Another day.
So I get up early, make a dump run, then head over to pick up the trailer I need to borrow to go pick up the SWB frame (about 75 miles away).
Find out the trailer is a round 7 pin plug and it won’t jive with my Dakota’s 4 wire flat plug up.
Surely any parts store has an adapter? After calling one, he assured me that he had one.
Four parts stores and one U-haul later, I realized “not so fast”. All the adapters are backwards from what I need.
I finally find one at the 2nd U Haul place, and right as the cashier is handing me the receipt, my buddy calls (the one lending the trailer) and said he many have what I need borrowed from his neighbor. So I return the $30 adapter and give it a go.
Up and running. Well at least going to get the frame wasn’t an ordeal, once I actually had the trailer hooked up
.
Got it all snug in its parking spot while I address the engine:
So I picked up some plastigauge this morning so I could check the main / rod bearing tolerances on the 230.
Oh yeah… stayed up late last night tearing it down a bit. Once you get started it’s hard to stop:
Head needs clean up, but who didn’t expect that. Not horrible though:
Pistons could use some love too:
So I stocked up on carb cleaner and went to work on the top end. Since I have the pan off, I’ll just use carb cleaner and shop rags to get some of the loose carbon off. Combination of air, shop towel, carb cleaner, than a brake clean dessert.
I start scraping the head gasket mating surface and the razor blade catches on something. It’s metal:
Hmmm…
It almost looks like the thread pulled a bit. Figures. Remember the object is to get this thing back in and running again with minimal expense. I want a year or two out of this engine. Hadn’t planned on a trip for the block to the machine shop.
Feedback?
Opinions?
Grind it flat (Carefully) and keep going and hope for the best?