Fenwick's "Build": The Resurrection of Stonewall Jackson!

THE RESURRECTION OF STONEWALL JACKSON!
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This thread is dedicated to the work I am starting on my truck- a complete tear-down and rebuild. For those unfamiliar with my truck's story, his name is Stonewall Jackson, after a Confederate general, and he is a '96 2WD Xtracab. Bought him for $250, not running, (sitting since 2008-09 or so) blown head gasket to say the least, but with a full set of mags (along with the steelies on him) and a nice tan MPULSE camper shell. I want to document what we (me and my best friend) do to this truck to bring it back to life, thus, the Resurrection of Stonewall Jackson!

I'm gonna post all pictures in this first post as well as in their own separate (dated) posts.

Pulled Stonewall Jackson into the garage this evening with the 4-wheeler to start tearing him down. Took off the hood and grille, drained the fluids, and we were in the process of taking out the radiator (my buddy) and undoing the exhaust (me) when we had to call it a night. We will resume working on it tomorrow, so that is it for now. Fenwick is excited, yo!

Got him 'home' after purchasing him. Towed home by my best friend.

Stonewall sitting in the yard I took him home from back in August:




And finally, today!

Grille is off. Truth be told, I think it looks sick without the grille.

Gettin stuff out of the way.

Everything ready!

BAM! I WIN! AND NO, IT DID NOT FALL ON MY HEAD THIS TIME.


Looks lovely, don't it?

Found this freeze plug in the oil pan. This is the problem, not a blown head gasket!


Gonna need new bearings.

After valve lapping

Assorted crap- head, valve cover (before polishing) pistons, etc.)

Cleaning pistons in gas

Painted block!



Valve Cover

My truck is Fenwick powered!


Throwin that joker back in there

BAM!!!

Took the shell off.

License plates came in!

 

Subbed. Digging the armrest.

 

Aww yeah! Gotta love that half-bench seat, too. Probably find a headrest from Pick-N-Pull, but I never see a Taco in there. Maybe that just says how awesome Tacos are since I don't find them in the junk yard.

 

This is all from today. Finished getting everything out of the Engine bay that was in the way. Had to completely cut all of the belts off- they were more or less melted/stuck onto the pulleys, really cracked and whatnot. The fuel left in the lines smelled rank- definitely old. Tranny fluid was pretty much black, but no trash. Everything actually came out surprisingly easy. The hoses were all in pretty good shape, surprisingly. I was quite pleased how easily everything went.
Gonna check out/remove the head and send it to the shop down the street hopefully tomorrow.



Gettin stuff out of the way

Everything ready!

BAM! I WIN!

 

All we did today was take the motor off the hoist and put it on a stand. Then we took it outside, plugged up all the places water could get into, and pressure-washed the sucker to clean it up. My buddy said it's always nicer to work on them when they are clean- this sucker was so dirty you could hardly see half the stuff on it! xD

 

Tires came in today!
Took the tires and rims off the Taco so that we can take them and the new tires up to get them mounted and balanced.

Sudden Brain Shock: I just realized that I'm the first person in my family to buy new tires- ever. Before this, it's all been junk tires from Pick N' Pull. I JUST BROKE FENWICK CODE. o_______O

 

Tread is always a plus. Go, Stonewall, go!

 

Yes, and also the fact that these tires will hopefully last a couple years, whereas we go through at least one Pick N' Pull tire a month. (Paper routes and hauling scrap metal are hell on vehicles.) My dad should have stock in Pick N' Pull, as many tires as he gets from them. I've done a bit of research, and I found that generally, when you buy only used tires, you end up spending more in the long run than you do if you buy new.
Oh yeah, we also did a leakdown test today. They were all terrible, but #2 was the worst. Definitely going to the shop.

 

Looks lovely, don't it? Oil is really thick on EVERYTHING- see how thick it is caked on?

Oh, and the tranny is being held in now by a ratchet strap so we can get the truck out of the garage while working on motor itself.

 

Crazy good news! I may have just been saved a considerable amount of money. Found a freeze plug in the oil pan when I took it off, and later found where it came from. This is looking the whole reason there was water in the oil- from here, the water was able to drain directly into the pan, milking the oil like a blown head gasket! The head looks fine from what we can see- took it off to be sure. Everything is level with the straight-edge, not seeing any scarring or anything.
So now we know for sure that the motor has been rebuilt before- the freeze plugs are all new, for one thing. The timing chain and guides are pretty new, too- the guides are plastic, and have hardly a trace of wear to them, proving that at least that was done somewhat recently. The whole reason that freeze plug came out is because he didn't put any sort of a sealant/rubber gasket to the back of it to ensure it stayed in like he did the rest of them.
On another note, pressure washed the whole sucker down yesterday, including the engine bay of the truck itself. Sealed everything we didn't want water in, and it all looks spiffy clean.

 

Nice! glad to hear it was something simple.

 

Yeah, couldn't have hoped for better! And just think- even though we went through all of the 'trouble' to tear this thing down, at least I'll know from having torn it down that there's nothing wrong with it, nothing to worry about.

 

Good job Fenwick!

 

Much thanks.

 

Well, got to piddle with the motor a little more today, got some good and bad news. Went up to Advance and bought a full gasket kit (will be in on the 29th) and a new timing chain, complete with the plastic guides, cover, etc. (will be in tomorrow)
Inspected the cylinder walls, and found that they are not bad- only one very faint scoring line in the second cylinder. When I run my finger nail across it, it does not catch, and it does not run all the way down the cylinder. You can tell that someone has honed the cylinders before because of the cross-hatching left behind. In the same cylinder, there was a very small, thin patch of what looked like rust that rubbed off easily when I touched it with my finger.
We looked at one of the rod bearings (got called in by my buddy's wife for dinner at this point) and found that it was badly scored- yet the crank didn't seem to be harmed at all, at least in that one spot. Seeing as we got called in, we have yet to check the other ones.
So I'll be getting new bearings, probably a new crankshaft too, even though I see no damage to it so far- it's going to be there, whether I recognize it or not, with how bad that bearing was. I'll try and take pictures tomorrow- my phone died today, so I was unable to take any pics.

 

Sub'd for the goodness haha this thread is awesome!

Though I'm personally a fan of Andrew Jackson

 

get a micrometer on the crank to see if you need a new one. You likely could get away just fine with a new set of bearings. also the cross hatching you see on the cylinders is likely original, it's not uncommon for it to be visible on engines with 200k+ miles.

Also, better read up on using plastigauge.

 

My buddy's got a mike, and plastigauge strips, too. We should be doing this today as soon as he gets off work. (My truck is in his garage, if I never mentioned that.) I had never heard of plastigauge until he said something about it the other day- I figure he knows how to use it, but I sure don't. My dad had never heard of it before either. Maybe it's shocking that me and Dad didn't know about plastigauges, but then again, we are also the same wierdo guys that didn't have any power tools until six months ago.
I've read a few things online about it now to learn myself up, so we'll see how this goes!

 

cool deal, yeah it's just used to measure clearance between the bearings and crank/rods. You can't just slap an engine together, you have to make sure everything is within spec first or it simply won't last.