It's Heaven.

You'll get her sorted out.

 

[LANDAU LIMITED]

You can remove the pan quite easily with the engine in. Definitely worth a looksy.

 

[Jon Early]

Welcome to the Club!!!!!!

But when they run right........ It's Heaven.

You'll get her sorted out.

I'm looking forward to finally experiencing that!

I'm confident I'll get there. Band aiding that hacked up alky system was getting too risky and the header leaks never would've allowed for a good tune to work anyway. I just need to get it back together now.

You can remove the pan quite easily with the engine in. Definitely worth a looksy.

Good to know! Thank you. I know I'll be less nervous later if I do that.

 

[Jon Early]

I finally got enough of my back ordered parts to make progress on the car and immediately screwed up... Valve spring edition.

I didn't bother to put the piston at TDC because I figured it would be fine under air pressure.... But I didn't have any. I had a brain fart and forgot to remove the valve core from my compression tester.

So here I am. I should have just pulled the engine at this point.

Fel-Pro 9441PT head gaskets and a set of basic ARP head bolts are on the way. Since the heads are coming off anyway, I need to make a decision about the ports. I have no desire to port match the heads to my intake, but I know it's going to drive me nuts knowing how bad it is.

I'm torn between just making a nice transition and replacing the intake with a stock one. This one has a failed heli-coil anyway, so I'm leaning toward the second one.

I'm still mad at myself for this stupid mistake though. I get to do a lot of surface cleaning tonight. Yay.

 

[turbobuick]

That sucks. I wouldnt worry about the intake to port alignment believe it of not it will make very little difference. If you want gains most of that comes from work in the bowl area behind the valve.

I would yank it at this point. It is just easier to assemble, clean, seal and paint it out of the car.

 

[Jon Early]

That sucks. I wouldnt worry about the intake to port alignment believe it of not it will make very little difference. If you want gains most of that comes from work in the bowl area behind the valve.

I would yank it at this point. It is just easier to assemble, clean, seal and paint it out of the car.

I'm strongly considering it. It would be nice to identify for sure what converter I have and replace it if it's actually an old 2200 stall. The biggest issue is figuring out how to actually do it. The car is sitting diagonally in the garage due to only being 19' deep. Things might be sketchy.

 

[~JM~]

I didn't bother to put the piston at TDC because I figured it would be fine under air pressure.... But I didn't have any. I had a brain fart and forgot to remove the valve core from my compression tester.

I'm still mad at myself for this stupid mistake though. I get to do a lot of surface cleaning tonight. Yay.

I did the same thing on the opposite side.

That's a comforting sound when you hear the valve bounce off the piston.

Might as well pull it if you intend to change the oil pan gasket/motor mounts.

 

[LANDAU LIMITED]

Definitely worth taking it out. Not only is it easier to work on but you can clean up 35 years of grundge and paint everything properly. That's what I did.

 

[buickruss]

I'm thinking of using a Dust Deputy with the shop vac because it doesn't filter out dust very well just using the shop vac alone . I have to vent it outside .

 

[BEATAV8]

Love this thread! KeepIng up the good fight

 

[Hunter Dog]

Just got a chance to read through this thread. Really enjoying it. Keep up the good work !

 

[Jon Early]

Thanks for the advice and encouragement everyone! After leveling my head, I decided to attempt the engine pull. I'm still not really sure how I'm going to go about it, but I think I just barely have enough room between the ram and fender to set the hoist up on the side of the car. That will have to wait though.... My two year old cylinder decided to leak all it's fluid out since the last time I used it.

I couldn't get the main nut off, and I don't think think there's a reseal kit for these Harbor Freight units anyway. I bought a more expensive cylinder online and moved on to other stuff. I didn't really want to jump right into the pull anyway. I needed to make some actual progress instead of more disassembly.

For instance, the blast cabinet could finally be completed! I got the dust deputy and a couple buckets of media for Christmas.

I am super happy with how it turned out. One other modification I did that I think I failed to show you was the addition of a finer grate. I metal zip tied some garden mesh I had sitting around to the bottom. Now I can blast bolts and stuff without worrying about dropping them into the hopper.

Beyond that, everything worked super well. I can see clearly, the cabinet doesn't leak, the feed doesn't clog or run empty, and the whole thing should be very serviceable. My first victim was the BGC downpipe elbow.

After about 5 minutes of work, I had this. My compressor actually does a lot better than expected too!

I could still use a bigger compressor, but it did fine for this small part. I definitely need to install a water separator too.

That was good win, but I wanted more. After doing a little work on my daily driver, I started prettying up the removed cylinder head.

Once that was dryish, I moved on to some unfinished business.

Of course this is not news to most of the folks here, but I was dumbfounded when I learned that these engines don't have exhaust stem seals! How goofy! While I was happy to get to this point, I think I'm pulling all the valves out again. I didn't really think about how the was head already off, so I might as well have cleaned and lapped the valves. They're looking pretty gross. I'll work on that tomorrow.

 

[LANDAU LIMITED]

I like the blast cabinet, beats the hell out of wire wheel.

 

[Jon Early]

All done!

Now to get going on the pull. With the intake out of the way, I found removing the top bell bolts from the top a bit goofy looking but easier nonetheless!

Getting this thing out on my own wasn't exactly fast or graceful, but it happened without scratching or denting anything.

I'm so excited to clean this nasty engine bay!

Looks like this transmission was rebuilt a lot more recently than I thought too! This torque converter has got to go though.

What's are everyone's preferences these days for a mild build like mine? Most of the information I find is pretty old. I'm eyeballing the PTC 2600-2800 stall 10" lock-up converters that a couple vendors sell. Does that sound like a good match for my stock long block and TA49?

 

[Jon Early]

I couldn't really continue working until I cleaned up the garage a little. My tools were scattered, parts were everywhere, and the valvetrain parts were organized nicely, but just sitting on a rag on the floor. That was a very dangerous even as a short term solution, so I went ahead and made these.

This will be a lot more difficult to scatter.
Then I got to work on adding the filter/regulator to my compressor. I decided to keep the old stuff and add the new. to the side plug.

Best NPT threads I've ever cut!

This made a much bigger difference than I expected. Ditching the QC and small plumbing in favor of 1/2" hard plumbing allowed for much more air flow to the gun. The filter also catches a lot more water than I expected.

With that done and mounted I was excited to blast my headers. My compressor was not happy about what I was doing, but my neck needed a break about as often as the compressor needed to catch up and cool off anyway. This is what I had after working for a couple hours.

 

[HotAirWH1]

I used KBS Coatings on my exhaust manifolds & turbo with great success.

 

[Jon Early]

I found a leaky valve on the other head, so I have to redo work.

All the springs came off and the valves got lapped.

Block is cleaning up nicely

But the inside required more attention than I anticipated. I'm glad I pulled this thing out and didn't opt to just flush the pan as per my original plan.

Among all that nasty stuff was a bigger chunks of turbo bearing pieces and a ziptie head. lol

Installed the first head with ARP bolts, a Fel-Pro 9441PT head gasket, Loctite thread sealant, and ARP lube under the heads. I hate how much of a mess it can be using two goos on one bolt, but I always feel better with ARP.