Hopefully this project is a good decision and not a bad one lol. I have to leave in May so it has to be completed by then.

I just had an amazing call with whunter or "Roy" over at peachparts. Words can't express my gratitude to him. He walked through pretty much my whole engine build with me and has helped me narrow it down to either just a bad hasket/incorrect head gasket install, and possibly some valve problems. As long as I don't have to re-ring it, I'll be happy. I'm going to research head rebuilding if mines out of spec, and possibly send it out to PowerstrokeJoe's machine shop since I think I can trust them. Hopefully it's all good though.

 

Clean engine joe ... glad to hear your on the trail of your issue...

I would say nice Cat yellow but I have a bit of a hate on for Cat these days...

 

Thanks aviator. Feels nice to touch the engine and not have instant black hands. Now I gotta decide on a color scheme.... Wish my truck had red accents and I'd go cummins red in a heart beat.

 

Nebraska is corn country and I have to remind you of JD green?!

 

funny you mention that...





my trucks seen more color changes than a mood ring. I thought long and hard about a John Deere them, with JD floor mats, steering wheel cover, JD STEERING WHEEL! and the fuel cut cable from a john deere. Decided 2 colors was enough, just stickin with black n yellow

On a side note, the merc might get put on the back burner now. Just went to nebraska and back today (6 hours) and got our V10 dodge to put new tires on and try to fix a bunch of stuff on before thursday, then my moms bringin the duramax down for me to fix. Lol, projects..... Good news is the 'rents agreed to let me keep the d-max till spring break, and i'll ride my motorcycle back down, SO I CAN START RIPPIN THE YOTA APART!!!!! This way i'll have a "part-fetcher" truck. It's gonna be a helluva ride for the next 3 weeks, but hopefully I can accomplish a LOT and get this swap leaning towards the "finished" side of the balance beam

 

Well I see you got them JD yellow saddles anyway... why not paint the frame and engine JD green? with the black body and JD green stripe it would pop...

 

that "green" paint is expensive lol. I got 2 JD tractors, and a Case IH. I'm not a "brand loyal" guy by ANY means hahaha. I also own a ford, chevy, dodge, yota, and now a merc.... and might as well add a michigan and a cat. I'd like to take the screamin detroit out of the michigan and throw it in a truck some day. It appears to be a v6 with a chain driven super charger. I'll post a vid of that when I get a chance (might be a year), but I compare the sound of the OM617 to that michigans engine over any other

 

That Detroit diesel would be awesome. It's a probably a 6v53 or 71. (6 cylinders, V configuration, 53 or 71 cubic inches per cylinder) All Detroits have a roots blower on them as they are a 2 stroke. That gives them their screaming nature. The blowers are gear drive off the front gear set on those. The Detroit 2 stroke is my favorite diesel of all time! The next project for me after this is a 6v53t in a 1970's Ford 3/4 ton. Any how things are looking good Good luck!

 

you can probably get that green paint cheap at any NAPA/pep boys shop... they'll just do colour match and you can get it in IMRON... IIRC you can get POR 15 in JD green also.

 

OMG Por-15 JD PAINT!!!! That sounds frickin awesome! I'd like to paint my "new" truck green if I ever get one.

Joe, my friend and I looked at the engine last night, cus I knew it was a V6 but I didn't think it was turbo'd, then I looked at it and we both said supercharger, which I know detroit installed stock because they were gutless without them, but I never knew they could be chain drivin like that. That's awesome! I didn't know Michigan used Detroit diesels. The valve covers say "General Motors Diesel" But ya they're also one of my favorites, I love the sound!!! They even had one at the NHRDA World Finals in Topeka in a cab-over, and he had it turbo'd on top of the SC. I'll see if I can find my vid of it.

 

The super charger on a DD is not really a power adder as much as it is a positive displacement blower to assist the engine in scavenging. Technically it is called a blower because it doesn't increase cylinder pressure. it rids the cylinder of the exhaust and adds new air. Without a blower they will not run. They also have intake ports in the side of the liner and only run exhaust valves in the heads. Quite neat. I have had the opportunity to work on a few and its pretty cool.

 

I need to make a quick decision here so I can get my order placed tomorrow and get my parts and get them installed asap. I have 3 weeks to do school, fix the Dodge, fix the Duramax, and get as MUCH of my Merc swap done as possible while I have a spare vehicle.

For my exhaust, I feel like I should at the bare minimum, exhaust wrap my down pipe and ceramic coat my exhaust manifold with some DEI cermaic coating from O'Reillys. Should I heat wrap the entire manifold too?? I seem to find more negative comments about exhaust wrap than I do positive, all because people say it warps the metal, especially stock cast manifolds.

I'd like to wrap my down pipe and maybe as much as I can till my stack. I'm also thinking about spraying the starter with ceramic coating but I'm not sure if that's a good idea. I'd just like to know how much stuff I should wrap so I can get it ordered from Summit on Monday.

Thanks guys

 

Well I'm not wrapping the manifold, just the down pipe and as much of the tail pipe as I can. Hopefully that'll save my starter and tranny. Just ordered the 4x4labs adapter kit. Thanks again Luke!!! Got my gauges today. I'm running boost, pyro, and an air psi gauge for my OBA. New head gasket came today (Thanks Phil!) I'll try to rip the motor down this weekend and get it buttoned back up. Gonna try to rip the 22R out next week and get my engine mounts made, then I can start plumbing stuff in. It's gonna be 65 degrees here all next week!

Here's a little taste of what I've been committing my time to this week

http://s961.photobucket.com/albums/a...=VIDEO0110.mp4

 

Just read the entire thread. I don't know what's more impressive... the work and determination that you have... or doing it throughout a Nebraska winter.

Keep it up man!

 

Hey thanks man. It's the positive comments like these that keep me motivated through the 5 degree snowing days lol

 

So tonight I had a friend help me, and we pulled the valve cover off and i gave some shots of air in the injector holes while my friend checked for air leaks. Nothin came through the timing chain hole, and the air actually turned the motor, so piston rings seem to be good. Didn't see any bubbles in the oil and didn't feel air around the valve seals so seals appear to be good and hopefully that means valve guides are good, too.

On my 2 good cylinders, there was no air from the exhaust or intake ports of the head. There was a lot out of cyl. 2, and some in 4 and 5. So I hope this is great news. Hopefully all I have to do is lap and polish my valves and I'll be good as new. Must just be a lot of soot and crap on the valve seats from the valves being ran TIGHT for so long. Hoping this is a simple afternoon job in my garage.

I'm going to look into getting my head acid dipped so clean all the crud out of it. The ports are HIDEOUS!

Now the fun part. I borrowed my buddies sand blaster. That's the good thing about being in college and meeting different people with similar interests; you get to borrow a lot of cool things, like a power washer and engine hoist and sand blaster. I blasted my manifolds and hit them with cermaic "very high temperature" coating paint I got at O'Reillys.



Before:



Blasted:



Painted:

 

Looks good joe

 

Sweeeeeeeeeetttt............. Roy at peachparts says my cylinder head is dead and needs to get new guides at the machine shop. Goodbye money! If only I could just go find another junk engine and rip the head off it!!!

 

The head is at a reputable machine shop that builds performance race engines daily. They're hot tankin' it and measuring everything to see what all needs to be done and what can stay. Sure wish I could just find a better head!!! The valve I had out was shot, and I'm guessing my guides are all bad.

On a positive note, I got just about everything on the engine sand blasted minus oil and fuel lines. Got everything painted tonite except the IP. Hopefully it doesn't all fall off as expensive and time consuming as it was. Thinin about throwing my manifolds in the oven since the can gives baking instructions.

My adapter plate came today! BEAUTIFUL! It's almost polished aluminum. I went ahead and clear coated it. I was going to color match it, but it's so pretty I just went with clear. My wheel spacers were just as pretty and are now brown, so I figured a good clear coating would keep it lookin good for years to come.

Hope to hear back from the shop tomorrow and get it back by next Friday. Then I'm off for spring break and hopefully I can get this sucker finished! O ya, I also got the yota all gutted. I'll post pics tomorrow.

 

Came to a little problem. My gas tank doesn't appear to have a lift pump, but it has 3 lines going into it. A feed line, a return line, and what the heck is the 3rd one? My fuel level sender also has some issues. One wire is spliced into the tail light harness. Perhaps it's a ground? There's 3 wires to the pig tail but only 2 come out of it. I'd like to know what the 3rd wire is as well. I'd also like to know why this wire melted!









Still waiting on parts to arrive otherwise....