Mechanic: 6.4L transplant, or what the Admiral did last week . . . and this week. · 3:34am May 14th, 2021
I lured some of you here by false pretenses! The horror!
Well, only slightly false pretenses, as those of y’all who’ve been around for a while know, when the Admiral is stressed out you get cute ponies.
Therefore, let me present a 6.4L engine replacement, a photo essay.
That was last Wednesday, probably; cab’s off and the engine is partially disassembled.
Here’s what it looks like from the front.
All that stuff that was on the back of the engine is gone . . .
. . . and now we’re nearly down to a short block. That was by last Thursday, if memory serves.
Bad motor’s coming out.
$2,000 dollars of injectors, swaddled in the finest shop towels.
Old motor, ready for final parts transfer.
New motor in the frame, bolted to the trans, ready for further assembly. That was Monday.
Cab being lowered back on, that was Tuesday, a week after I started disassembly.
And here it is running, this afternoon:
It’s getting the air bled out of the high pressure system.
I’ll of course give y’all a longer blog about this truck in the future; it’s the same one that starred in the post-repair diagnosis blog post. The most astute of y’all might have noticed a bit of a time skip from Tuesday (when the cab goes on) to Thursday (when the truck runs). That, too, will be explained.
But really, all you need to know for now is ponies in hoodies are cute.
my mech is rebuilding my 5liter ford this week new oil pump, lifters and cams
My 2016 Nissan Versa just returned from a clutch kit change. In one hand, now I have several payments of the repairs ahead of me (frontal shock absorbers, brake pads, oil, filters and two tires were changed too). IN the other hand, the clutch is so, SO light and precise, that I nedeed some time to get used to it again. Also a slight loss of traction at low speeds is, FINALLY, solved, and the car is running really smooth now.
Man, what a project. I was all into it until I got blindside by the ridiculously cute bat in a hoodie.
I feel like Lily looks, seeing those photos. I know it's your job, but wow that is a tremendous amount of work.
Also thanks for adorable Twiren pones in hoodies.
Uff, that looks like a ton of work (both in the "a lot to do" and "crap this stuff is heavy" sense).
So basically, mechanics are like surgeons for cars.
Cami is adorable, cute story is cute,
Hmm. This makes me realize I don't think I've actually seen a story on here about pony mechanics. Like for modern day cars.
I've seen a few steam punk ones that gloss over the details but not ones dealing with trying to fit a wrench and hoof between the engine block and the fire wall or something.
Lift the bonnet, lift the engine through the hole?
Nah, this is like a leyland bus or train, (Pacer) just lift the body off and you can get at the rest a lot easier?
5518393
Somebody with the know-how needs to write a story for the Not-A-Contest.
Ponies in hoodies are indeed cute
Nice work on the swap! That must have been a fun week.
It makes me wish my STI swapped SG Forester was finished. Hopefully by the end of May.
"as those of y’all who’ve been around for a while know, when the Admiral is stressed out you get cute ponies"
...You know, come to think of it, probably a good thing your manager isn't, I assume, a member of the fandom, or there might be some perverse incentives involved there. :D
But yeah, sorry you've been stressed, even if it does come with the benefit for us of more cute ponies and stories.
Oh, or photo essays; those work too. :)
And that is indeed a cute bat pony in a hoodie, yep. :)
5518332
That sounds like a more fun job than this was (although I don’t remember where the oil pump is on the 5.0). I’ve done that job on a GM 5.3L Vortec, and it’s a toss up whether it’s quicker to pull the motor. You don’t have to, but you’ve got to take most of it apart. It’s certainly faster to put a short block in one.
5518339
Yay!
Expensive repairs suck, but it’s nice when there’s a real difference when it’s done. I think the last of my own cars I did a clutch on was my S10 (mini truck), and it failed completely before I did it . . . in fact, it was so bad that I wondered how it had worked up until the day it stopped working.
5518368
It’s not for the faint of heart, that’s for sure. By the book, it’s a 30+ hour job, about as long as job as you can get on most cars.
I wish I’d gotten blindsided by a bat in a hoodie; instead, I had to take it partially apart again and fix an injector and a wire harness . . . hence the two day time skip from ‘cab goes on’ to ‘actually runs’.
5518371
That’s one of the things I wish wasn’t my job, to be honest. It’s likely not the least fun job I’ve done ever, but it’s very low on the fun-meter.
One can never go wrong with adorable ponies in hoodies.
5518375
Aside from the engine itself (three people to line it up going in, and that’s with the engine hoist lifting) and the dual turbo (also put in with the engine hoist), most of the stuff that went on and off isn’t terribly heavy, there’s just a lot of it and messing up the order in which things go together means more work.
5518390
In some ways, yeah. On the plus side, it’s not likely to die on the ‘operating table’ if we decide we’ve had enough of it for one day or need to wait for more parts; on the minus side, it’s not very likely that it will fix itself despite our efforts.
Thank you!
5518393
Best I can offer is Drive with 30s to 50s cars, or Sunbeam where she’s not the mechanic, but works at a modern parts store.
Yeah, it can be a problem. There’s a reason I’ve got regular wrenches and long wrenches and short wrenches and crowsfoot wrenches and bendy wrenches and offset wrenches and so on; sometimes the challenge is getting the tool and/or the hand into the spot it needs to be to do the work.
5518409
Not a big enough hole on these, hence the need to lift the entire cab off. If you’re really a maschocist, you can pull it out the front, too, but that’s not the preferred way to do it.
Essentially, yeah. If you’ve got the option, this is the best way to do it . . . I’d probably still be working on it if we’d tried to pull the engine out the front.
5518491
I’ve got an arm I might twist . . .
5518522
You can’t go wrong with ponies in hoodies.
5518590
It was awful. It’s the kind of job I least enjoy, and parts that should have been replaced when the engine was out weren’t, to save money. One of those parts might come back to haunt me in the future, since to replace it I’ll have to do about half this job again.
The end of May’s soon . . . send pictures when it gets done
5518636
He’s not, and I’m pretty sure he hates cute things.
It’s hecking adorable and that’s a fact.
Hello Admiral Biscuit,
Is Cuddles IV meant to be an entry in the cuddlefic contest that Categorical Grant is running?
LINK
5519026
Nope, not at all! Just the cute ponies we need doing cute pony things.
I’m impressed man, you moved pretty fast and I hope it’ll have worked out for your truck. Cheers to ya
5518987
Ah, sorry.
:)
:D
Normally, I'm glad I don't have to do stuff like this, but I had 6 hours of meetings yesterday (one of which gave me a bunch of extra work so yay) so I'd love to spend some time taking apart a car (although I suck at it). Also, this remind me, I need to take my car to the mechanic for some maintenance. Also, that last cute pony picture is so adorable, I love that about your blogs.
And I thought replacing the oil pressure switch in my Dodge Caliber was a lot of work. Glad you made it to the end of the project relatively unsinged.
5519052
Thank you! It was faster than I thought it would be.
As for the second point, well, on the plus side it’s not my truck, it’s someone else’s. On the down side, it still isn’t all the way fixed and I’ll have to go back in.
5519171
I suppose I can console myself with the fact that I rarely if ever have meetings to suffer through. I feel for ya, man. As for taking a car apart, if you’ve got the space, buy a cheap one, maybe one destined for scrap, and do stuff to it. Or a riding lawn mower or some other machine. Best case, you found a new hobby and got new skills; worst case, somebody hauls it off to the scrapyard.
Maintenance is important!
Thank you! I love finding and sharing cute pony pictures!
5519954
There are some little parts that are deceptively difficult, especially if you don’t have access to a boatload of tools and a hoist.
Thank you!
5521247
one of the meetings had a powerpoint that is over 100 slides. Fun
honestly, I've done some mechanical assembly. i've already stripped down and re assembled a lawn mower engine for school. It's more of a big hands small spaces thing.