Return of the Geek SHO

[Geek SHO]

After over three years of my black '89 SHO being on hiatus, I have finally secured some garage space for a while:

On the previous episode of The Geek SHO (summer 2006),
The guinea pig Eaton M90 supercharger project was resulting in blown crank seals and a seemingly related low compression (about 1/2 of the others) on the #6 cylinder. Squirting a small amount of oil into this cylinder boosted the compression notably, raising the suspicion of possibly bad rings. Disassembly of the front cylinder head began, but because of a house remodel, the car needed to be moved. The car was towed up to our farm, and covered for three years. It was used as a SHO parts storage, and temporary parts car over the years.

October 2009:
With garage space secured, I grabbed my brother to help me push the poor black Taurus back from the farm to our garage. It was less than 1/4 mile and mostly downhill, but still a workout!


Finally made it into the garage, but the car is a mess:





Here's a quick Photoshop quasi-panoramic of it in the garage. The car is just too large to fit in straight, so for more room, it sits diagonally:


The interior was packed full of parts. Mostly its future interior parts and the old Eaton M90 bits:




Three years has allowed some mold to grow in places:



The engine bay was a mess. Spider webs and nests all over the place. It looks like rats made a nest as well, leaving acorns in the battery box and turds on my intake port protector rags. You can also see here how far my disassembly got three years ago:




There must be something wrong with me. I was really excited to get back to working on this car, even with clearly so much to do ahead of me.

 

[Geek SHO]

Rebuild Plans

My project goals:

Remove front head and determine if the #6 cylinder can simply be re-ringed, or if it will need to be honed or bored out to run again properly.

I will NOT be reinstalling the Eaton M90. I will reinstall a normal intake (or possibly a ported one) and just run nitrous again for my speed thrills and kills.

This car will become something of a weekend warrior and track weapon, so I am planning the following modifications to lose weight, but retain a full weight appearance:

- Delete the A/C system
- Delete the cruise control
- Delete the stereo system
- Partial interior swap from grey to black
* Keep original dash and headliner, but remove center console and insulation for weight reduction.
- Strip the trunk

I have the following parts I would like to install during this operation:
- Grant GT steering wheel
- Zach Leahy aluminum rear control arms
- Remote starter (and rig a safety ****-switch to the shifter)
- Unknown brand straight-through mufflers (used to be on my 91+, it's loud)
- 13" PBR brakes w/ SS lines
- 18" Kazera KZ-A wheels
- A-pillar triple gauge pod
- DIN panel double gauge pod

The car already has the following modifications:
- 3.2 L swap w/3.0 cams
- Zex Nitrous (w/ 155 LPH fuel pump, colder copper plugs)
- SHO Shop catted Y-Pipe with custom cat-back
- Quaife
- Spec Stage III clutch
- Fidanza 9 lb flywheel
- Jose Fernandez SHOrt Shifter
- Aluminum subframe bushings
- Eibachs / Tokicos
- '96 brake upgrade

And finally, I'm hoping I can get this done by January. I will likely be moving to Texas then, and I'd like to be able to drive this car there (but I will tow it if I must).

 

[Geek SHO]

Progress so far

After a LOT of vacuuming, and some disassembly work, it looks like this:



And finally, I finished getting the head off tonight:


Closeup of the #6 cylinder:


Front head:


The #6 looks particularly nasty:


I haven't worked on this engine for probably almost five years, so I don't know what's best to clean out the rust without damaging anything. I shot some WD40 to let it soak. Any tips other than just elbow grease? Does this look like a particular problem to anyone?

Maybe I didn't properly install the head, and coolant leaked in. Thoughts?

 

[HotRodKid]

step 1: hit it with a brick
step 2: swap the motor

(first step is optional actually)

 

[Off Road SHO]

I've got to agree with HRK on this one. Even if you found that the original problem was something minor, once water has sat in a cylinder for that long there will be pitting of the cylinder walls. That will require a complete tear down and bore job. Not worth it IMHO when you can get another engine from the junk yard.

Tom

 

[SuperchargedSHOguy]

Bore it to 3.3 gets my vote.

 

[Sho Amo]

Yeah it looks like some coolant had gotten in there and over time it rusted. Good luck on the project I'm lookin forward to seeing progress.

 

[Geek SHO]

Thanks for the tips, guys. That makes sense that rust has ruined the cylinder. If I can scrape the funds together, I would *really* like to bore it to 3.3 (who wouldn't?). If I went that route, I would consider lowering the compression a little. I'd love to put a turbo in this car down the road, and already have a few parts towards that like hot-pipes, injectors and a 255 lph fuel pump. Since I'm not looking for more than 450 hp, I might be able to just keep stock compression. But enough bench racing.

The more likely, and way less fun route, would be to just drop in another junkyard 3.2. I will keep updating as I work on the interior.

 

[shomtx95]

before i got my new seats, i had the exact same seat covers in my 89

 

[greengiant]

i'm confused are you planning on putting the eaton back on, please do that thing made your car awesome, it looked so ridiculous and overpowerful it just made me laugh.:laugh_ti:

 

[SuperchargedSHOguy]

i'm confused are you planning on putting the eaton back on, please do that thing made your car awesome, it looked so ridiculous and overpowerful it just made me laugh.:laugh_ti:

He said on this very thread that the eaton blower was not going back on

 

[Geek SHO]

Yeah, I even put it in BOLD. When this car runs next, it will be N/A with an occasional 75 shot of nitrous (you can see the Zex kit still installed). Looks like my next step is to pull the motor, no matter what route I go . . . *cracks knuckles*

 

[38SHO]

fix it up or bore it to a 3.3

people are so quick to throw shit away these days, its not even like this engine is from the 40's or 50's, and you all are so quick to damn it.......... people reuse those engines and get them back to running condition all the time......

 

[SLOSHO89]

Ok Sean,

Go to pick and pull. Get another 3.2L. Make sure there aren't any metal shavings in the motor before you pull it. Then take it home and drop it in there, don't swap the cams, don't change the rod bearings, just drop it in there and run it (ok, maybe a new rear main seal and oil pan gaskets).

Ef

 

[SuperchargedSHOguy]

don't change the rod bearings, just drop it in there and run it

I want to go to that world of running a junkyard SHO engine without worrying about changing the rod bearings first...

 

[greengiant]

sorry i misread i have wicked a.d.d and read like a drunk 4th grader

 

[SuperchargedSHOguy]

sorry i misread i have wicked a.d.d and read like a drunk 4th grader

Wow, I remember 4h grade and want to go to that world because all it would have takes was probably 1 beer back then...

 

[Toolman]

Wow, I remember 4h grade and want to go to that world because all it would have takes was probably 1 beer back then...

how many does it takes now?

 

[SuperchargedSHOguy]

how many does it takes now?

With beer I get too bloated...need licquor in the mix to get officially drunk dude!

 

[K-Dawg]

fix it up or bore it to a 3.3

people are so quick to throw shit away these days, its not even like this engine is from the 40's or 50's, and you all are so quick to damn it.......... people reuse those engines and get them back to running condition all the time......

For me, it'd be a **** of a lot easier to just put another engine in.