WranglerMangler

I found Ghosty’s old owners/ build thread. Second truck of mine that has been on CC before my ownership. Pretty cool!

I noticed the spray foam around the heater core tubes while buying the truck. Dude claims it never leaked. But even still, I can’t stand to look at this mess. Figured while I’m at a stand still with the engine I’d start on getting this addressed. Makes you wonder what people think. It appears that the clutch pedal linkage is missing some bushings or has some worn out parts and it is a little sloppy these days. Someone came up with a funny fix. Just put some springs on it! I’ve been worried about what the harness radio plug looks like, since I saw the aftermarket speakers self tapped into the door cards. Unfortunately I found this. Then they hacked into the harness again down by the E brake Not terrible. I’ve seen worse.

What are you thinking? I’m open to suggestions. 7k RPM screamer with a 150 shot of nitrous sounds fun. Lol

Lol. That’s exactly where my mind went too.

Wow. Thank you. That’s some high caliber eyes on my problem. (Another reason this site is so awesome) With the grooves in the crank though, I’m leaning towards too tight of bearings, then 5 years of corrosion. The grooves are really deep. And there is corrosion present as well. Photo doesn’t do justice. Guess it really doesn’t matter at this point! Thank you Pizzaman09!

My parents hooked me up with a nice assemble yourself car port for Christmas, so Ghosty got a new home for the time being. Since she is now under cover, and out of the rain. I decided to do some more investigation into why the rotating assembly is locked up. Goal was to get the oil pan off first. I started getting the truck on jack stands, front axle hanging in the air. Next, I unbolted the oil pan to see if I had enough clearance to drop it out. Unfortunately it wouldn’t clear. So I removed the entire front axle. I’m too old and fat to screw around with sliding myself under the axle then maneuvering the ratchet around and through the steering and track bar to get at all the fasteners and all that hoopla. I did first try to get the oil pan out by only unbolting the shocks and sway bar, didn’t have enough clearance, so out with the entire thing. What’s 4 control arm bolts, track bar bolt and brake lines? Easier than maneuvering around it through the whole process in my opinion. The 2wd axle might not even be going back in anyway but that’s a while away. I didn’t like what I was seeing in the oil pan upon removal. Magnetic gray sludge…. Uh oh. Up inside the engine was all looking good. No rust or corrosion to be seen. New and tight timing chain. ARP Main cap bolts. The inside of the cylinder walls all appear to be in good shape from the bottom side. I started with unbolting the connecting rod caps. Front 3 All 6 So after finding this, I wanted to see if the pistons will move, I took a rubber dead blow and bumped the stud sticking out of the bottom of the rod. The first 5 all moved easily. #6 took a good whack to get freed up but they are all now not in contact with the crank. I went back to the breaker bar on the balancer bolt to see if the rotating assembly would now move, it would not. So off with the main caps! Broke the first main cap loose, still locked up, second cap, Hallelujah it moved! Unfortunately this is what the crank looks like.. The grooves in the crank feel like extra sharp ridges around the outside of a quarter. Here’s the #1 main cap. About the same as the rest. Trash. I didn’t remove any more main caps for the night. I had seen enough. Crank is trash. Now, what to do, what to do…

I’ve always seen the stuff in store not knowing what it is but have just always gone to Acetone. Thanks. I’ll try it out.

Finally!! Got the rotating assembly to move. Removed all of the rod caps, every piston but #6 moved with a small bump on the stud with a rubber dead blow hammer. #6 actually took a good whack with the dead blow to get to move. After all rod caps were removed, the rotating assembly was still stuck. I started at the front loosening the main bearing caps, after the second one was loosened, it moved. Most of the grooves feel like ridges on the outer diameter of a dime or quarter to the fingernail. Bummer to find, but about what I was expecting this far into it. Thank you for the input everyone!!

Think I found something… unfortunately lol.

Got the pan off today, this is what I found. Not exactly sure what all the gray crap is. Unfortunately it is magnetic. Everything looks good. No rust anywhere. Tight timing chain is nice and tight. Seems new. Cam looks good ARP main cap bolts. Looking up into the cylinders, all of them look this way. Appears that I’ll be pulling the caps off here shortly. Hope the crank isn’t smoked. Assuming that’s bearing material I’m finding.

I can still get the bolt loose, so I’ll take that advice for sure. I’ll be sure it’s loose before trying to get the bottom end to move again. And was most definitely going to do an ARP replacement. Thank you.

Yes sir. I will do it! Better safe than sorry. Good call.

Won’t harm the paint? Have never used it before.

Lol. Sounds like a fun one! I’ve had off my fair share of 4.0 pans!

Yes, I agree. Really the only reason I haven’t removed the pan yet is because it’s super rainy out and I don’t want her sitting out with the pan off. I did just get a pop up car port so that will be changing soon! I’ll take the pan off tomorrow or the next day! P/O said the engine did run for a few seconds before catching on fire, taken with a grain of salt from a random guy off the internet, but everything else he had told me has been true so far. Thanks!

I’ll stop and get some Diesel and Marvel. Thank you Sir.

Yes sir! I agree. I have no personal experience with that and really don’t want any! Thank you

Never knew that tool existed! Cool, thank you. I’m thinking it’s about time for the pan to come off as well. I have not tried the old pry bar on the flywheel yet either. Might be worth a shot. Especially if I could find someone to crank on the bolt as well!

I have not tried to fill the pan with anything other than some 15-40 Delo. I drained out the oil that came in the engine to verify it wasn’t water, then decided to fill it back up with 15-40 to avoid any further corrosion. Verified the transmission is in neutral, yes. Starter is removed at the moment. The back wheels off the ground, the Transmission output shaft spins freely.

I just tried a violent back and forth on the bolt with the breaker bar trying to send shock into the rotating assembly, no luck, I was leaning weight on the breaker bar while hitting the top of the pistons with a rubber mallet. Set the mallet on the piston then hit it with a 3lb, no luck yet.

This was exactly how I found it when the head came off. I’ve drained the oil as well. No moisture was in the new oil that came out.

The distributor would not come out by hand! It took some tapping with the rubber mallet to get it loose, unfortunately the rotating assembly is still locked up

So far I have only been doing it one way, the bolt was loosening trying to go back the other way. I have not tried Marvel yet. I have hit the top of the pistons with a rubber mallet yes, I placed the rubber on the piston then struck the top of the rubber mallet with a 3lb

Wow. It won’t come out by hand. Might be onto something here! Working on it now.

I actually have thought about this before. Cooling my P/S fluid made a world of difference with my wheeler. I used an aftermarket transmission cooler mounted in front of the radiator. I highly suggest doing it either way. My thought was, If you run your P/S fluid through the radiator instead of in front of the radiator, will it never be cooler than what the truck is running at? Or whatever temperature the radiator cools the water to? As opposed to a cooler in front of the radiator, has a chance to not be at whatever temperature your truck is running at. I never did any checking on what the before and after temperatures were but if the radiator is constantly accepting water that is 200~ degrees, and your power steering usually runs at 150~, would you want the 150~ fluid next to or inside something at 200ish degrees. Where the cooler in front of the radiator would only accept fluid at 150~ Has a better chance of cooling without getting the hot water involved? Hope that makes sense. Lol. Numbers just made up. Let us know if you do it and see if you can get a temperature difference!