Lugging at speed/No power at WOT

Did more research... apparently these "low cost" rebuilds (at least the "mashal" ones they used to sell) are hack jobs. Cheap quality internals, mis-matched bores, etc. Ugh. Great for flipper cars with no warranty to the poor idiot who buys it next, but garbage for those who want to keep and drive it for a while.

As for the "famous brands" ones, other than being made in mexico, I haven't found any info that wasn't speculation or "it's cheap, try again". I'll ask around on my other forums/facebook groups I'm part of to see if their product is any good. 3 year warranty at least?

I bought a 460 longblock from Pro-Mar in March of '08 for $1,600 with a THREE year warranty.
I've put over 150,000 miles on it and I beat it like a redheaded stepchild.

*Every Day*

IDK
It works for me

They want $2400 before shipping. Ouch!

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Regarding the copper I saw on the bearings: is it possible that thats left from the engine restore (the stuff with silver, copper, and lead in it, not STP) I was running previously? My oil pressures have always been really good, which makes me skeptical that the bearings are that worn down. I was running 5w30 oil too...

Not that it matters, other than for aging the engine (truck has just over 100k on it).

Check with a good local auto parts place. Should be no shipping costs and your core return is simplified as well. The two I go to locally are very competitive with the prices you've found.

https://www.autozone.com/powertrain/engine/surefire-remanufactured-long-block-engine-df74/627117_361847_11266

https://www.oreillyauto.com/detail/b/remanufactured-4685/engine-parts---mounts-16774/engine-block-long-12068/3c30a164587f/power-torque-long-block-engine-remanufactured/df74/4669598/1984/ford/f-150?q=engine+block-long&pos=0

Same price, only AZ has a 4 year warranty. Still a bit of a pill to swallow though.

Advance has them for $4k... No thanks!

That's odd as my local advance {formerly Car Quest, still same people though}, was the same price as Auto Zone. I guess it's a geographical difference. Doesn't matter though as you have options available and my opinion is they all are using the same rebuilder as their pictures are identical. With a warranty and knowing they {the rebuilder} are doing a fair volume of rebuilds so they surely have a standard they are maintaining.

I'm an idiot. They don't carry them at all, what I was seeing was a long block (more like full engine) for one of the V8's. Didn't say which, but either way, not what I was looking for. If I had studied the picture closer... DOH!

Leaning more towards a long block. Mainly, because I suspect this engine is not original and has the wrong cam installed.

The Block's casting number is incomplete. It's labeled 1TE-6015-AA... the first (year) digit is missing. It could be a 1981 pattern... or 71, 61, or heck, even 91. The "tag" label was also of no help, all it says is "3L8".

The camshaft has no ID marks at all.... other than two 5's about midway down. Nothing stamped on the end. Not a stock cam?

All of this makes me wonder what happened here... and why 5 of 6 rings were busted like that. Something doesn't add up.

Stupid question: If I replace it, for the core, do I need to torque the fasteners to spec? Or can I just snug them, knowing it will all be torn back down anyway?

You could give them core, in a million pieces, in a crate.
That's what they're going to do anyway.

I suspect your compression rings are shattered because of detonation.
Knock or ping under cruise is usually caused by too much advance and or incorrectly curved distributor.
Along with the mandated lean mixture.

I think the cam gear is the right stuff.
Factory (OEM) replacement for a chowdered fiber gear.

Ford used plastic and fiber gears to meet federal noise regulations.
Nobody goes back with that crap when they wear out.

...except the reman engines, which have fiber gears in the pictures. After all, it's "stock". Same thing for the pistons too.

Part of me wants to say **** it and just de-glaze the cylinders, replace the pistons, rings, and bearings (and get the crank polished if I can find somebody who will do such a-la-carte), and clean the rest up. All done for less than $500 if I were to estimate (and that includes non-engine parts I need to replace: water pump, electrical connectors, and choke stove rebuild kit)

Yes, in an ideal world, I'd have it hot tanked and the like... but in addition to said cost, would mean pulling apart the heads, which also opens up the cylinder head rebuild rabbit hole (), which leads to the same cost as a reman. Which is money I don't exactly "not have", but money I'd rather spend on other things (alignments for both of my trucks, tires for my bald 1995 ranger, etc.).

"while I'm at it" is a contagious disease... it turns minor repairs into overhauls, and simple overhauls into budget busting race builds. I'm trying to avoid said disease while also trying not to half ass stuff.

EDIT- other note I forgot to make: when I bought the truck, the ignition was way advanced, and the ECU power lead not connected. That's noted earlier in the thread, but now I know what happened. Somebody was ****ing around with it and went too far. Whoops.

Well, you could keep your steel (or iron) timing set. Nobody's going to care about that.
All that would be new with a rebuild anyway.

If you think you're getting out of it for $500, you're in for a shock.
Because that won't even pay for proper *basic* machine work.
And no one is going to work on an engine that's not CLEAN, inside and out.
The shop is going to have to clean it before -and after- because one little piece of grit in their machines is going to make all subsequent work 'off' as well.

Get some prices.
Ask if they'll let you supply your own parts.
Consider ala carte v/s a package deal.
V/s a reman long block that is bolt and go.

I'm going to stop here, because I don't want to be pushy.
But I'm trying to break it down to you, from the perspective of someone who's BTDT.

I'm never going to follow a tangent like Gary
There's always a middle ground between 'less is more' and 'Moar is better!'

Your links led me to Ford 300 CI long blocks. I don't understand. I built a 240 CI way back about 1991 or so and spent@ $1000 dollars. About $250 of that was getting the head done which included shaving some off to be sure it was nice and flat, very necessary in my opinion. That nice clean flat surface helps it seal up nice and tight.

Took some quick measurements on the block. The bores, as far as I can measure with calipers, have not been re-bored. I found an area where the ridge was mostly missing, calipers measured it being 3.990". Obviously, that's under nominal, which tells me I'm measuring the ridge. To confirm, I set the calipers to 4.020 (20 over, 10 below 30 over), which wouldn't fit any of the cylinders. I feel safe saying that this block has never been bored.

I then did the ring test on cylinder 1 (worst compression) using the one good upper ring I still had (which came off cylinder 3, not cylinder 4. I am stupid!)... I was having ring alignment issues, but with a precision of 2-4 thou, I couldn't measure any taper in the upper cylinder (0.058" was a good fit). Further down I did see the gap narrow up ,maybe 4-9 thou, which translates to 1.3-3 thou of diameter change. That's well within the the FSM spec of 0.010" max taper.

The $500 comment was with me doing the work, other than the crank polishing (I've read that's more like $30-$60, all they do is put it in a lathe and use a big sanding belt on each journal. I have no personal lathe, let alone one big enough, and since I can't take it to work, I gotta farm it out). I take the block in for work, I know it would get expensive, which is why if it comes to that, I'll put in a reman. If I thought my block was trashed (bores hosed, overheated, etc.), there would be no question, other than how long I'd have no toy budget after the reman . However, other than glazed cylinders (and some scale in the water jacket, but truthfully nothing obscene), my block seems fine. The heads I'd ideally want to be gone through... but once again, we hit the "reman is cheaper" issue.

I don't know why the thought of a reman'd item I can rebuild myself makes my skin crawl. Maybe because I've seen so many of them get slapped together and blow up on people. Maybe it's sticker shock. Maybe it's the fact that all my life I've been told my projects (not just cars and trucks) suck and that I need to scrap them and buy some consumer level run-of-the-mill piece of "reliable" dog shit instead. Probably a personal issue on my end (if this tangental rant doesn't indicate such well enough).

It is up to you on how you procede with your engine as it is your engine. You have to go which ever way that you feel confident in going.                                                                            

I know, and I'm an undecided mess at the moment. I'll get some quotes and sleep on it.

I have time. My employer is mostly shuttered right now until 4/20 (I'm a salaried engineer, who THANKFULLY is still getting pay to do what little work I can from home), which is how I've gotten so much done so fast and, combined with fixing my Ranger and scoring tools at the right time, why I chose to pull the trigger on the pull and tear down.

Good luck and I'm glad to hear you are one of the lucky ones to still be getting paid.

Use the head of a piston to push your ring square into the bore.
Start at the top, work your way down taking a measurement in the middle too.

Long stroke engines with long rod to stroke ratios, don't wear sideways nearly as much as oversquare engines with pancake pistons and ultra short rods.

I'm not saying that you can't, but I can't figure out why anyone would (get the crank, cam bearings and pistons new or overhauled and install all that into an otherwise worn out engine.

If it's a bandaid, then get some rings and put it back together I.

If you go reman, you will want to get a torque wrench and go over every bolt of the long block checkinging to be sure all fasteners are torqued properly. Sometimes bolts get missed, even in the best of shops so that is just a good thing to do before installing the oil pan and valve covers. I always double check myself even if I am absolutely sure I didn't miss anything. Also, no matter which way you go, the break-in is critical to the longevity of the engine as well.

A decision has been made. I'm working with the block/head I have.

I posted the following on another Forum I'm a member of (not a truck/car forum):

Pulled the heads apart tonight.

Good news: the valve seats look OK. A re-lap wouldn't hurt though.

Bad news: the intake valves are NASTY... like on a GDI. Probably due to all of that blowby oil circulating (it was beyond what a catch can would fix, even the oil cap hose was blowing oil). Right now I have the Cylinder 2 Intake valvetrain (other than the push rod) soaking in MMO to see if I can loosen the carbon. As for the head itself, I'm told oven cleaner will KO the crud.

Ordered parts. $420 for what I bought after shipping and tax ($344 at RockAuto, $17 at Amazon, $19 at eBay, and $30 at WalMart). List of parts:

-Rering Kit: Includes rings, rod/main bearings, and a gasket/seal kit (includes valve seals)
-Pistons (Hypereutectic, not plain cast like the stock turds)
-Rear main seal
-Water pump (my shaft had a lot of play, no leak, but no good
-Thermostat
-Engine and transmission mounts
-flexplate (mine had chowdered teeth)
-Air Filter (wix, of course)
-Alternator belt (mine is "new", but already missing teeth and falling apart. I fucked up the tension for a long time and shredded it)
-New connectors for the coil and TFI module
-Spark plugs
-Lower rad hose (old one had a metal spring inside, which was rusted to pieces).
-Fresh oil and filter. I'll be running pennsoil platinum 5W30 and a motorcraft filter.
-Fresh coolant. What came out isn't old (changed it last fall), but filtering didn't clean it up.
-Ground cable for battery (existing setup was hacked and fell apart in my hand. $12 fix from walmart of all places)

Not included is tools and other stuff, which I have about $120 invested in so far. But tools keep.

Today I cleaned up the valves and head. Oil Pan is sitting. Are the cleaning jobs perfect? No. Better than what I had? By far.

I also got the choke stove tubes redone last night (used 1/4" copper tubing and the insulater sleeve out of a failed repair kit). The lower "port" on the manifold seems oversized. I tried to solder it, but my map/pro torch ran out of gas, and I don't know if such will hold up to the heat of the manifold. What's a good way to seal it up? (The way it's routed, it's on the cold side, not the hot side, so other than being unfiltered, a leak here isn't completely an issue?)