Soda Blasting

So, nothing is going back into the engine if it’s scruffy. There are various ways of making it clean, but the varnished on oil from the engine front cover I very much doubt would clean up in a parts-washer.

So, to the soda blaster again.

Here is the before-and-almost-after picture.

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Spinning the Rods

imageI took the crank out at the same time as I had to take the bolts out, and decided to “spin the rods” which is something I should have done before. I wasn’t too concerned though, because SBD had measured my crank when  they keyed it and supplied bearings to suit. However, it is good practice.

 

One by one, the rod is attached (with lots of assembly lube) and screwed up ‘ratchet tight’ so not torqued up to any great torque. The rods should move smoothly and without any slap. Then dismantle and put a piece of newspaper in there as a buffer between the bearing and the rod and tighten again. It should jam up pretty quickly (which it did).

If it doesn’t jam then you have too much clearance between the rod big-end and the crank. It’s a little bit ‘rule of thumb’ but a safe test. All mine passed, so at this point I decided to commit. I used my sharpie to write the piston number on the top of each piston and coloured a pattern (again in sharpie) on only one side of each rod, over the joint between the top and bottom of the big end. Thus after I’ve torqued everything up and I need to take it apart then everything can go back together in just the same position as before.

Taking the crank out meant I had to remove the flywheel, which had been bolted up with thread-lock. This meant I had to chase the threads clean again. I bought a set of thread-chasers to clean down the threads. However, it turns out (along with a lot of things in this duratec) that they’re 12×0.75 threads, not 12×1 which is the standard size for 12mm. Thread chasers are quite a lot like a tap, but slightly easier on the thread. It’s not a big deal, so I borrowed a 12x.75 tap and cleaned out the threads. It’s a slightly tedious job – you just keep going in and out until the crap stops falling out the end and the tap moves easily through the thread. So, tomorrow, I should be putting it all back together.

Prep for the Dry-Sump

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So, there are a couple of things that need to change if you’re running ARP crank cradle bolts on the titan dry-sump. The bolts are 2mm too long. I wizzed them down to Simon and Cornering Force, and we span them in the lathe and took 2mm off them. The results are below.

 

imageThen they go into the block again and the nuts spin on. They needed a little finishing off after the lathing. Firstly the sides needed a 60 degree chamfer and Simon has a lot of experience here – he puts the chamfer on so it just meets the thread, and then the nut should start straight away. You can just see a tiny lip at the remainder of the hex head in the middle (there’s about 2mm of recess left). This was filed off with a needle file to remove any overhang and a dremmel (slowest gentlest setting) to remove any protrusion. The top is now perfect.

The bolts spin in to only 4Nm torque (which just so happens to be the torque on my electric screwdriver) so they’re back in the block. There isn’t enough recess left in the top of the bolt to get any more torque in than that anyway.

And yes, the nuts fitted beautifully on the threads. Simon did a great job.

Duratec Fly-wheel locking tool

IMG_2805 IMG_2807So, ages ago I bought a universal flywheel locking tool, but it doesn’t fit my lightened flywheel at all well. So, I’ve made my own. It took less than an hour.

All I did was trace the outline of the flywheel onto a bracket, and then cut and weld it to a piece of 20mm square tube.  The tube was then drilled and bolted to the block. It’s a nice snug fit and should be able to take the load when the crankshaft bolt is tightened 100Nm + 90 Degrees.

I have my new wishbone receiving brackets

Here they are. the gap between the bracket to receive the spherical bearing is 1/2″, and the width of the bolt is 7.9mm, and there’s a few spherical bearings that nicely fit in here. What bugs me isn’t the price of this (£56 per bracket) but the fact that they have been used. I wasn’t expecting to buy used when they’re advertised as new.
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These brackets are a great option to receive the wishbones and of course can be height adjustable.