F40 Engine Rebuild - Don't try this at home!

Do you know another way of press-fitting the sleeves into the cylinders? There's nothing wrong with the torch and ice chest method.

 

Yes Bripab,

There is something wrong just like you can use a nail where any cotter pin can go. Pros use proper ovens for uniform heating and proper freezers for uniform cooling. heads should always destudded to properly assurtain deck flatness for proper head gasket sealing...but thats just me. Maybe thats why my cars last longer than a few thousand miles? There may be those who are so superlatively skilled that they can heat evenly with a torch or cool in an icechest but and "deck" a block with studs in it. Lets see how many miles this rebuild lasts. Even A chevy rebuilder would laugh at this.

 

regarding the sheen of the valve covers... it is possible that they simply topcoated the satin wrinkle red with clearcoat to protect it from peeling. I had valve covers professionally shot in black wrinkle and they suggested this process for better durability.

 

It is not correct for them to be painted in a gloss finish, if properly done, there is no reason they should peel. Now if the owner requested gloss, that is a different story.

 

Hey

Great story!

Here is another interesting story about a F40. A german guy repaired a crashed F40. Unfortunately in german but with nice pics.

http://www.ferrarif40.de/cms/front_content.php?idcat=28&lang=1&client=1

 

wow now thats what i call a repair.

 

Actually, we did try this at home....first a major service on a 355, then an oil pump on an F40, and within the next week or so there's a 288GTO coming in for some work. I've been lending my lift out to a Ferrari mechanic....even with the oil spills, it sure dresses up the garage. See http://www.ultimategarage.com/ugr2003d3.htm for a few pics. SD

 

Yep anything can be done at home if you have the knowledge ... or confidence

Pete

 

I am also curious, as are the other posters, as to why the block was not heated uniformily in an oven and the liner properly chilled. Liquid nitrogen seems to work quite nicely in other applications, pehaps not for these particular liners? Is this heating method, along with the ice chest and liner installation the factory recommended techniques? I am not being critical, just trying to understand why the craft standard is so low for Ferrari. Is this just tribal knowledge being applied by very experienced mechanics, or how did this become the accepted way of replacing the liners, etc?

 

Have you ever seen the tools used by highly skilled doctors? they still use in some instances chisels, hammers and saws.....

My point is, the result is dependent on the skill of the technician. A technician with very good knowlege and skill can use the torch and ice chest, some without the finesse and experience must leave that to technology.

Heating the block and cooling the cylinder liners is the recommended method but is unclear on the procedure.

I like to think of a ferrari as a kind of tribal car.

best regards, Jim

 

Jim etal,

Just because you can do something does not mean it is wise to do something regardless of skill. I do not think any car person of knowledge would argue that uniform heating is not better that torch and hope. Taking risks at my expense is careless. It is no wonder cars like these get rebuilt so early. Sure you dumb down a chevy but everyone knows how you deck a head properly on one etc. And that is part of the reason they go 100,000 miles with no problem. These guys are pros and should have proper equipment and think like pros. If I do the ice bucket in my garage that is one thing but I hope the guy I pay has enough reserve to buy the right tools. You know you can have surgery with a rusty scalpel then just take a bunch or anti-biotics to prevent the infection. Is that a good idea?

 

would uniform heating and cooling be better than a torch and ice chest, For sure. I`m just not ready at this point to judge this technicians skill based on a photo in ferrarichat.

It may be that for years he has sucessfully rebuild engines this way and is the best way he knows how. It maybe that his engines last for years of service. To him it may not be a risk.

I myself would have to resort to an block oven and freezer for the liners. I do not trust myself using a torch in that way.

Again, I`m not saying to use the torch like that or that that is the way to do it, only that I will not judge someone elses work without seeing the result.

Regards, Jim

 

Jim,

Correct me if I am wrong here but..... Shouldn't the liners be just a snug fit if the block and liners are clean? Aluminum transfers heat so fast any way that you would have to be real quick in your instalation of the sleeves. Mine slide in and out with no heating or cooling.

Also, here is a little trick we did to the mains to help prevent them from walking.

Rick
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In a perfect world I would agree the torch method leaves a bit to be desired. The advantage here is the aluminum block will transfer the heat if left sit for a while and will be close to even heat through out. At the dealership level, having an oven available is often not an option because of space (I know we did not have one, and the best I could do was a toaster oven for small parts).
I just finished removing the liners from 3 engines yesterday. My prefered method (albeit a good bit backyard) is 2 metal drain pans with charcoal a foot and a half under the engine, then cover the block with an aluminum tent, and rotate every 3 min. Heats up slowly and uniformly, but doesnt look very professional while being done. Drew a crowd of on lookers trying to figure out why we were cooking engines yesterday.
The other advantage here is that Kevin is involved. From my dealership experiance I came away with a very high level of respect for 4 or 5 techs across the country. Kevin is one of those techs! With him involved, the finished product will be correct.
I still do not agree with the bigger turbos. This simply moves the power band up too high for my preferance. Playing with the cam timing is my choice (free, and has big performance returns), unless a bigger play budget is allowed for. If that is the case, Kattie bar the doors, its time for some serious fun! More to follow soon on that front, as there are (5) 40's getting a "make over" this winter at the shop.
Dave

 

Well Dave I would let you use a torch and like you said 4-5 guys you think highly of? Just think about the other 100 guys? I am an absolute nobody and just for my Ferrari hobby I have one o-scope, digital scopemeter, full service twin post lift, welder, torches, oxyacetyne, mill, lathe, F-1 USAG tool box , and coutless other tools and Ferrari special tools in a three car garage with 2 Ferraris, Z06 vette and a 16 ft. trailer! Space it tight! If I did enough Ferrari rebuilds I would find space for the Pizza oven. I commend you for doing the open pit rotisserie for "even" heating and you can cook your lunch too. But honestly if you have room for the rotisserie you can have an oven and you can cook painted parts in it and perhaps even use it as a powder coating oven too. Besides it would go well next to your Lathe. You are thinking.

Jim...I never bad mouthed the WWOC work per se I just question what I see in the photos. There is no question things can be done this way I have done them myself but then I took the personal risk for the outcome. In this case the customer has an F-40 with short life before rebuild. If a new rebuild is shortcutted and screws up who pays the next time? Does the mechanic say well from the factory it only last 10,000miles so what do you expect? Or does he pony up his time to do it again for free? I say and I am sure Dave believes ,from the little I know about him that, "If you don't have time to do it right the first time you don't have time to do it over!" When I see studs still in the block it implys to me that the deck is not properly checked or dressed. Sure it works with gasket seal and a fat gasket but if you want bullit proof engines you have to pay attention to every detail and the most important step of engine rebuild is the one you are on. I guess I expect the attention to detail in rebuilding my Ferrari to be as good as rebuilding my chevy. I guess that is why I have always rebuilt and did my own machining on my Ferrari motors and Gearboxes. I saw a famous guy with a torch and a hammer setting valve guides on a priceless Milli Miglia Ferrari. I cringed not even a pizza oven just a torch and brass faced hammer. But what the heck 90% of these cars are garage queen shiners so they don't have to really drive anyway.

Here is another silly datapoint. I have slumbed around countless Ferrari shops. Dave is the only guy I ever met who has the Ferrari tool to line hone the Ferrari blocks. Even FNA shops don't seem to have them. The classic answer is "we send them to our machine shop". There are 500 machine shops in So Cal and nobody has one. I guess the real mechanics have to do what this rookie did...hope the block is true and wing it. I know know dave has this because I saw Dave's tool. I guess the real mechanics have to do what this rookie did...hope the block is true and wing it... Thanks for caring Dave.

 

Just for an fyi... All ferrari dealers have available to them the bars for checking and repairing the bores of the crank and cams through FNA. All they have to do is pick up the phone and fna will loan them the necessary tooling to do the proper job. I know this because I worked for them and would ship those tools on a regular basis.

And dave I agree, Kevin would not let anything go that was in question or do anything that would risk a proper rebuild. And I know for a fact that Wide World does stand behind all work 100%. One of the reasons I respect that dealer.

Best regards, Jim

 

Sorry to be skeptical but I just can't help it. Do they use them like they all use their staeger tensiometers for the T-belts? I wonder what the statistics is on number of crankshaft journal sets purchased vs. FNA rod bore tool requests? I'm really not a mean guy just trying to ask the tough questions to raise the bar for Ferrari owners. It does not matter what you mechanics do since I do all my own work. I hate to hear complaints from owners about what crap these cars are when the car is only partly to blame. These cars are just cars but are not chevys. They demand careful meticulous mechanics for peak performance. I can use a nail to work like a cotter pin but I know a cotter pin works better as a cotter pin. O.K. I'll keep my mouth shut now and go hide.

 

Specialist tools are extremely fragile often, and unless the operator uses them all day every day, there is a huge risk of human error.

I believe I know my limits, and sub contract extreme specialist jobs like engine machining to experts. I send them the job and pages from the relevant manual. They don't need the Ferrari tools as they use equipment to measure and machine to any spec. I think it's the best way. I only do around 3 or 4 engines a year on average, and to tool up to the level discussed here is simply un-practicable.

I've nearly finished my 550 engine. I spent nearly AUD$10,000 on sub contracted repairs to crank and cam line boring and head repairs. I think it's well spent.

People expect too much of mechanics. There are people out there that make millions using only a phone and a personal organiser/pc and are simply middle men. Good on 'em I say, but don't expect your humble mechanic to have $500,000 worth of tools to earn $30,000 - $50,000 a year.

Consider the job in question with the F40 torching the block.....Combustion process puts massive heat (and extreme pressures) in a tiny space, granted, it's controlled by the coolant etc, but the mechanic is moving the torch around uniformly. He's doing a good job, efficiently to the best of his ability. In the US of all places, the liability laws would surely make him think again if he had any doubt's over his skill level.

As for the studs removal....well, if 100% of the 90% of the total area you can measure is flat, why would 100% of the last 10% be out?? Having said that, it is quite easy to remove the studs, but it's not the difference between a good job and a bad job.

 

Heres my 2 cents.
I have an F-40 a TR and a 427 Cobra (CSX continuation car). I purchased the engine for the Cobra as seperate components so that a local shop could do the prep and assembly work. This shop specializes in 427/428 ford engines and has done several engines for me. The 427 block and heads came "ready to assemble" from Shelby's supplier in California. By the time the local shop was finished every machining task that had been originally performed on the components had been redone. According to Lloyd Bray the shop owner the machining specs were within tolerance but not acceptable for a performance engine. When the shop was finished we took the stock bore/stroke 427 to a dyno and pulled 625 HP. At the time Shelby was selling a turn key stroker motor which was 526 cubic inches, the advertised HP was 585. Careful attention to detail has been instrumental in Lloyds NHRA career that has yielded many records and over 50 NHRA trophies in the SS/G class competing against competetors with much deeper pockets.

 

I fully agree with every point you have made and the thoughts behind them. I would love to have an oven to do all of these things as you suggest, but budget gets in the way. Having to "make do" has become a way of life in this business. In November alone I have had 4 "no pays" alone on cross country PPI's (names you all know and folks on this board included). This is the Ferrari business and because of this there will be no equipment budget for a couple of months to come.
You would be supprised how many customers are not willing to pay for the use of the line hone bar. Those sending the blocks out for line hone are just kidding themselves unless they also send the head nut wrench, heads, old head gaskets, manual etc... and have the engine assembled before the machine line hone. Of the half dozen machine shops in Denver, none of them can line hone a 355 block with the heads torqued in place. A more realistic statement is none of them will go through the hasstle, and these are exceptional ISO 9002 machinests. Machining these blocks without the heads torqued in place puts them further out of spec than if they were left alone in the first place. Same goes with the cam bores. I bought my cam and line bore tools from a dealership going out of business some 20 years ago. On all of the old (GTO, TdF, and SWB) race and street engines, I do not even offer a choice if they are used, they just get it and the costs that follow. The IMSA 348 engine you saw was built by a BIG name Ferrari specialist before I had to redo it. The valve guide bores were gaulled so bad I had to make valve guides that were .200" O/S on the OD just to clean up the mess created by the same brass hammer situation you described. The main bores were off so much that it took 2 days of honeing to straighten them out. Not much metal comes off with 400 grit paste, and that is the rough cut with the final being 800 grit. Picture the process, dissamble the engine, clean completely, obtain a perfect set of used head gaskets or buy new ones. Assemble heads on the engine, and torque in place. Put bar in the main bores with lapping paste and torque main caps in place after surface plating them with 400grit paper on a damn expensive granite plate. Remove engine from stand, as this distorts the block as well, and set it on a table and strap it down. Rotate the lapping bar while moving it in and out and removing the main caps to clean, check and re-paste about every 30 turns. Just when you think everything is perfect, you remove the bar clean everything, install bearings and crank, retorque all and check it just to find out you did not go far enough. Start the whole process over and lap it more. The final product of these efforts is a crank, that when torqued in place with the heads on, .0007" of clearance on the bearings will spin like it is suspended on air. Remove the heads, and one can barely turn the engine over with a big bar on the crank. THIS is what Ferrari did to win races and create a name for themselves, that everyone in the world recognised for an unparelled level of perfection. That "old world" level of perfection comes with a price tag and is not considered when they printed the flat rate labor book! This is where your statement of doing it right once comes into play. How does one quote this work when a customer calls for a price quote? How does one explain that an engine done this way will spin up quicker than one would ever expect? Race engine builders know this but that is what their customers are looking for. The average Ferrari owner wants a price quote and expects that the engine in his / her car was done this way at the factory when it was new. If that car was built later than the mid 60's, that couldnt be further from the truth. Blueprinting is what they call it. Hang big cams, turbo's, exhaust, ect... on an engine and it is still no better that the base all of those are bolted onto. It was a sad day when the term "Consumer Acceptable" came into play at Ferrari. We were taught at the school on 360's, held at the factory, to remove the screen in the oil tank on the first oil change to remove the metal shavings that wash down. DAMN! Attention to the smallest detail is what makes these engines live for a long time. Lining up marks on a camshaft is for Toyota's, not Ferrari's, yet that is what the Ferrari flat rate labor guide provides time for these days.
I write this only to explain the meaning behind Fatbillybobs post. All of his statements are well thought out and have only the best of intentions behind them. In an earlier post Brian Crawl (Rifledriver) explained it well by saying something on the line of "at the performance levels Ferrari's operate at today, there is little room for error". Brian is one of those 4 or 5 tech's I spoke about earlier, and no truer words have been written! There are those that call Fatbillybob, Brian and myself, unrealistic. I can live with that.
Dave

 

Great Post Dave!

Cheers,
Tony Palladino

 

Great Post Dave...And people wonder why it's so difficult to be a mechanic..grease monkey..my ass...

 

I bet we all would have had heart attack if we watched the Italian craftsmen create Ferrari engines back then. Italians have never been ones to use fancy dancy tools to replace (self) taught skills ... hence why they hand beat bodies well after the English rolling wheel was invented.

Infact if you read www.tomyang.net's restoration and particularly his engine rebuild by an ex-works Ferrari mechanic they did not even use a cam dial wheel to set the cams ... but by feel as that is how they were taught. One customer made him check ... and the cam timing was perfect.

Thus I'm pretty sure that the hammering method would have been correct for a Milli Miglia Ferrari ... not tolerated nowadays but how it was probably done back then, and guess what those cars won races back then too.

While I am all for the finest tolerances, etc. some of us (myself included) do take this way to far and make our lives and others a misery.

I've put gudgeon pins in rods by gas heating the little rod end ... just as the Nissan manual detailed ... was not a race engine, yes, but a shop van and yes it like all good shop vans got hammered ... and probably still is being hammered many thousands of miles later.

Pete

 

speaking of cam timing....

I dialled in the 550 cams today. Once again the referance notches were so close to perfect it seems the 2 hours of dialling were wasted, but of course, they were not.

FYI....

Inlet 0.70mm lift at TDC on overlap, Exhaust 0.69mm Lift at TDC on overlap.

Perhaps the F40 engine owner/builder can comment on his findings when ready.

 

And a month ago, working with Ellery from ZR Auto in Canada, we dialed in a 355. The marks were almost a tooth off on 3 of the 4 cams. Hands down the worst I have ever seen. Think it takes a long time dialing in cams where the marks are close? Try one where they are off by a mile, and it has you second guessing your work, and repeat checking time after time after time!
Dave