Stef's 7A-FE Rebuild, up and running since 12/16/07 Options

[hurley97]

So obviously my oil problem is only getting worse, I decided it's finally time to do something about it.

so I went and picked up Defgeph's old 7A...
177,000 miles and was begining to use some oil before he swapped and it sat in the garage for 2 years.
but since I was getting it for free from a friend I decided to pick it up and hope for the best...



so I picked it up Fri (8/24) and the next day it came with me to work (I work at a Toyota dealer) where they unloaded it into the brake lathe room and it stayed hidden for a while. this past Saturday (9/8) me and one of the techs began tearing it apart. I was pleasantly surprised to find that it is actually in incredibly good condition for its age...

I will be spending close to $500 in parts replacing every bearing, seal, gasket, etc that we can think of. What I need from you guys are your suggestions as to what I can do to make this motor a little stronger and better flowing. I'm keeping the stock pistons and considering bigger cams and having the head machined.

We work for about an hour each morning before customers start coming in. Between Sat, Mon, and Tues (today) we have everything pretty much apart (except for the valves since I haven't decided to send them to the machinist with the head or not yet). This is a huge learning process for me and happy to have the oppotunity to do it. I'll add more pics and info so maybe some of you can learn some things too.

This post has been edited by hurley97: Mar 6, 2008 - 9:09 PM

[hurley97]

I cleaned and painted the block yesterday...


and we honed the cylinders. I don't have a picture of the tool we used but it looks like a bunch of wire bristles with balls on the end attached to a drill. you have to break the glaze on the cylinder walls in a crosshatch kind of pattern so the oil sticks better...


and today we just re-ringed the pistons..


there are two thin rings that go above and below the oil control rings in the bottom groove and the top two are the compression rings. you want to place the openings in the rings on alternating sides and always right above the wrist pin since that takes the least stress. so in the picture the opening in the ring under the oil control ring is facing back, the one on top is facing forward, the first compression ring facing back (there is a "2R" written on it that should be facing up), and the top ring facing front. they fit very loose like that so as to make a tighter seal with the cylinder wall when installed.



we can't do much else until the main bearings come in (probably Monday) since we need them to put the bottom end back together. we want to finish the bottom completely before starting on the head, just to keep things organized.

This post has been edited by hurley97: Sep 13, 2007 - 6:10 PM