The Stealth BOMB'r is under the knife

[Cumminalong]

how does that engine stand like holding the weight of the cummins? mine would probably wad up like aluminum foil. It doesn't like for a 6.2 to be on it.

I don't release the engine on just the stand.

Our stand is a 2000 lb stand, but the Cummins is too long, has too much leverage.

I hook the back of the block to the engine stand and I keep the hoist hooked to the front lift point until I get the head off.

I need to make an adapter plate so I can bolt the stand to the side of the block so there isn't so much leverage on the stand.

 

[Cumminalong]

Here's yesterday's progress.

I'm Friggin Stoked! The inside of the engine was IMMACULATE!

:thumbsup:

The only areas that showed ANY wear were the front and rear main bearings.

No need for any machine work on the block, pistons or crank. Only thing I'm doing to those is getting the crank balanced and the pistons coated.

Everything else looked great. The cylinders were in great shape; nice cross-hatch and no scuffing. The valves all look good. The seats all look good.

Time to get evil.....

):h

 

[Cumminalong]

The head is all cleaned up and ready to ship out.

It looks really good, so do the valves.

I gotta say, I couldn't be happier with what I'm finding in it so far considering the crap I've done to it.

These are parts of the rotating assembly.

The pictures of the connecting rods ARE NOT of a broken rod. Those are the cracked cap rods that are the weak link in the rotating assembly. These are why I'm swapping them for 12V rods.

The big shiney cylinders are the piston wrist pins. They're MASSIVE. I put them next to my phone so you could get a size estimate.

Here's some pics of pistons themselves. This afternoon I started cleaning them up to get them ready to send out for coating.

Rings were on good shape.....

Piston skirts looked almost brand new.....

Crowns and bowls looks nearly perfect. No signs of melting or burning.....

Wrist Pin bore.....

Here you can see the passages for the oil to get to the bowl and crown from the oil squirters.....

The $20K+ pile of parts.....

 

[BudTX]

This is an absolutely first rate thread, Rich. Very informative, and with fantastic photos.

 

[Cumminalong]

This is an absolutely first rate thread, Rich. Very informative, and with fantastic photos.

I try to take a lot of photos so that folks can see what all is involved in something like this and some of the things they'll ned to consider if they've never done it before, OR what they can expect if they're having someone else do it.

:thumbsup:

Some folks get really intimidated by a project like this, but when you strip it down to it's bare essentials, it's just another motor. It's all the crap on the outside that takes longer than anything else.

Anyways, today is going to to be a slow day on it. Need to package parts to ship them out, need to build the engine dolly and steam clean the block, need to clean the crank and bring it down to get balanced.....just gonna be tedious stuff today.

 

[searstractorfan]

So if the 5.9 can be built into all this, can the new 6.7 be done like this since its a redesign of the 5.9?? always wondered how much power could be had from one of these motors...any chance you will upgrade to a 6.7 in the future for more power?

 

[Cumminalong]

So if the 5.9 can be built into all this, can the new 6.7 be done like this since its a redesign of the 5.9?? always wondered how much power could be had from one of these motors...any chance you will upgrade to a 6.7 in the future for more power?

Not until this truck becomes unstreetable.....which really isn't the goal for it.

Everything I'm doing to this truck is be able to make stupid power and still have it do everything a truck is supossed to do and still be reliable enough that I'd let my wife take it across country.

Could I make more power with it? Sure.

Would it cost a lot more? Sure.

Could it still be reliable? Sure.

But remember, there are 3 factors in a build and you only get 2 of them at anuy one time.

Powerful, Reliable and Cheap.

You can have power and reliability, but it won't be cheap.

You can have it Powerful and Cheap, but it won't be reliable.

You can have it Reliable and Cheap, but it won't be powerful.

 

[hoot]

Love this thread! Thanks for taking the time to talk and post pictures!

 

[Cumminalong]

Nothing real exciting done today.

All I got done was getting the head packaged and palletized to ship tomorrow.

Other than that, I was scraping gasket material and stubbing my toe and the friggin crank. I about threw it across the floor until I remembered, 1 - How heavy it was and, 2 - How expensive it was.

Got the new connecting rods, HD rod bolts, lower gasket set, upper gasket set, main and crank bearings ordered today.

Need to clean the pistons up a bit more before I send those out for coating.

This week I need to steam clean the block, crank, front cover, adapter plate and oil pan so that everything ready to go when the parts come back.

Once everything is sent out and I have the engine all cleaned up, it's time to tear into the transmission. Gonna put some tricks in there too.

 

[Cumminalong]

Nothing real exciting again today.

Just cleaning stuff.

Started working on the block. It was filthy, so the first thing it got was blast with simple green and then we took a trip to the car wash.

Got all the heavy stuff and have it soaking in WD40 tonight. Tomorrow I'll hit it with the steam cleaner.

This is before I did anything to it.

 

[Acesneights1]

The ease of working on them is what had appealed to me when I bought mine. It really is an easy engine to work on compared to PSD and Dmax. Looks great.

 

[Cumminalong]

The ease of working on them is what had appealed to me when I bought mine. It really is an easy engine to work on compared to PSD and Dmax. Looks great.

None of the motors are that hard to work on.........once you get past the wrappers and the BS that surrounds them.

Underneath all the crap that surrounds them, they're all just basic motors. There's nothing supper sexy about them.......other than the fact that the internal components are enormous.

 

[Cumminalong]

So, here's today's progress.....

Lotsa painting and lots cleaning.......all the parts the are getting re-used are in the parts cleaner.

Other than the painting and cleaning, 2 big boxes just showed up from Cummins.

Here's the OEM cam shaft vs a Hamilton.

Notice the cam lobes are wider and the machining is much nicer vs the stock casting.

The cam is timed to the gear via the keyway.

Here's the cam gear pressed onto the new cam.

All the Hamilton Cams are drilled and tapped for a bolt on gear and are engraved on the gear end.

Mr Big Brown truck brought me a few boxes of goodies today.....

Got all my seals, bearings, gaskets and........them big, sexy 12V rods.

Here's the CR connecting rod vs the 12V connecting rod. The 12V is on the left.

Here is why the 12V rods are so much stronger than the CR rods....they're forged and machined, not powdered and cracked.

Machined end caps rather than cracked caps.

Matched sets.

MUWAAAHAHAHAHAHA!

 

[hoot]

Love it!

 

[BoostN]

It amazes me that a factory rod will hold up to that kind of abuse.

Keep posting the pics, awesome to read.

 

[BigBlueChevy]

This thread is defiantly something to drool over. Nothing beats the UPS man stopping by to drop off a fresh box of bright and shiny new parts!

 

[Cumminalong]

Well, today was mostly a cleaning day.

The block is all done. Just need to do a final hone and cleaning once everything is back.

All the gasket and sealing surfaces are cleaned up. I think it came out pretty damn good.

Just had to test fit the studs. Bye Bye main bolts! HeLLooooooo bullet proof bottom end!

And, all oiled up, bagged up and ready for assembly.

Also got almost all the rest of the lower internals cleaned up today.

Oil pick up, oil squirters, girdle, oil pan, etc., got put through the parts washer and cleaned up.

 

[83GMCK2500]

Good Lord what an awesome thread. Thank you for detailing all of this, it looks great.

What color did you paint that block?

 

[Cumminalong]

Good Lord what an awesome thread. Thank you for detailing all of this, it looks great.

What color did you paint that block?

The block is the same silver as the truck.

The head, front cover and oil pan will be black.

:thumbsup:

 

[Cumminalong]

Here's a few pics from yesterday. Didn't get anything done today; had a little doggy emergency with my old man.....my 12 1/2 year old shep / husky was having some breathing issues, so that took priority.

Not a whole lot done, I was breaking the twins apart so I could sand blast all the hot side cast iron and ceramic coat it all.

Found a hair line crack inside the turbine housing on the small turbo, so I called ATS and they have a new housing on the way already.