Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

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Ron LaDow
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#31 Post by Ron LaDow »

C J Murray wrote:I never use break in oil. I never got that concept. Is break in oil less slippy or more slippy and why?
We ran the Cosworth on Redline pure synthetic. At that time, if you called Redline, you got the guy who owned the place on the line.
He was VERY clear; his product was so 'slippery', it would not allow the rings (for instance) to wear the peaks off the honing in the cylinders; you would not get a good ring seal.
He specified 30-40W (single weight, your choice) detergent dino oil for break-in runs on the dyno. As I recall, that was a certain time/varying load/heat procedure. The power pulls were done with Redline.
I assumed he knew far more than me, and that's what I did.
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Dan Epperly
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#32 Post by Dan Epperly »

Oil or no oil, one brand or another...eventually if the rings are in right and the cylinders are round won't the rings eventually seal?

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Wes Bender
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#33 Post by Wes Bender »

Yup. But if they aren't gapped or installed correctly they won't seal properly. When I bought my Shasta cylinders and JE pistons and rings from Leonard, he advised that I check and grind the rings to JE's specs. Did so and then used 30 wt non-detergent oil for the first two oil fills, switching to Brad Penn oil after that and had zero problems with ring sealing or smoking.

...and he was right. They DID need grinding, slightly.
Some days it's just not worth chewing through the restraints.....

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C J Murray
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#34 Post by C J Murray »

Dan Epperly wrote:Oil or no oil, one brand or another...eventually if the rings are in right and the cylinders are round won't the rings eventually seal?
Not always.
Ron LaDow wrote:
C J Murray wrote:I never use break in oil. I never got that concept. Is break in oil less slippy or more slippy and why?
We ran the Cosworth on Redline pure synthetic. At that time, if you called Redline, you got the guy who owned the place on the line.
He was VERY clear; his product was so 'slippery', it would not allow the rings (for instance) to wear the peaks off the honing in the cylinders; you would not get a good ring seal.
He specified 30-40W (single weight, your choice) detergent dino oil for break-in runs on the dyno. As I recall, that was a certain time/varying load/heat procedure. The power pulls were done with Redline.
I assumed he knew far more than me, and that's what I did.
Today the finish on the cylinders is so smooth and the rings are so perfect that I doubt this applies. Certainly Porsche and Corvette use Mobil 1 as the factory fill and it stays in for 10k miles.

The rings on the AA cast pistons are stone age tech and the finish is old school rough. Are the cylinders with the forged pistons that rough?
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Rusty Ferrell
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#35 Post by Rusty Ferrell »

Pulled head for cylinders 3&4 looks just like 1&2 rings installed in right position with dots up. Gap spacing okay no aligned gaps. Plan is to clean everything up and assemble with different oil that Greg chooses. I’m leaning toward the Brad Penn break-in oil.
Rusty

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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#36 Post by Wes Bender »

Assembling wet or dry or the type of oil to use has been an item of discussion for years. Everybody has an opinion of what is best. We're all right and we're all wrong........ If it works and it's fun, do it.

We'd all probably agree that a foreign substance (baking soda for example) shouldn't be used to accelerate the break in process. But then, maybe someone will like that too.....
Some days it's just not worth chewing through the restraints.....

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Ron LaDow
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#37 Post by Ron LaDow »

C J Murray wrote:...Today the finish on the cylinders is so smooth and the rings are so perfect that I doubt this applies. Certainly Porsche and Corvette use Mobil 1 as the factory fill and it stays in for 10k miles.
The rings on the AA cast pistons are stone age tech and the finish is old school rough. Are the cylinders with the forged pistons that rough?
Remember when NPRs were the hot ticket?
Anyhow, the Cozzy used iron liners and they typically got a hand-honing for re-ringing. My 356 iron cylinders were bored and honed by Ted Robinson, who at least honed them in stages so they could cool down in between.
In both cases, I'm pretty sure they were nowhere near the quality of modern factory stuff, nor what a NASCAR builder delivers.
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#38 Post by C J Murray »

Here you have it from the horses mouth...
http://blog.jepistons.com/how-to-break-in-an-engine

I was going to mention this before and the above article reminded me....When the engine was started could the carb/carbs been flooding some, or could the engine have been allowed to idle with rich idle mixture screw settings?

At any rate if you have not discovered any other specific problem you should consider honing the cylinders. The cam should be broken in now so start the car and put the engine under load as soon as possible.
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#39 Post by Craig Richter »

You guys are making me feel old.
 

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Ron LaDow
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#40 Post by Ron LaDow »

C J Murray wrote:Here you have it from the horses mouth...
http://blog.jepistons.com/how-to-break-in-an-engine
At any rate if you have not discovered any other specific problem you should consider honing the cylinders. The cam should be broken in now so start the car and put the engine under load as soon as possible.
I LOVED this:
"This does not mean dumping a couple of teaspoons of Bon-Ami cleanser down the intake."
At one time, I had a Model T with an A engine/trans in it. At least one of the rods had a leather bearing (that was enough; I didn't check the other ones).
Added by edit: THX for the link, Cliff; good stuff.
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Greg Carter
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#41 Post by Greg Carter »

C J Murray wrote:Here you have it from the horses mouth...
http://blog.jepistons.com/how-to-break-in-an-engine

I was going to mention this before and the above article reminded me....When the engine was started could the carb/carbs been flooding some, or could the engine have been allowed to idle with rich idle mixture screw settings?

At any rate if you have not discovered any other specific problem you should consider honing the cylinders. The cam should be broken in now so start the car and put the engine under load as soon as possible.
Mr. Murray,

It's possible the carbs were rich but we now think the Brad Penn 20W-50 oil may be so effective it was never going to let the rings seat correctly (at least not anytime soon). It was allowing so much blow by past the rings that, under load, the engine was forcing oil out everywhere (even into the muffler). At this point the rings have almost no wear but a re-hone of the cylinders is probably a good idea. I may buy another a set of rings as well just to be safe and then run the engine in with a break in oil.

I'm hoping it goes better this time.

On the plus side, Mr. LaDow's full flow oil pump setup works great. The oil looks like the engine hasn't even been run.

Greg

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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#42 Post by Eric Wills »

Greg or Rusty----

A quick question. And I ask not attempting to offer advice, but just trying to gain information as I have used AA piston and cylinder sets in the past.

When you removed the AA installed rings, are the gaps set correctly? I always worry about someone else in a hurry doing that sort of work.

Many thanks for info if possible.

Eric
Eric Wills

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Greg Carter
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#43 Post by Greg Carter »

Eric,

The ring gaps were all set correctly from our measurements. We also set the alignment of the ring gaps per the JE instructions that were included.

As mentioned, we think the issue was simply using Brad Penn synthetic oil instead of straight 30W or a break in oil.

We're going to re-hone the cylinders lightly and install new Total Seal rings.

Greg

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C J Murray
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#44 Post by C J Murray »

Although I stagger ring gaps it is pretty much accepted these days that it doesn't matter. The rings rotate around the piston while the engine is running. I do stagger them but any leakage past a ring gap can easily find it's way to the next gap no matter where it is.
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Re: Blowing Oil After Top End Rebuild

#45 Post by C J Murray »

I have checked the ring gaps on the AA cast pistons that come already assembled and found them to be correct. I would rather they not come assembled though. I assume the JE pistons supplied by AA do not have the rings installed since the parts must arrive to AA separately. Is that true?
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