• Hello Guest, welcome to the initial stages of our new platform!
    You can find some additional information about where we are in the process of migrating the board and setting up our new software here

    Thank you for being a part of our community!

No Goals 244

A new challenger has arrived! Picked up another 740 TIC for a song. This one is complete, but rough



After bypassing the in tank pump I got it running and she pulls hard, but there's low compression in hole #2 and I suspect a bad headgasket. Easy enough.

I traded the interior from the red car for a rebuilt 15G and cash, ordered some blue injectors, and a gasket kit, so on my next week off I should be able to ram this baby in the 240 and have some pretty decent power finally.

My neighbors weren't big fans of last week's activities

 
Round 2 trying to get a build-able bottom end!

I picked the hottest days of the Summer so far to get the motivation to pull the FT from the new 740 donor.

Got my work space set up:



This was honestly one of the easiest to pull engines I've ever run into. It was really nice not having to deal with everything being rusty and seized up. Being in the South now has some perks, I guess.



After getting this car running, and performing some pretty fun shenanigans, I knew that this engine had a bad head gasket. Cylinder 2 had low compression, and it was definitely losing coolant. Knowing this I bought the stuff to reseal the whole motor and just generally freshen everything up. I got the head off, and found this:



This engine has had a bad head gasket for quite a long time. Now I've got two B230 boat anchors taking up space in my garage. I haven't decided yet if I want to have this block sleeved and just do it right in preparation for going 16v, or just run a dingleball hone through it and let it have a little blow-by. I ordered everything to run AN lines for the turbo feed/drain, clock th 15G for RWD, and do some other odds and ends that I hadn't initially planned for, so the project is still moving forward either way.

I also got this:



Picked up a smoking local deal on a CD009, shifter relocation kit, M47 bellhousing adapter, and lightweight flywheel. I'm gonna use the flywheel right away, but the rest will be reserved for when I do the 16v build. Hopefully by then I have a garage big enough to get the whole car inside.

What's the best way to get ahold of TLAO for some chips?
 
The thought of "building" a turbo engine with a worn out cylinder was keeping me up at night, and I'm not really in a position to rack up a huge machine shop bill at the moment. Just when I though all hope was surely lost ANOTHER local FT motor popped up for a good deal, so I scooped it from a cool dude on the East side of Houston. All we knew is that it was supposedly good but had sat inside on a stand for quite some time.



I just had to know what I was working with so of course this one came apart, too.



Sweet Jesus hallelujah! Finally one worth messing with. I ran a ball hone through it mostly to knock the carbon off to get a good look at what was there.

This is where I should have cleaned up and painted the block and bolted the head back on. But I didn't do that. This motor was a little sludgy in the top end, and had a lot of crunchy carbon build up in the crankcase, so I pulled everything out, threw my previous "plans" out the window and ordered bearings, and H beam rods. And also picked up a used MS2 setup from a member here.



All the bottom end bearing and crank surfaces were (un)fortunately mint, so I don't anticipate any issues with rolling in new bearings. Plus I gain that piece of mind. All I'm waiting on now is a Yoshifab order, and the rods. Hopefully they get here soon.

New engine plans are NA pistons on Maxpeeding rods, new bearings and gaskets everywhere, pull and lap the valves, reclocked 15G on 90+ manifold, stick with LH and Buchka wasted spark for now, and run it. This is how a simple +T turns into a lightly built motor all because you don't want to screw around with welding an oil return into the oil pan...

As far as the rest of this hoopty goes it needs some attention as well. I was able to fix the cruise control again for the 10,000th time, that makes my 70 mile per day commute a lot nicer. After reading some threads in here I'm 99% sure that the new blower motor is wired backwards, so I need to reverse the polarity on that bad boy. I'm also somewhat confident that's causing a lack of airflow over the evaporator which is at least a partial cause of my heavy condensate/freezing evaporator issues. I need to find out why the power lock stopped working on the passenger's side, and will most likely add remote locks after that's figure out. The subwoofer ground has been an on and off issue since the initial install, and just needs to be done properly one of these days. Right now I have a janky setup with some jumper cables rolling around in the trunk. And I REALLY REALLY need to face my fears and fire up my buffer to get some more shine on the poor thing.

I'm hoping to be able to drive it to Vegas, turbo or no turbo, in September for my wedding (this looks less and less likely every day when reading the news), so now there's a time frame.
 
Not talking smack. I'm not an engine builder by any means, but I'm curious about your approach.

Are you not concerned about the crank journal alignment or assembly balance? Maybe redblocks don't have as much shifting going on as the crappy Buick blocks I'm more familiar with, but my V6s would certainly die a quick and messy death if I tried slapping one together with new bearings and no line bore. Does Yoshifab sell pre-balanced internals?

Honestly, I think I've seen this done several times on here with a decent amount of success. If it's really that easy, I'll dump one of my Buick engines right now and buy a redblock to play with. That sounds a lot more fun. Either way, good luck! I'm enjoying the read. :rockon:
 
Not talking smack. I'm not an engine builder by any means, but I'm curious about your approach.

Are you not concerned about the crank journal alignment or assembly balance? Maybe redblocks don't have as much shifting going on as the crappy Buick blocks I'm more familiar with, but my V6s would certainly die a quick and messy death if I tried slapping one together with new bearings and no line bore. Does Yoshifab sell pre-balanced internals?

Honestly, I think I've seen this done several times on here with a decent amount of success. If it's really that easy, I'll dump one of my Buick engines right now and buy a redblock to play with. That sounds a lot more fun. Either way, good luck! I'm enjoying the read. :rockon:

In this case I would only worry about a line bore if I saw weird bearing wear, or was installing a different crank. As long as the clearances are in spec once it's back together it should be fine. This is by the book for most of of the much more expensive engines I've had to mess with in my day.

As for the balanced assembly that is gonna be a bit of a crap shoot, and I honestly didn't even consider it. I've read that the rods are made well enough in that regard, and I'm using factory Volvo pistons, so I'm not worried about them.

There's a laundry list of ways that this isn't the "right" way to do it overall, but it's good enough for who it's for. I anticipate many miles of fun in its future.
 
In this case I would only worry about a line bore if I saw weird bearing wear, or was installing a different crank. As long as the clearances are in spec once it's back together it should be fine. This is by the book for most of of the much more expensive engines I've had to mess with in my day.

As for the balanced assembly that is gonna be a bit of a crap shoot, and I honestly didn't even consider it. I've read that the rods are made well enough in that regard, and I'm using factory Volvo pistons, so I'm not worried about them.

There's a laundry list of ways that this isn't the "right" way to do it overall, but it's good enough for who it's for. I anticipate many miles of fun in its future.

I gotcha. I don't know how tight the tolerances are on these. I'll be looking forward to how well it goes for you! I'm jealous of all the LS and and SBC guys slapping stuff together with no machine work and ending up with a reliable and powerful engine. Maybe red blocks are just as forgiving.
 
After fixing some other problems, I'm realizing I have a new one. I've had two EZK failures since going to the waste spark board.

My solder joints are good, I sealed the boxes where the wires ran out, I smothered critical areas with dielectric grease. For the ground I'm piggybacking off the cylinder head to firewall ground, and I cleaned both ends, all of my wiring is soldered lineman's splices with heat shrink, I made an aluminum heatsink for the mitsubishi ignitor, I feel like I'm doing everything right.

Can anyone think of anywhere else to look, or common causes of EZK failure that I should be investigating. So far I've lost two late chipped turbo boxes, and a gold box. I have not tried any of my nonchippable NA boxes.
 
After fixing some other problems, I'm realizing I have a new one. I've had two EZK failures since going to the waste spark board.

My solder joints are good, I sealed the boxes where the wires ran out, I smothered critical areas with dielectric grease. For the ground I'm piggybacking off the cylinder head to firewall ground, and I cleaned both ends, all of my wiring is soldered lineman's splices with heat shrink, I made an aluminum heatsink for the mitsubishi ignitor, I feel like I'm doing everything right.

Can anyone think of anywhere else to look, or common causes of EZK failure that I should be investigating. So far I've lost two late chipped turbo boxes, and a gold box. I have not tried any of my nonchippable NA boxes.

Is there an occasional short somewhere possibly? the EZK internal 5v regulator is pretty stressed stock, it wouldn't take much to release the magic smoke. I have the wasted spark board in my car, but I use the Bosch power stage from a 6 cyl 960. Not sure if the wiring is different. I also have the power stage physically bolted/mounted to the body, acting as both headsink and gound. Maybe the one you have requires the same?
 
Last edited:
Is there an occasional short somewhere possibly? the EZK internal 5v regulator is pretty stressed stock, it wouldn't take much to release the magic smoke. I have the wasted spark board in my car, but I use the Bosch power stage from a 6 cyl 960. Not sure if the wiring is different. I also have the power stage physically bolted/mounted to the body, acting as both headsink and gound. Maybe the one you have requires the same?

BTW, if the ezk are already dead i'll buy em off you. I've been trying to reverse engineer it. :oogle:

I'd never considered having the actual ignitor grounded. I'll have to give that a shot. Now I need some more EZKs.
 
Finally after over a year I swapped the polarity on the blower motor and it spins the right way. It's a drastic improvement in airflow, and stationary vent temps. We'll see what the rest of the week brings as far as overall improvement.
 
Finally got around to installing the new torque arms and panhard bar. All of these bushings were shot, so the improvement in "handling" and ride quality was quite drastic. It's also nice not to hear the rear end clunking around all the time.

That turbo motor build is still just sitting around in pieces. Progress is progress.



 
I finally decided to stop being lazy and get some engine work done

Gave it a scrub


Tore the head down


Not red block


A red block!
 
Nice. I'm assuming you changed oil pick up tube o rings? Also if pcv hose is hard/brittle, I would recommend replacing it. I was changing the oil pick up o rings the other day and that pcv hose of course broke into many pieces. Use OEM only for o rings and pcv hose(if you need it).
 
Nice. I'm assuming you changed oil pick up tube o rings? Also if pcv hose is hard/brittle, I would recommend replacing it. I was changing the oil pick up o rings the other day and that pcv hose of course broke into many pieces. Use OEM only for o rings and pcv hose(if you need it).
The tube is still quite compliant, as for orings and seals I have all new everything.
 
FB marketplace got me good with this clean 760 turbo. The kid I bought it from didn't have a clue what was wrong with it, just that the battery kept going dead. Turns out the alternator belt was loose and I've been cruising it around all morning.

It came with service history going all the way back into the early 90s, and seems to have been owned almost solely by people who just paid professionals to fix everything as soon as it was broken. The last few years haven't been that kind to it, but it's extremely solid overall, and just needs a few bits here and there, as opposed to the "everything is shot, replace it all" approach that the 240 needed.

One of the POs is a local Houston guy and sent me this link from when he was selling it: https://bringatrailer.com/2017/03/2...Px4TsYkJSyL_CQikdPxkdLltOvrq6IQ7IWcauAlbNrj7Y

I plan on this being my daily for commuting back and forth to work, but I don't want to turn it into a restoration or project car, I'll have the paint detailed to bring back the shine, and that's about it.

Needs:
The brakes are not great. They start grabbing almost at the floor.
The steering rack failed while it was on the trailer on the way home. No idea what's up with that
Some clunky suspension bits
Seats need redyed
Sunroof only tilts, no full open (is that normal?) - I fixed this
An exhaust leak that goes away when hot
I'll do an oil change and basic tune up just because
AC only works if you jump 12v straight to the compressor. Some witchcraft has been done here, I'm working on it.

Of all the options this car has, nearly all of which still work, it doesn't have cruise control. At all. WTF is up with that?



For $750 I'm very happy with the investment
 
Last edited:
I've got a real thing for these 3 cylinder FTs. This makes number 3 now.



Cylinder 4 had low compression, stayed low with a wet test, and was doing some weird stuff with oil and coolant so I figured I'd throw a gasket in it and see what happened. I wasted that head gasket trying to reuse the head that was on the car to begin with, but a new one came in today, and I'm going to use the head I just redid for the future 240 motor. The good news is the bottom end in this car is pristine. Then she's ready for daily duty and sprucing up.

Without having an extra set of hands, or a starter trigger, I was unable to pinpoint where the pressure was escaping from, so the plan is just to attack all of my known options at once. I water tested the ports on cyl 4 AFTER wasting the head gasket and found the exhaust valve leaking some. Another thing I want to tackle is the dowel pin in the back is stuck in the block I want to take that out, and clean it up real nice before I put the next head on. The third option is maybe that old head was warped/cracked/compromised in some way. I am confident the new one will do the trick. Along with that other stuff. Hopefully.

Then it's back to 240 stuff.

Edit: Also, see that wire between the coolant pipe and the block at the rear of the engine? It's got a really hard, thick insulation on it, and seems to go to a sensor down on the transmission bellhousing. What is that? I can't find the other end of the wire.
 
It’s an RPM sensor for a Volvo dealer diagnostic tool (think it was called the mono tester?). The connector would have been up by the valve cover from the factory.
 
Nice work man! thanks for sharing, I enjoyed catching up on your projects! I look forward to seeing what you do next.
 
Got the head back on the 760. Compression on cylinder 4 came up to ~85psi from ~35psi. This is good news I guess (1-3 are all ~125psi). I'm crossing my fingers and thinking wishfully that a heat cycle or two will bring that number up. The bore is gorgeous, still has crosshatch, very minimal ring ridge, no pitting or anything. I don't know what the deal is, but it's going back together at this point. As long as it loses the dead miss at idle I'm happy. Maybe I'll drum up a junkyard bottom end for it some day...



AND I got the crank and new bearings in the freshly painted block. Clearances are spot on, I've gotta remember which safe place I put the piston pin clips so I can wrap up the bottom end while I figure out what I'm going to do about a head. I just paid off a huge chunk of debt, so maybe I'll snatch up that last set of big valves in the group buy and send one of my spares to an actual machine shop :omg:

 
Back
Top