Tales of the Wonderbus continue.
After the overheat event I thought I pretty much had things in hand.A valve seat at #4 cylinder was cracked so new heads have been obtained and are being cleaned up, cc'd and prepared to be opened up for a nice reasonable CR for a bus. Cylinders honed and scrubbed, carded and painted. Pistons inspected and cleaned and ready for re-use. Yesterday I received one of aircooled.net's nice $99 engine floor stands so I could stop stooping down to work on the engine which has been sitting on my $69 ATV lift. Now with the engine up at a workable level, I was ready to go.
So I rotated it so I could find TDC on #1 using the brilliantly simple stop-bolt method and check deck height (the pulley's helpful TDC mark is off by 3 degrees).
But hello -- what's this? The piston bushing at the small end of #2's connecting rod is rotated, so that the oil holes don't line up. That can't be right. Hmmm . . . #3 is the same way. Look closer and . . . what the?!? #2's bushing is cracked.
Darn it. The overheat not only toasted a head, but the accompanying detonation whaled on the pistons so hard that I might very well have spun or hammered crank bearings. Or a bent piston rod.
Jeepers -- a little overheating goes long way! Need to invent an air pressure switch wired to a Klaxon horn to alert the driver if the blower ever stops.
(I'm waiting for Bob Hoover to weigh in right about now and explain to me what a nimrod I am...)
Anyhoo, rather than trying to get the Wonderbus running right away, I decided to take the pressure off myself and have scored a spare set of wheels (84 Westie, stock, 68k miles) for summer use while I TAKE MY TIME and tear the Wonderbus's engine down entirely. While I am at it, I will remove the silly aftermarket cam ("Hey buddy -- what that bus needs is a wilder cam!"), install a stock cam and time the valve train, and do some modifications to improve oil flow throughout the engine and the rockers a la the stuff that Bob H. has written about.
Cracking the case . . . I didn't wanna do it, I didn't wanna do it.
But given the dreadful workmanship and crap parts I found /outside/ the case on this "new" 1776, I figure that what's inside can't be any better.
Tell my wife I love her, boys -- I'm goin' in.