PINTO CAR CLUB of AMERICA
Welcome to FordPinto.com, The home of the PCCA => General Help- Ask the Experts... => Topic started by: fh4ever on November 02, 2015, 06:41:46 PM
-
I have a '74 2.3 with only 30k miles. Its been in a basement in the car for 30 years. Was not smoking when parked but now it is. It smokes some immediately when cranked and gets worse as it warms up. Runs great but smokes. All cylinders are within 10 psi compression ratio. no one cylinder has fouled plug worse than others, I plan to disassemble to diagnose why it smokes. Anyone care to diagnose before I start? Where is the best place to get gasket sets, valve stem seals, rings, belts, water pump....Advanc e Auto? etc. Does anyone here have the torque values for the bolts?
-
There are a few possibilities, but I'd check the valve stem seals with suspicion.
-
I agree about the valve seals. Could be rings gummed up in their grooves too. Also Check the PCV system for sticking or clogs.
A while back I bought a Studebaker with a Chevy 283. The compression was in the 150 PSI range across all the cylinders. I installed both the Chevy O-ring seals - and the umbrella seals. I soaked the cylinders with various concoctions of fluids (for weeks) to potentially free up sticking rings. The engine ran well, but I just couldn't get it to stop smoking - slightly. I hope the best for you, but sometimes it is an accumulation of things that add up to one larger unwanted whole. In this instance I got a 66K, L98, 350 out of a '85 Corvette. Now the car only smoke on a hot start up. LOL
-
Being a 1974 2.3 , the first year for the engine I have to say it's the valve stem seals , and sitting over the years the rubber valve stem seals gets hard and just crumbles, and with the cam on top of it all you have eight hole in the cam squirting oil at 60 psi all inside the valve cover it works its way the combustion chamber, but do not run the engine without the valve cover , years ago a good friend learned a lesson when oil from the cam put some nice oil stripes on the ceiling and himself , priceless 😆
-
I was told mine sat for 15yrs and it was smoking pretty good when I got it, valve seals were so brittle they fell apart when I touched them, put new ones on and smoke gone and don't burn a drop of oil..
-
any chance it could have been rusty cylinder walls from a damp basement? The air cleaner was in place and the choke was on ...shutting off the cylinders from damp air and all of the exhaust line was in place too. Under the valve cover, the engine looked brand new!!
As far as the stem seals....not ruling it out....but would the smoke get worse as the engine warmed up if it were the seals? Heck, lots of older engines did not even have seals. Thoughts?
-
Anything is possible but odds are it's the seals, my motor had only has 66,000mi on it and it's as clean as it was when it came off the showroom floor, it is a very common thing and wouldn't hurt to change them anyhow it took me less than a half hour to change them, be a bummer to tear the motor down to clean the cylinders and re ring it and then find out it was the seals after all.
-
hey pinto wagon....which method did you use to keep the valves from falling while replacing the seals?
-
I like to use air, I use junk plugs and make a adapters but you can use a hose off a compression gauge if you have one.
-
I use about 6ft of 1/4 rope through the spark plug hole leave about a foot hanging out,then use a socket on the lower pulley and compress the rope by turning the crank, been doing that trick for years , good when you do not have an air compressor and one time the air line come off and a valve dropped in the cylinder 🙀
-
I have heard of both but tried neither...than ks!
-
hey all....just an update...I wanted to make sure the there was no issue with cylinder walls and rings after sitting for so long. ...so I did go into the motor....cyl walls and rings were ok, but there was some "crust " on the oil rings and they cleaned up good. I do not see anything to indicate the lower part of the engine is the reason for the smoking....but ...
I have a question...the oil ring is the 3 piece...A thin top and bottom with a corrugated center...does the gap position of the top and bottom matter to each other? The oil rings on all 4 pistons had the top and the bottom gap in line with each other. I thought these should be staggered in relation to each other (not referring to staggering to the compression rings). Should they be in line or staggered?
Next, since I have a complete gasket set, I am considering changing the rear crank seal. Mr Chilton's shop manual says to see the dealer for rear crankshaft seal replacement because special tools are required. Any advice if I am to do it myself? Isn't it just a matter of pushing the seal into the groove? Anybody here have instructions from another shop manual?
-
a little more research and I found the oil ring stagger pattern. So any word on the rear crank seal question? thanks all
-
got the rear main seal replaced, wasn't a big deal after all. Finally did the valve stem seals and they were hard and had little resistance on the valve stem. So my guess is the smoking could have come from the valve stem seals. Glad I did take the engine apart ..as it gave me a chance to replace all gaskets and seals. Worth noting ...the rear main seal, the crank seal, auxillary shaft seal, etc...all were hard and not soft and flexible. so replacing these 40 year old seals was a good thing.
-
update,...ran motor several times at 20 minutes each time and no smoke ! It must have been the valve stem seals !! I can breathe easy now..thanks all
-
Glad to hear you got the problem solved. 8)