Replacing Rings In Car?

How do you know the seals are good? If the compression is good I don't think it is rings. How bad is the oil consumption? Does it smoke only on startup?

I donno but I bought a Hawk with a 289 back in 1998 and it smoked and used 2 qt of oil to 100 miles. Trying to figer out what was wrong I took compression test and did a leak down compression test and both were good. I finally pulled heads and the cylinders and piston and rings were wore plumb out. Had to bore +.030. Why did it have good compression?

I'm thinking maybe a broken oil control ring, or

Well I traced it to the right front (#2) cylinder by noting smoke from that bank and oil on the suspect spark plug. I don't think it's guides/seals because the guides are within specs and the seals are new positive/teflon type. Also, the smoke is most noticeable under acceleration. It's using about 1qt per 100 miles.

An added wrinkle: I notice it does not seem to smoke when a qt or more low (according to the dip stick).

I realize I can pull the engine and take everything apart, but I'm a bit lazy and hoping for a shortcut. If the piston can't be pulled from the bottom, then removing the one head and pulling the piston out the top would still save a lot of time/effort. Of course that would make sense only if the problem could be fixed by just replacing the rings.

S2DSteve

Steve Huds> OK, I've been fighting a smoking/oil consumption problem with the ('63)

Sometimes the piston pin retainer bolt comes loose and the pin rubs grooves in the cylinder walls, four of them. Takes more than new rings to fix this.

Have you considered that maybe the dipstick is wrong and you're actually only smoking when the engine is TOO FULL of oil?

Being a lazy sort of guy myself, I'd drain the oil and measure how much comes out. If it's four qts, you're okay...if it's 5 qts...you have a dipstick problem and NOT an engine problem. You do however, seem to have some problem if the spark plug is fouling, so maybe this is a stupid idea....but it came from a lazy guy, so what did you expect??

Bob (it's too hot to be energetic!)

S2DSteve wrote:

That's a lot of oil usage. Sounds like you will have to pull it apart.

If it's a Stude engine, it should be five quarts (six quarts for 1955 engines (259)) plus filter allowance (if used).

JT

Bigbob62 wrote:

Hey, it's the "lazy" people who come up with most of the time and labor saving inventions...