Circlip seating for piston #5 and #4, respectively.

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All pistons are back in their original positions with new rings.

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Wow, every time I visit this thread I'm more impressed!

Looking forward to the first start up :D

Thanks, yeah, I`m looking forward to it too, as you can imagine :) Still lot of things left to do.

Got some gaskets and other stuff from Pelican. Time to move on with the engine.

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New crankshaft seal.

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I don`t have the insertion tool, so I simply used the old seal and a spacer made of two used bearing shells to drive the new seal in the engine case with the pulley and its bolt.

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The original waterpump looks like new, so I decided to put it back in with a new gasket.

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Same for these chain guides, they have very little wear. They should be fine with new chains.

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Just a couple of random things for today, such as
cam chain and rails are fitted with the sprocket:
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Oil pump went back on.

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Pick up screen and oil return lines with air- oil separators are cleaned, reassembled and bolted back on.

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At least one side of the engine is sealed now, so now I don`t have to wipe the oil puddles off the floor so often.

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I could allocate some time recently to work on the heads. If you follow this post from the beginning you may remember that timing got messed up in this car and pistons contacted the valves in bank 123. However, the valves looked perfect, no visible damage whatsoever. So the heads were rebuilt and ready to go. Yet, it`s been a long time since I lapped the valves and reassembled the heads, just enough time to get paranoid about it. What if the valves somehow got damaged due to the impact from hitting the piston head even if it`s not visible and will get stuck in its bore and seize? Very unlikely, but I wanted to sleep well, so I ordered new valves from Pelican, lapped them and reassembled the head. Again.

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I checked the seating with this classic method when you pour gas on the valves and see how long it takes for it to leak down. After an hour it was still in the chambers, so it should be ok.


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Then I inspected the heads for deterioration/possible warpage. I placed a straight edge on the cleaned surface and tried which is the thickest feeler gauge that I can slide in between the straight edge and the head. The thickest was 0.03mm. In the shop manual this is exactly the highest tolerated value for a freshly resurfaced head. The tolerance for a used head that you still can put back on is 0.05mm. So that`s great, no need to take the heads to the machine shop.

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I inspected the head bolts. These are stretch bolts, so you must replace them if they are stretched over their limit, i.e. they won`t be able to produce the same clamping force any more. There is no specification about this in the shop manual, but it is also not stated if these bolts should not be reused. So I ordered one brand new bolt and compared its thickness and length to the used ones. There was no significant difference between them, so I concluded they should have one more round. Yes, I`m cheap, I know.

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I had good results with this brand so I went with this.

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Looks like a few bubbles got trapped during the casting procedure. Another day when the quality control guy was on vacation. Luckily it`s not a critical spot on the head.

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Now it starts looking like a flat engine, or as they call it where I came from, a boxer.

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Nice job! Please keep updating your progress.

I usually pour the gasoline down the ports; gives the gas more head pressure to test for leaks.

Lookin sharp. :D

Thanks! If you pour gas in the ports, isn`t it difficult to tell which valve is leaking?

Thanks, there`s a few more things to add, I`ll upload some pics soon.

I took the engine off from the engine stand and placed it on the workbench to get access to the rear side. It`s getting very heavy now and I almost managed to drop it when one of the straps snapped. I`ll double the straps or switch to some heavy duty chain from now on.

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IMS flange is refitted with new O-rings and a bit of sealant.

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Time to fit the tensioner. There are three tensioners in this engine, they are all alike, but not the same. They are identified with the number of rings, 1, 0, or 2, hard to mix them up. Pretty thoughtful.

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New O-ring and aluminum gasket.

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Now to the rear main seal. I needed a tool here so I went to a local hardware store to find something I can use.

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And I found this. (Without the holes of course.) It`s an end cap for some PVC drain tube, exactly the same size as the RMS. This is my lucky day..

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After cutting it to size, it worked perfectly using the flywheel bolts and the old seal as a guide.

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Hopefully it won`t leak.

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They leak slowly. You can see the moister coming from the leaky valve and then you can investigate further.

With new laped in valves you shouldn't have any issues.


Looks like you got it covered though. Should be a fun reliable engine :D

Nice work! I could never get that deep into a motor. I've Thought about doing a ring job on a Subaru motor, but when I saw what's all involved, I just decided to change the bottom end. I just do head gaskets and timing belts. haha. That gives me great appreciation for what you're doing!

By the way, is that a ball or roller bearing you chose for the IMS?

Yeah, I can understand that :) It`s time consuming and lots of things may come up along the way that you didn`t think of. But at least then you know what you put into the engine, so you can only blame yourself if it falls apart :) For the bearing: actually, both. A roller and there`s a ball bearing behind for trust control. There are more pictures of them if you go back a few pages.

Oh, well, we`ll see that :)

I just read it. Pretty impressive! You should sell the kit for $1800 ;)


Also, I see you went with open bearings. You're confident they'll get enough lubrication? Don't take it the wrong way, I'm just trying to pick your brain in the event I decide to change mine.

Lol, just simple bearings I had machined to size. Actually, I made the groove for the circlip myself with a custom made grinder :)

Yes, I`m pretty confident. The IMS literally swims in engine oil. If you go back in the thread I posted some measurements about the oil level. Even though the level dropped a lot, the sprocket is still spinning in oil and should supply the bearing with splashed oil. Also, I added an extra oil channel as well that supplies the bearing with oil directly from the back, just in case, it`s pictured too, if you go back to that section.

Don't sell yourself short. It's a pretty ingenious solution. ;)

I'll have to check it out.

I worked a bit on the valve lifters last weekend. I`ve never seen or heard this car run, so I can`t tell if they were noisy. I didn`t want to reassemble the heads with bad lifters because pulling them out with the engine in the car seems a huge PITA. (I might still have to do that.) A plausable choice would be to replace all lifters to new ones, but when I realized that this would be over $500 I decided to rebuild them.

They were all in good condition, with no measurable wear. What usually causes problems in these is the check valve, that gets dirty over time and won`t close anymore, so the lifter collapses, resulting lifter ticking and other subsequent problems.

Taking them apart is not difficult but requires some patience and cautiousness so the tiny bits won`t get lost, and you need a system so you don`t mix them all up. This is all the parts you find inside a lifter, in case you were wondering:


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You need a tweezer and a little pin to handle the tiny parts safely.

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I cleaned all parts with gas, then with brake cleaner, then with compressed air. Disassembly and cleaning takes about half an hour at the first one. The required time gradually decreases for the next ones. The 24th will only take a few seconds :)

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The oil that came out from the lifter housing was really dirty and used. In a few of them I found some solid gunk too, so I think it was a good decision not to just put them back like they were.

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This is the seat for the ball, if it gets dirty, the valve won`t hold pressure.

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After they are cleaned and reasembled, time for a good bath in fresh oil. Baby food jars serve well for this purpose, and you won`t mix up the lifters. The best is if all go back to where they originally were.

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Camshafts been patiently waiting for almost two years now. Time to go back into the heads!

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After cleaning everything meticulously, I just spot this piece of camchain guard stuck in the scavanging oil channel. Quite amazing.

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Lifters back in their original positions.

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Crucial parts like camshafts are marked in the factory, you just have to follow the signs to avoid mistakes. Intake camshaft for bank 1-3 is shown.

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Unlike the originals, the new chains are not labeled for timing, so I copy-pasted the marks.

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Six links should be left between the timing dots on the two sprockets.

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Compressing the actuator.

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And securing it with a 5mm bolt. Other engines need left-threaded bolts, mine needed a normal threaded bolt, thankfully.

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This unit is for bank 4-6.

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