Spridgeteers,
I pulled the 1275 out of the sprite this weekend and it's with Neil
Estes of Estes Restorations. As I said to my friend Wayne who helped
me, I can live with (read: ignore) a collapsed tappet (or two),
piston slap, rod knock (rod and main bearings both, most likely),
burnt valves (odd compression, anyway), and a partridge in a pear
tree, but not all in the same engine at the same time. Also, I wish
I had the time to do the rebuild myself, but that's just not in the
cards. Anyhoo, some points about pulling an engine from a newbie...
It was very straightforward. I read the BL manual, Haynes, and
Clymer. They all say about the same thing, though Clymer flat-out
advocates pulling the transmission with the engine, which I did. Just
a couple of items to watch out for. First, I borrowed an engine hoist
with a leveler (a jack screw that allows the engine to be angled
out). This setup made the job easy and safe for humans and the car.
Second, I went ahead and removed the carbs and distributor before
pulling the engine. This was easy and saved some worry about banging
things around. I removed the manifolds (six nuts) and took the carb
and intake off as a unit. My exhaust manifold is not original and is
welded to the down tube, so I just bungee corded it to the steering
wheel shaft to hold it out of the way. The Haynes manual intimates
that if the the front U-joint is accessible, like if a PO had cut a
hole in the bottom panel of the tranny tunnel or if the car came that
way, there is no reason to disconnect the driveshaft before pulling
the tranny since it can be guided back onto the shaft when it comes
time to put the tranny back in. Well, the problem with that is that
the drive shaft flops around if the car has to be moved, like say, to
get it out of the way to do the rebuild. Disconnecting the driveshaft
at the rear U-joint is very easy, so just do it. However, I did find
that it was very easy to remove it once the engine and tranny were
pulled - just unscrew four bolts and pull it out of the front of the
tunnel. Third (if you're still counting) is to have a friend handy.
This was not absolutely necessary, but it was great help to have
another set of eyeballs and hands, especially at the point where the
sump is just not quite clearing the upper body work lip. The engine
and transmission had to be cocked a hair more than the leveler would
allow, and having a friend there to give the little extra oomph made
it a lot easier. Fourth, I used bolts in place of the valve cover
studs (rocker tower studs) as connection points for the hoist chains.
I had a nut on each bolt and two sets of washers. I screwed the bolt
into the stud hole, then ran one nut and washer down onto the tower
such that the bolt was attached to the tower and head in compression.
My idea was that this would protect the tower and head from the
lateral loads that the bolts would receive. The chain was above this
nut but below a double set of washers. Total cost was about $5 (try
to use all grade 8 material). The engine/tranny have to come out at a
terrific angle, so there are indeed a lot of lateral foces on the
bolts. I did not use the studs as they did not have the length I
needed for my lateral-force-avoidance plan.
Anyway, the total time it took was only two hours. This included two
trips to the hardware store to get bolts, nuts, and washers to
replace the rocker tower studs. I did not drop the engine on my or
Wayne's toes, and I did not break anything except the water temp
sensor, which was a goner anyway - it was the only thing that Kroil
(the oil the kreeps - get it?) could not work magic on. No doubt I
will live to regret this.
So, four days later and I'm having serious LBC withdrawal. Claudia
found me sitting in a dark room, making Walter Mitty putt-putt
noises, a fan blowing on my face and my feet feebly twitching as
though to work imaginary clutch and gas pedals. Oh the humanity! The
only upside is that it's rained most of the week.
BTW, this makes my 397th post to this list. Me too! Me too!
Tinkerty-tonk,
Jeff
Jeff Boatright __o_\__ '65 Austin-Healey Sprite
http://userwww.service.emory.edu/~jboatri/sprite/sprite.html
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