Today i went to do my cam and intake manifold swap and i found something rather interesting, my crank moves front to back about 1/4 inch. I was reading around and found some people that had thrust bearing problems having similar problems as me. The dry knock at startup and a knocking noise that sounded similar to piston slap, this is what lead me to check the endplay well i had it apart. So now i'm pulling the engine and im hoping the extent of my damage is bearings and that no damage is done to my forged crank. I'm wondering what the damage could have been caused by. Personally im thinking that the thrust was improperly set at the machine shop causing my problem, since i had the knock from day one. I also know transmission problems and a ballooning converter can knock the thrust out, but my old engine i removed had thrust bearings which are perfectly find. So it leads me to belive that the shop did a poor job assembling it, which i will find out when i look at the wear of each side of the bearing. Also has anyone had a problem with balooning a converter? how likely is it and what are the causes? This is on my SBC engine, but i just wanted to vent. So much for a simple cam swap and manifold swap.

 

ugh. I was only 2500 miles into my modded, punched 5.3 and after a ton of issues...burning converter bearings, trans pump kept breaking, throwing SC belts, harmonic balancer bolt kept getting loose, wild KR issues, tons of unexplainable misfires, one day it would run strong as **** and the next it ran like ****..I took it to a different trans shop (more of a speed trans shop) and the owner said in 5 minutes..."You have a bad thrust bearing." No way I said, I thought that was only a manual trans issue, pushing the clutch into the flywheel and such. He says, for what it's worth that, "You'll never get a machine to admit or even prove it but they screwed you on the bearing install. Probably had a junior install your crank." It cost my *** in troubleshooting and two trans pump rebuilds.

Hard to believe that the crank can move that much and not destroy your motor and/or crank.

 

Im not even gonna get into the issues I had before, during, and after the LS1 swap! They are really sad! I know it sucks but you are far from being alone! Good luck man and at least it will be stronger in th end!

 

Ya i read about your problems. That really had to suck. I read all these post's with ton's of people having problems with built engines, i thought to myself damn im lucky im not having any problems... I was mistakin, I just hope the crank isn't damaged to bad, That's my biggest concern. I should know tonight though

 

i pulled the engine out tonight and now its torn down to the bare block.. I pulled the thrust bearing and the side closest to the converter was about half the thickness of the other side. One side of the crank went un damaged and the other side is close on if it can get machined or if it will need to be welded, I'm going to try and find out tommorow. I also removed the pistons and found that the bore is a little scarred on each side where the skirt has been hitting it, not to sure what my plan of attack is there. Right now at the bare minimum im going to need to have the crank machined, new bearings, a gasket set, and a converter. It seems that since the thrust bearing has one side that wore significantly more than the other that i have a ballooned torque converter... Anyways here's a little tour of my garage right now or should i say shop.

This is kind of my mini office when i work in the garage, I use my lappy for the service manual I have on there. Not to mention the forum breaks. It also has all my pistons and main caps from the engine

On the right are the heads that came off the truck, i was trying to show the difference between the ported and the stock.. Allthough you can't really see in the picture

Crap from the truck

This was a fully assembled engine in a truck at the begining of the night

crank, rocker arms, etc.. Also the pushrods aren't on the concrete as it may appear they are

This is what my engine bay looks like, yet again

Got snap-on?

and one of my personal faviroites.. One of the main bearings


Whatch ya guys think :?

 

who built your motor?

 

well, i bought the engine brand new off of a friends co-worker. He said he had it built by a local machine shop. The machine shop i go to for my work is a different one then he took it to. I don't really want to name names even though its local just in case. Anyways now that its all apart im having my shop machine the thrust surface and jet blast the block. It's also looking like im going to have to hone the cylinders. It looks like the metal in the oil caused some scratching on the cylinder walls. After that i will be doing the assembly myself and i will be checking all the clearances.

 

First off nice little shop! The one good think is that you are doing the install which is saving you a shitload of money but yours till gonna have a decent sizes machine shop bill! Here is how I look at it. Although it would have been nice for no probelms but at least this way everything is checked out and your gonna know that everything is right before you install! Not just on this site but other sites and word of mouth but there are a shitload of machine shops/perf shops that really F-up some motors,heads,etc..... Its scary! It almost worth the money for the big well known shops to build your motor! Good luck man! It will be better in the end!