Rod Bearings Info!

[91 Plus]

Ok I am doing this next week and I want to make sure I have EVERYTHING I need to get the job done.

I orderd the 6 bearings from Napa at 7.45 a piece!
I also order from shonut:
1 Front oil pan seal
1 Rear oil pan seal
1 oil pump pickup gasket!
some oil and filter
Is there anything else off hand that I will need? thanks for the info

Also Napa sold me this gasket for the oil pan?I heard its the wrong one so I am taking it back? is it for a slo? or what!

<small>[ March 05, 2004, 01:16 AM: Message edited by: 91 Plus ]</small>

 

[AutoSHO]

That pan gasket is for a SLO, yes.

 

[Zap]

You are missing a few things yet, that you will definitely need:

-a tube of Ultra Black RTV, to seal the sides of the oil pan where there isn't a rubber seal

-Assembly ****, to coat the crank facing side of the bearings with so they are lubricated until oil hits them for the first time (from what I've been told, if you forget this, you may be better off leaving old bearings in there! Severe wear happens with the metal-on-metal contact. eek! )

-You mentioned ordering 6 bearings... There are actually 12 total bearings, 6 upper and 6 lower. They come in sets of two, so if you ordered 6 sets, then you are good.

<small>[ March 05, 2004, 01:43 AM: Message edited by: Zap ]</small>

 

[RStalveyARFF]

You'll want a torque wrench to correctly torque the caps. Also it'd be a good time to replace the oil level sensor if yours is leaking at all.

 

[jelloslug]

If you replace the oil level sender you may want to replace the oil level sender gasket also.

 

[DHMag]

Eye Protection.

if possible, drain the oil/remove the pan 24 hours in advance. this allows a majority of the oil hanging onto the internals to drip off.

i wear contacts and it is absolutely of the utmost importance for me to protect my eyes. i average 4 eye infections a year because of dust and other crap i get in my eyes/on my contacts.

as for the eye protection, find something thats comfortable. find some at the store, and wear them around while you shop, if they begin to bother you, dont buy them. it doesnt matter how it looks on you, youre not setting a fashion statement.

 

[revhardSHO]

I would suggest a plastigauge to verify the new rod bearings are in spec if the old bearings look severly worn. If the old bearings look decent i wouldnt do the plasigauge. IMO not worth it to put that extra stress on the rod studs.

 

[91 Plus]

DHMag:
Eye Protection.

if possible, drain the oil/remove the pan 24 hours in advance. this allows a majority of the oil hanging onto the internals to drip off.

i wear contacts and it is absolutely of the utmost importance for me to protect my eyes. i average 4 eye infections a year because of dust and other crap i get in my eyes/on my contacts.

as for the eye protection, find something thats comfortable. find some at the store, and wear them around while you shop, if they begin to bother you, dont buy them. it doesnt matter how it looks on you, youre not setting a fashion statement.

Yea I was goingto do that..Its off the road still so I planned on doing it a few days before. My buddy chris did his and it dripped on him he entire time!

 

[91 Plus]

SHO91MTX:
You'll want a torque wrench to correctly torque the caps. Also it'd be a good time to replace the oil level sensor if yours is leaking at all.

What are the specs for the bolts?

 

[NIGHT_RIDER]

Yea i cannot stress the eye protection. When i did it, i ended up with a drop of oil in my right eye eek! . Then i went and got my safety glasses. As far as the torque specs, I will be bringing along gen1 SHO manuals. Parts, I would suggest getting some new exhaust bolts cause i snapped them when I put the old ones back on, plus they're only a few $ each.

 

[91 Plus]

yea,i had my exhaust off about 500 miles or so ago! so i think it shouldnt be a big problem with the bolts!

 

[shobikes]

Rod cap nut torque 33-36 ft-lbs. Two steps - first step 22-26 ft-lbs. It's not as much as it sounds - most of mine were at the first step from just "snugging" them.

 

[91 Plus]

can someone explain a litte more on the "plastiguage" so i can make sure i get this right

 

[SHOman247]

nick you coming down 2?

 

[mack]

Hi All,

Hoping to ride the coat-tails of this to figure out where the necessary parts can be obtained, and what folks suggest as a guide...

I've been referencing Kurt's guide (http://kurtmetros.com/bearings.html), but SHONUT doesn't seem to have the exahust flex pipe gasket? Is this something I need, or should I be able to re-use the old one? Is it recommended to replace the front/rear oil pan seal, or just go with the FelPro gasket...

Lastly, it's been mentioned here quite a bit that a new oil pressure sender may be in order, esp. if the old one is leaking. Is this something that's expected to be bad at around 160k?

The car had the recommended 120k service done and a new Y-pipe installed, so I'm guessing anything bad was fixed then, but don't know for sure... also hoping the exhaust manifold studs will behave as a result.

Just trying to avoid any pitfalls, etc. before getting started. Want to make sure I have any necessary parts up-front, rather than get halfways in and realize I need to special-order something.

If there's parts I'm going to need that aren't readily available at napa/kragen/etc., sources would be excellent. I saw the oil pump pickup gasket and oil pressure sender/gasket on SHONUT (and rod bearings), but none of the other parts listed by Kurt.

Any advice would be great. Bought the car a couple weeks ago and in the process of fixing it up (assuming crank isn't scored.)

Thanks.

-mack

'89 Silver SHO, SHOShop Y-Pipe, Intrax springs and very worn (stock) struts.

 

[sdpatt]

That Kurt Metros site can give you some good information. This topic is my experience with the rod bearing replacement. I also outlined the actions in a step-by-step procedure that is provided in the topic.

The Fel-Pro OS30636R oil pan gasket set can be purchased from AutoZone for $16.99. This set includes the front and rear rubber seals and two tubes of black RTV. I recommend the Permatex Ultra Black versus the Fel-Pro provided RTV having used both the Fel-Pro tubes and the Permatex product at different times.

Mack, you may want to look at this topic for a list of the commonly replaced parts and their sources and prices.

 

[mack]

Hi Scott,

Thanks for the reply. The threads you mentioned were helpful, hadn't seen them on the first time around (doing a keyword search).

I noticed that #25 was "Use new donut gasket on exhaust ******".. is this a gasket matched to the ******, or just found something that looked like it would match? I tried finding this at the vendor sources I know of, but couldn't find the ford part # or anything that looked like a match..

Thanks.

 

[sdpatt]

For the 3.0L engine, the exhaust ****** donut gasket can be found at many auto parts stores and on-line sources. This is a wear part as it allows the engine to flex in the mounts while the cat-back remains stationary. I have been through many. I prefer the ROL, but cannot get it locally.

Fel-Pro 60641, RockAuto.com $4.92
Fel-Pro 60641, O'Reilly $5.29
Walker 31372, RockAuto.com $6.43
NAPA NGAF10085, NAPA $6.99
ROL EG24807, ROL Mfg., about $5

 

[Sleeper]

plastigauge is a thin strip of soft material that is placed across the journal. when you torque the caps down, the material is squished. The cap is then removed, and the material, which is wider now from being squished, is compared to a reference chart. This allows you to know the exact clearance between the bearing and the crank. Kind of a waste of time in this application. If the clearance is excessive, what are you going to do? Pull the motor, pull the crank, get the crank reground, return your bearings, get oversized ones and put everything back together? Time to run the motor anyway. Worst that will happen is you'll wreck a junk motor. If this was a freshly rebuilt engine, then you would use plastigauge to make sure everything was within specs. I wouldn't worry about it here though. Just more work.