LouisvilleLT4

What are your thoughts on cranking the starter without oil? Anything besides the common wisdom that a second without oil is too long?

My engine is bare (edit: but no internal rebuild has happened yet ), oil drained, no oil seals to put back on. The point of the test is to see if it's safe to put all that back on and bundle it up. But I also don't want my dry test to be the thing that ruins my compression.

I know I should have tested this back when it was together, but I didn't find my oil problems until after all my covers were off.

Safe or not safe?

Some things that entered my own mind are that cranking RPM speeds, at just a few spins per second, mean less strain than even idle speeds. And also that it seems like a common load - oil pressure begins at zero the instant cranking begins for everybody all the time. So does that mean I'll be OK? I'd just tap the battery to the starter real quick (10 spins or so each time).

Lloyd Smale

Id say if you used good assembly lube you should be ok to crank it over enough to do a compression test

Joe C

my 2-cents - FWIW -- I've got to ask, what are you trying to accomplish by turning the engine over with the starter? seems to me, if you have a partial engine build, about all you'll accomplish is detecting any binding in the rotating assembly, and the starter circuit. like stated above, with good assembly lube, a momentary crank SHOULDN'T hurt anything, but personally I wouldn't do it. if the rotating assembly turns freely by hand, I'd finish the build. if you have decent engine building skills, and did everything "by the book," you should be good to go -

LouisvilleLT4

Oh it's not a rebuilt/new engine, it's a bit worn out and needs a test. The oil sample I sent out when I took the pan off measured half H20 (!!!) and had lots of bearing particles. So there's reason to believe water could have been blowing past the piston rings, hence me suddenly wanting to test for compression now -- good question.

Thanks. I know I made it sound like I did a rebuild but I'm not there yet, and this test is so I can hopefully avoid digging into the longblock (which I have nowhere to store besides in the car).

So no assembly lube, and not a lot of lubrication was going on in this engine when I tore it down. Instead what about a small shot of WD-40 from a sprayer tube in every cylinder between cranks? I'd get no dry reading to compare to but still...?

rocco16

There should be enough oil left in all the right places to let you safely crank it with the starter to check compression.

You DID have full synthetic oil it, right?

antfarmer2

Reading it it was half water. Damage is already done.

Joe C

- especially this part...

c4cruiser

Even if there may be enough oil in the crank and rod journals (or the cam journals and the lifters), the fact that there was so much water in the oil makes me think that there could be enough cylinder wall damage that any compression reading will most likely be too low or that once everything is back together, the damaged cylinder walls will allow oil to blow past the rings. And if the compression rings may be damaged from a lack of lubrication, it would be time to dig into the block anyway.

Spraying anything in the cylinders will not help the rotating bearing surfaces. And it could give you a compression reading that is not correct.

Rather trying to rebuild, have you thought about buying a short block? If the old engine has to come out, it won't take long to transfer stuff from the old engine to the new shortblock and install it.

cardo0

Im reading what u are trying to do is check your ring seal after finding large amounts of water in oil and bearing metal in oil also. Not bashing u for trying some ingenuity here Louis but like others have said that motor needs tear down and inspection even if it had good compression and ring seal. If u think u can avoid that then u will be educating yourself shortly here. Unless u just want to enable the engine to sell the car then in that case its not going to matter either as u should just replace the seals and try to run it for sale.

Safe or not safe u would just be adding to damage if metal particles are in the bearing shells. Drop the pan and pop a few main and rod caps for a look. I think youll have damage to photo and show us if u do.

LouisvilleLT4

I'll try to post bearing photos tonight and I guess use that cotter pin trick to get the top halves out, thanks!

LouisvilleLT4

My condo's board of directors would definitely be pissed if they saw an engine out, in the bylaws they have a no-repair rule and I already got a nastygram left on the car threatening they'd fine us for my work on it downstairs This impedes even swapping in a shortblock and doing this the easy way.
Edit: Well, so does my desire not to toss this engine until I've verified it's bad (my diagnosis could be wrong / overblown)

Hot Rod Roy

With that much crud floating around in your engine, you have only two alternatives:

1. 100% teardown and rebuild.
2. Long block exchange.

Anything else is a waste of time. How you get this done is your only problem!

antfarmer2

lots of bearing particles.& fines from your condo you need to get the car someplace you can work on it does not sound like a quik fix

LouisvilleLT4

Here were the oil sample results - namely their analysis of how second sample was, and you can see the first test's numbers (which was from the drain plug instead of scraped off the pan) in that column that starts with "10,000".

That second sample was scraped out of the pan specifically where I saw a clear puddle, which would explain why it's so bad, but the high metal counts in test 1 are more what I am pointing out here. No visible shavings, but lots of invisible particulates.

cardo0

The worst wear will be on the bottom half of brg shells. I dont see the need to roll out the top halves. Hope this saves u some work.

I think u need to double check your agreement. In Nevada the garages are part of the owners property and not for the to association to inspect. My 2 car garage is so full i park my DD outside.

LouisvilleLT4

YES, that does.


It's a shared underground parking lot, unfortunately. Nosy busybodies can walk by and get themselves worked up from looking at it on their way in. The agreement provides for just enough work to move it out of there, which I plan on invoking, but it doesn't matter - they'll fine if they want regardless of whether I have a point. We'd have to pay because they have the authority to foreclose.

antfarmer2

This is the second time they tested it? And this is better? Would not waste the time.

I could never live like that. If I can't pee off the porch and shoot a shotgun at the same time I will not live there. Lol

LouisvilleLT4

NO it's not better, the second one I specifically bottled up a clear puddle I found in the oil and sent it. Both sets of numbers came from the same oil.

Tell me about it, believe me that situation is not by choice.

antfarmer2

Time to find a place to work on it. Go with it and be happy

chadk

what he said! waste of time.