AllWheelRS
10+ Year Contributor
- 134
- 3
- Oct 17, 2009
-
Orange County,
New York
August 30th 2009 I brought home my first DSM. Purchased in Long Island NY, and towed home 80 miles, or 3.5 hours with the traffic coming over the GW bridge. I was told that the motor had overheated driving home the day the owner bought it, so the head was removed to be sent to the machine shop, where it was determined to badly warped to be usable. I think I got an alright deal considering it was an original 6/4 bolt combo with 85k on the odometer, and all it really needed was a head and exhaust, a 2.5" turbo back catless exhaust was included. So after 3 years of looking for this particular car I found it and brought it home.
On September 13th 2009 I was ready to pull the motor and transmission out and get it on a stand.
I wish I had known at this point how rusted the welds on this stand were under all that paint, but more on that later.
The following weekend I tore the motor down and was happily suprised to see it was in pretty good shape, and the bores were right in spec so I could get away with just using a brush hone.
By the first week of November 2009 I had the bottom end back together with ACL bearings NPR rings, all new freeze plugs, a balance shaft elimination kit installed, new water pump, all new seals/gaskets. I reused the stock pistons and rods.
The winter was cold so I spent most of my time indoors working on the head. I purchased a nt head with no cams, and purchased stock cams and gears and a CAS seperately. In hindsight I could have saved a whole lot of money just buying a rebuilt head, but this was all trial and error for me, so I bought all new valves and 3g lifters. I Lapped the valves/seated, installed the ARP head studs, and a MLS head gasket by parts dinosaur, and went on my quest to find cam gear bolts.
On September 13th 2009 I was ready to pull the motor and transmission out and get it on a stand.
I wish I had known at this point how rusted the welds on this stand were under all that paint, but more on that later.The following weekend I tore the motor down and was happily suprised to see it was in pretty good shape, and the bores were right in spec so I could get away with just using a brush hone.
By the first week of November 2009 I had the bottom end back together with ACL bearings NPR rings, all new freeze plugs, a balance shaft elimination kit installed, new water pump, all new seals/gaskets. I reused the stock pistons and rods.
The winter was cold so I spent most of my time indoors working on the head. I purchased a nt head with no cams, and purchased stock cams and gears and a CAS seperately. In hindsight I could have saved a whole lot of money just buying a rebuilt head, but this was all trial and error for me, so I bought all new valves and 3g lifters. I Lapped the valves/seated, installed the ARP head studs, and a MLS head gasket by parts dinosaur, and went on my quest to find cam gear bolts.
