V-12 Engine into 308 Build, over on Grassroots

I like that Scott. I don't like the $400 and will need to get that preapproved but it seems the most straightforward solution.

In other news, cam cover off, rear head retorqued. some of the nuts, particularly the ones on the ends and around cylinder 3 (a leaker) moved well over 1/4 turn, the others were under 1/4, some as low as 1/16th might....almost like the liners I set the fit up nice and snug to the block moved a little deeper once it warmed up. Anyway, this is clearly enough to cause a leak and they were loosest where there were leaks so I'll try to reach the front head then put it back together and see what I have. I'll need to get new gaskets so a little delay there.

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I did learn that the intakes are flat impossible to remove with the cam cover raised even 1 mm. I had to tap it back into place then remove the intakes...its a tight fit.

 

front head retorqued. The main wrench just fit, I had to cut the other one a bit but I got it

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All the exhaust side nuts turned 1/4-1/2 turn and 5 or the connectors the clips just snapped off, the black jacketing and heatshrink are not where I left them.....its way to hot there for the coils to remain there blocking up what little air flow there is. More work. This is why I like the tefzel aircraft wire though, that's all fine

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Cam cover gaskets should arrive Tuesday along with a new sump gasket so I can clean out any coolant that may be hiding in there. Another 10 quarts of 30wt breakin oil +5 qts of 20/50 to top it up (empty it holds 14 qt I guess) + new filters arriving tomorrow. Something is leaking pretty bad, I'll try and find that while I'm under it. Between the gaskets, oil, stoppleak I'm $300 into the head gasket leak at this point so hopefully I won't need to do it all over with the added cost of head and exhaust gaskets.

Also arriving some the correct 8.5mm x 3mm lower injector o-rings. Harder to install I couldn't get the idle under 1500 rpm so I'm thinking they may have been leaking air. I also had most of the throttle return springs disconnected which was done in an effort to try and get the actuator to pull less than 5A so I could use the driver in the ECU....that effort failed and I have an external driver on a 15A fuss so might as well make it safer and put the springs back. and clearance the sides of the manifold so its possible to remover the cam covers without removing the intakes.

I needed to play with the tach again....the way I had it setup it was buggering the 5V output from the ECU. I bought a $13 freq to volt converter card...and the tach is working again.
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Then cooling as it was running hotter than it should. I bought a 160F T'stat so I'll swap that once it arrives but t]stat open the fan was not able to hold the temp down. Could still be the leaking head gasket but...the radiator core is 21x18, the fan is called an 18" (maybe 17.5" really) and is 2950 cfm which is about best out there. If I add a should it will be flowing air over about 30% more core area which would probably fix the issue....

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Apologies in advance, I did not read the whole thing. I did see you are having a head gasket issue. From personal experience I will say TR heads do not have huge rigidity. In fact they are pretty bendy if what they are clamped to isnt real flat. If the liners are on the proud side it can distort the head when torqued down. It will distort along its length and make a trough lengthways down the middle. I see you are using Cometic composits. Those are made in 2 thicknesses and I suggest the thicker one to give the gasket more give to imbed the liner and still have clamping pressure on the entire deck surface and not distort the head. In the event the head needs to come off look for equal liner imbedding depth full circumference and signs of good pressure on the gasket between the liners equidistant from the block edges down the length.

I have never once used sealant on head gaskets even on blown motors. With a solid gasket I could possibly see it but at least in my opinion its a band aid covering up a problem.

Aviation is a great product and as I understand it is for metal to metal gasketless use. Used it on about 1000 Mercedes oil pans when I was a kid building motors for a living.

 

No reason to lock horns on this one, but Elring rightfully placed red piping sealant on Ferrari (and most) head gaskets for a reason. It can’t hurt and it’s great insurance. I recall an old school trick with some 60s vintage Ferrari V12 heads shown to me by an old Italian curmudgeon mechanic some 22yrs ago. His method was placing a piece of yarn around certain holes on the head gasket. Not something I would do but he of course swore by it and alleged it was a factory practice

 

We have and continue to use gaskets without that with zero leakage. I took a lot of those engines apart when I was new in this business. Nice story but the factory did not do that.

Many years ago, 30 or 40 I had a conversation with a rep from a gasket company and I mentioned painting a head gasket with a sealant and he flipped out. Told me to take the head gaskets out of the package and put them on exactly as they made them . He told me one big issue is air pockets will be trapped between surfaces preventing proper sealing, proper torquing and proper heat transfer. Never questioned it, never did it and never found a need. Not once have I ever taken a factory assembled motor of any make apart and found sealant of any type other than the silicon bead on some. I have learned factories work real hard not to have issues and they are pretty good at it. If you want their results use their methods.

 

it is factory practice...on 40s aircraft engines at least, not sure how long that was factory practice but a buddy had an old piper cub and that was how it was done. Paint on the (now called) aviation sealant, lay a silk thread along the stud line, slide the mating case 1/2 on. The thread ensured the gap is consistent and there is enough sealant remaining to seal. Not sure how you'd do that on a head though?

I drained all the old out today, washed out the tank and also dropped the sump to clean that out....so no oil leaks at the moment

 

Cleaned the sump off and changed the oil filters. While filling the fillers I realized I bought 20/50 breakin oil....did know they made it but it should give me more stable pressure so a good mistake I think.

Changed the thermostat today....frikin sealant. I pumped the sealant directly into the block not the coolant tank so I'm hoping all this **** is here and not in my radiator

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and that was followed by an hour "do I have the right one?" investigation...I decided both are right. The new $51 Mishimoto is shorter and allows more recirculation flow when the t'stat is closed but does close the recirc when its open, its closer to the ferrari design iirc.

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nothing to do with my car but I was wondering what oil newer ferraris were running, 458 is 5w40, 458 special is 10w60. While looking I spotted this in the 458specail owner's manual...the optional wheels that are compatible with chains. Who i wonder would fit tire chains to their ferrari? I guess its got to be a law somewhere that they specify who to fit chains? Morning chuckle Image Unavailable, Please Login





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A thread on a gasketless surface was common practice on many things and used by a number of European auto manufacturers but not in addition to a gasket.

 

Yep you have to offer ability for a snow traction device, chains or snow socks

 

I've never heard of it done on gaskets either, and never seen it in person on anything, just the 1 airplane engine story. I had no idea it was ever done on a car engine.

I have a lot of parts that are in the the "it MIGHT seal with a gasket" category and more in the the "there is no gasket for that" category as very little of this engine is factory stock at this point. So while I prefer to put on a gasket and put it together as factory.....using sealants is the only viable option for a lot of this and on the note I'll probably have 5-6 hours in cleaning off the old sealant before I can reassemble this vs 15-20 minutes if it was as factory with just gaskets.....but that is the price I cutting and welding everything extracts I guess.

Sump is back on, I'll get the cam covers tomorrow hopefully. Then I need to figure out where to relocate the coils but the new connectors aren't here yet so that may hold things up

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On a project like this those are the kinds of judgement calls needed. Personally I am pretty comfortable going gasketless on a lot of stuff depending on the shape, size etc. We have really good sealants these days.

Thread with sealant was common from early 60's back on many low production items from Europe. Gaskets were expensive and had to be contracted out. With a big rigid casting like an oil pan to a big rigid casting like a block it worked very well but then Mercedes had the same situation and just glued them with no thread so who knows if it did anything but give the assemblers a sense of security?

Hope you get the head sealing resolved. Everything else is just nuts and bolts. The usual start from scratch custom build stuff.

 

Its mostly back together. Cam covers on a couple days ago, end covers went on yesterday, intakes on and fuel system pressure tested tonight. The new coil plugs are coming from Chia is seems and are now due 1/19 so I won't wait and will cobble the coils somewhere so I can get it running and see if the heads are sealed, Saturday at the latest

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I did a few little things. The rewelded fuel rail ahd a little weeping, not really leaking...a pin holes in the weld I guess that I fixed.

I had disconnected 8 of the throttle return springs to take load off the actuator to try and get under 5 amps so the internal driver in the ECU would work...that was a fail and I added a 25A external driver so I went ahead and reconnected the springs hoping it helps get the idle a bit lower. Thre springs were already pretty soft, I custom made them way back to be much lower force than the stock springs on the the ducatic TBs came with figuring I had 12 not 2
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On the same note I went back to the slightly tighter 14.5mm OD o-rings on the bottom of the injectors to be sure there is no vacuum leak.

Last I beveled the sides of the manifold son now in theory at least the cam covers can be removed without removing the intakes.

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How much static advance has it got? With 12 throttles it may be problematic to get the idle down. Have you considered an ignition retard? OEM's do it all the time.

 

I started heading that direction and pulled timing from 15 where is was down to 8 and it dropped from 1500-1600 to around 1200 so for sure that work but I moved it back to 13? I think for now because keeping cylinders running in spite of the coolant leaks was the bigger priority. This go I'll now mechanically I have done all I can which will let me know if I can control idle with the TBs as the ECU is currently programmed or if I need change the setup to maybe fix the throttle location then let the ECU idle control adjust timing (instead of TBs) to hit the idle point from there.

I'm hoping its sealed now and I can get on with fixing idle....but honestly I expect to be pulling the engine to replace the head gaskets.......

 

Here's the good news for the day.
-It fired right back up
-God I just love hearing this thing run
-With the new o-rings and all the TB springs installed it was no problem to get the engine idling down to 700 at least before I sync'd the TBs and not sure all the cylinders stayed running down there, I re-set to about 1150 for now.
-the TBs are much easier to sync now, getting them matched to 5% total error took less than 5 minutes. I could have gotten them better with a little more time but didn't see the need for now.
- got to driver it out of the garage rather than push it and I continue to be thrilled every time it moves under its own power
-power steering sure is nice turning the car around in the driveway
-oil pressure was way more stable with the 20-50 break-in oil rather than the 30wt I used last time
-tach is working...it seems a little sticky but its working

Bad news for the day
-yeah, the head gaskets are no more sealed than they were before so it needs to come apart.
-no idea where I'm going to move the coils

 

Sorry to hear. If possible get some really good close ups of the lower side of the head gaskets. Especially the fire rings between cylinders. Or near where it looks to be leaking.

 

This was the most probably outcome....getting a gasket, any gasket, to reseal is a feat I've never achieved but seem to always try...does it work? no....does it work? No...does it work? NO!!!!


I guess all things considered, if this is the worst thing that goes wrong this time around then I'm doing fine

For sure I'll try to get some decent pics and recheck cylinder protrusions...but I'm leaning toward the Scott solution of painting it with sealant even though I know in my heart its wrong because I'm thinking this is a problem of my own making....the 86mm bore size. I know Nick/Scott are putting together 89mm bore engines but I think they are also using the newer style MLS head gaskets that are coated everywhere with viton or similar. I didn't pay up for custom tooling to make those so I'm using the older type composite that is a gasket with flame-rings and in my case the flame rings basically touch each other.
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so the only thing keeping coolant out of the cylinders in the between the cylinders area is the flame-ring, which is not a gasket really but more heat/pressure/flame protection for the gasket....and then I used the evans coolant which seems to be extra good at leaking so in my mind this is where sealant becomes the only real path foreword because I effectively don't have any gasket between the cylinder...at least that is what I'm thinking.

Time to go pull the engine.

 

Remember what I said about the TR heads bending down around the upper and lower side of the liners? Even with kind of OK protrusion with that little space between liners it may be happening anyway. Get a good look at the lower side of the old gaskets to see if the gasket / rings are being well crushed where liners are closest.

 

I hate to suggest even more work for you, but because the head gasket issue may be a good bit more trial and error, perhaps a simple test stand to run this thing until that issue is sorted is in order.

I have to wonder how much crush (post torque) is built into that Reinz gasket you’re using too. Looks very similar and basic like Sangalli’s head gaskets. Specifically the crush of the rings. Different manufacturers seem to have their own recipe, some start at 1.5mm static and only crush to 1.3-1.4mm, others such as Corteco in my experience lately, crush a lot more, placing more pressure on the other portion of the gasket thus greater sealing outside the rings. Corteco is also coated with a shiny sealant on the entirety, Reinz or Sangalli equivalents have nothing.

 

A run stand would be the best bet.

Awesome car!

 

Couple pics..
Wiggle wiggle...
89mm bore leaves zero room for said wiggle. Flat deck though.
Witness pressure marks on MLS gasket... Yeah block moves, esp with 89mm bores.
Redesign of embossing and finally just adding a layer of sealant.. fixed. Granted that's because we are running 20psi of boost.

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is that something like the Permatex copper spray rather than aviation sealant?

 

Are you thinking an adjustment to the protrusion may be required?