Another hard lesson learned (but at least it's learned)

4SPEED427 · A Poncho Legend!

Another hard lesson learned (but at least it's learned)

4SPEED427 · A Poncho Legend!

67BBSD · Canadian Poncho Superstar!

Carl Stevenson wrote:

Some of you may have seen the post I made about a coolant leak on a used 283 I installed in my non Canadian Pontiac (Nova).

Here's a couple of shots of the mistake. I should have changed both frost plugs in the back of the block (behind the flywheel) before I installed it. If you are putting in a used engine, spend the 3 bucks or whatever it is and take 5 minutes to change those 2 plugs. It will save pulling a trans and flywheel like I did.

Look at the first picture. See the black spot top right, about 1 o'clock position on the plug? And the second picture, about 10 o'clock you can see the little crater with the black spot in the middle. Corroded right through.

Toyota frost plug in a Chevy ? or just offshore reproduction parts ? hmmmmm or 45 year old genuine GM parts.

4SPEED427 · A Poncho Legend!

I think it's 45 year old GM Ken.

beaumontguru · Canadian Poncho Superstar!

Dang, that sucks.
Ive seen it on atleast 3 60s 283s and 6cylinder motors i have.
Luckily i caught them while the engines were out of cars. Now i check real carefull.

67BBSD · Canadian Poncho Superstar!

Carl Stevenson wrote:

I think it's 45 year old GM Ken.

I had a 71 LS5 Chevelle with a bad bottom end-so I sent the whole engine out for the $3000 job, bored pistons, fresh top end and all-I put it in the car hook everything up nicely-dump the antifreeze in and it lands on the floor almost as fast-well when the engine block was hot tanked the brass drain plugs went missing to the acid-nobody put new ones in and no one including me check to see if they were there-not as bad a job to do but equally frustrating.

Ken

4SPEED427 · A Poncho Legend!

One more to hang on the wall of shame, along with-------

It can hang here with the extra oil ring (box had 17 upper/lower rings for the bottom groove instead of 16) and when I was putting the rings on the second last piston I noticed I had 5 left, not 4. I KNEW I had done the first 6 pistons right so took the chance that there had been 17, and I won! Now I count rings before I start putting them on pistons!

cheetah 427 · Poncho Master!

i always us brass plugs , its cheep and they get painted anyway, who wants leaks!!!!

Pontiacanada · A Poncho Legend!

Carl Stevenson wrote:

One more to hang on the wall of shame, along with-------

Hey Carl, do you actually have a wall of shame in your garage?

If not, I think it would be a great thing for you to do ... to show off all the things that can go wrong while working on a car, lawnmower, boat motor, etc. and as a reminder.
Please don't take it that I'm saying that you make a lot of mistakes!

I have a wall of shame in my shed. I just have to remember not to reach up and reuse one of those parts! biggrin

I have a couple pics of my injuries hanging there also.

forespeed · Poncho Master!

Carl Stevenson wrote:

I think it's 45 year old GM Ken.

In 1965, my job at the V-8 Engine Plant in Flint Michigan was to install the soft plugs on blocks on the assembly line. I stuck an old brush with some kind of black sealer into each hole on the 283, 327, 6 cyl & 4 cyl blocks. Then set the plugs in manually. They then went into a press that sealed all the plugs at the same time. The plugs were galvanized steel except blocks destined for marine usage, they got brass.
That was 45 years ago.

4SPEED427 · A Poncho Legend!

Pontiacanada wrote:

Carl Stevenson wrote:

One more to hang on the wall of shame, along with-------
Hey Carl, do you actually have a wall of shame in your garage?

If not, I think it would be a great thing for you to do ... to show off all the things that can go wrong while working on a car, lawnmower, boat motor, etc. and as a reminder.
Please don't take it that I'm saying that you make a lot of mistakes!

I have a wall of shame in my shed. I just have to remember not to reach up and reuse one of those parts! I have a couple pics of my injuries hanging there also.

No, I don't actually have one but I have sure thought about doing it! Problem is, I would likely have to do an expansion on the garage! I could hang up the heater core with the hole in it from when I drilled through the heater box to mount a stereo component! And the too-long flywheel bolt that jammed the crankshaft against the webbing at the back of the block. And the broken pinion and trans case from drag racing with no driveshaft loop. And the leaky valve cover gasket because I tightened the cover down on the ground strap. And ...........................

4SPEED427 · A Poncho Legend!

forespeed wrote:

Carl Stevenson wrote:

I think it's 45 year old GM Ken.

In 1965, my job at the V-8 Engine Plant in Flint Michigan was to install the soft plugs on blocks on the assembly line. I stuck an old brush with some kind of black sealer into each hole on the 283, 327, 6 cyl & 4 cyl blocks. Then set the plugs in manually. They then went into a press that sealed all the plugs at the same time. The plugs were galvanized steel except blocks destined for marine usage, they got brass.
That was 45 years ago.

So you are the one to blame for this!!! I'll fill out my warranty claim today, just send me your address please!

I have read that coating the back of the plug with a sealer could help lengthen the life of them. I'm not sure how effective that would actually be.

65 SD L79 · Canadian Poncho Superstar!

forespeed wrote:

Carl Stevenson wrote:

I think it's 45 year old GM Ken.

In 1965, my job at the V-8 Engine Plant in Flint Michigan was to install the soft plugs on blocks on the assembly line. I stuck an old brush with some kind of black sealer into each hole on the 283, 327, 6 cyl & 4 cyl blocks. Then set the plugs in manually. They then went into a press that sealed all the plugs at the same time. The plugs were galvanized steel except blocks destined for marine usage, they got brass.
That was 45 years ago.

I guess six day work weeks were normal back then? My 65 327 was assembled Saturday March 6th 1965

67SD396 · Poncho Master!

Carl Stevenson wrote:

Pontiacanada wrote:

Carl Stevenson wrote:

One more to hang on the wall of shame, along with-------
Hey Carl, do you actually have a wall of shame in your garage?

If not, I think it would be a great thing for you to do ... to show off all the things that can go wrong while working on a car, lawnmower, boat motor, etc. and as a reminder.
Please don't take it that I'm saying that you make a lot of mistakes!

I have a wall of shame in my shed. I just have to remember not to reach up and reuse one of those parts! I have a couple pics of my injuries hanging there also.

No, I don't actually have one but I have sure thought about doing it! Problem is, I would likely have to do an expansion on the garage! I could hang up the heater core with the hole in it from when I drilled through the heater box to mount a stereo component! And the too-long flywheel bolt that jammed the crankshaft against the webbing at the back of the block. And the broken pinion and trans case from drag racing with no driveshaft loop. And the leaky valve cover gasket because I tightened the cover down on the ground strap. And ...........................

................ installing a used crown and pinion that was laying on the floor beside each other but ended up not being a matched set

. It was a great lesson! A little time consuming but it was fun.

forespeed · Poncho Master!

Any job involved in the assembly process was 6 days 10 hr shifts. The supporting dept.'s were on 5 days 11 hrs, Sat. 10 hrs and Sun. 8 hrs.

After my stint in the Marine Corp & Vietnam, I went back to college and ended up back with GM on salary in the accounting dept.

I recently reconnected with several of my co-workers from the engine plant days while in Florida. Some of those guys have homes in Florida and Michigan along with hobby shops in Florida where they play with a number of very expensive toys on a regular basis.
They worked 30 years of seven day weeks and then left for business ventures involving their kids or in the car hobby. Commercial property is very very cheap in Florida and so many of these guys have some commercial building for the toys because the retirement communities don't allow room for anything extra except a golf cart.