DC Love

Hello everybody.

I am new to this site as a user, but have been surfing around on here for a long time now. I have a couple questions and concerns for you all and would appreciate your advice and input.

Here are pictures of my motor after I just pulled the head. Basically I am wondering how you guys think everything looks. I bought the block which was sleeved by GE and built by a reputable shop sometime last year.

I drove it and beat on it from time to time. Then I began to lose water ever so slowly. I began to notice that I would lost water only under or after boosting. So I began to think the head was lifting under boost or the headgasket was blown.

I was pretty concerned about it but didnt have time to look into it, until now. So the car/motor has been sitting for about 4 months now. When I drained the oil, I noticed it was a greyish/greenish color, so I assume coolant was mixed with it. And I think the coolant had a bit of brown in it as well.

When I pulled the head today, I was happy that I didnt see any cracks in the sleeves or chips in the pistons or anything like that. But I am concerned about the buildup on some of the pistons and some of the crud on one side of the sleeves. I am also concerned about the rust or rustish color that I see on/around the sleeves as well. I also inspected the headgasket and it was not torn or anything and I couldnt tell if/where it was leaking from. Hopefully it was the headgasket or headlifting. What do you think?

I was wondering if you guys could give me your input on what you think about this. Also, is there a way to clean it all up without taking the bottom end apart? Also, would it be alright to let it sit for another month or so and then slap it back together? If I am missing any information or if you need better pictures, let me know.

Thanks in advance. Here are the pictures:

DC Love

dr_latino999

I'm not what you would call an experienced engine builder, so anyone feel free to give me the on this but here is my thoughts -
Pistons seem to have spots where they are lacking deposits, a sign of coolant entering the combustion chamber. The crud on the sleeves could be from using more water than coolant, and those being the mineral deposits from tap water.

Yay/Nay?

DC Love

Sorry, I didnt mean it like that. Your input is appreciated.

I know for a fact coolant was entering, but I dont know how. And thats what I was guessing the crud on the sleeves is. I did use about 30% coolant/70 tap and 1 bottle of water wetter. I did not know I was not supposed to use tap water!

Is there anyway to get rid of it? Is there any negative effects from this? Anything I can do to reverse this? So next time Ill run it with the correct mixture.

Thanks for your input.

Joseph Davis

D-series heads don't lift.

D-series headgaskets fail when you feed them too much ignition timing, classic symptom of which is everything "seems" to run great and make good power but you purge into the coolant catchcan every time you boost. The headgasket deteriorates over time after you purge coolant so much as once, even if you take timing out until the tune is correct.

DC Love

It is a B Series motor. Sorry I didnt make that clear earlier. It is either 84 or 85mm, I cant remember and I dont have the correct measuring device.

omniman

Sleeving in general can be a tricky proceedure and often times have long term reliability issues. The complexity comes from having an aluminum block and a steel cylinder. Aluminum expands about 3 times more per degree than steel. When a steel sleeve is pressed into an aluminum block it has to be interference fit. Meaning the steel cylinder liner will be larger in diameter than the hole in the block it will press into. If the interference is too much the block will generally crack or be distorted. If the interference is too little the sleeves will get loose when the motor heats up (aluminum expands about 3 times more per degree than steel). If the sleeve gets a little loose under operating temps the sleeve can vibrate excessively under higher rpms and also sink lower into the block. If the sleeve sinks it reduces the amount of pressure on the head gasket sealing the cylinders. this inturn allows coolant to enter the cylinder under heavy loads. The block also grows so the sleeve will loose some sealing pressure just through an increase in heat. Most sleeves are positive meaning they stick out a small amount higher than the block itself. this allows a better seal around each cylinder and must be precisely done. If the sleeves stick out too much when the block is assembled it puts pressure on the main journal area. This can also crack the block or cause the bearing clearances for the main journals to be incorrect and even have serious interference. Even the best sleevers cant get it right all the time.

Sleeving should really only be used for race only vehicles and not daily driven street cars. The stock sleeves are pretty strong and break because of detonation which is basically a bad tune or too low octane for the boost or compression your running.

When you build your engines and tune them make sure to factor in the following questions..... Do i have enough knock retard for running on a 110+ degree day under full boost in the summer time? do i have enough fuel to compensate for a 30 degree or colder night in the winter time? Dont expect your engine to last if your on the edge on an 75 degree day and any slight change in atmospheric conditions cause it to self destruct. remember its a street car and you have to compromise some power for longevity.

Joseph Davis

Well, expletive.

DC Love

Hi omniman,

Thanks for the great info. This block had actually sunk a sleeve (sleeved by ge), but that was their first style of sleeve. Sent it back to have it resleeved and they guaranteed it would not ever sink or shift a sleeve again.

This was a daily car, but it was not driven in any extreme conditions or any conditions where the weather was not close to the tuning conditions. I would not feel safe with stock sleeves at the power level I was shooting for.

But can somebody answer answer my questions Hopefully everything will be alright. Thanks!

DC Love

Anybody else?

nasteboyii

just out of curiousity what hp u looking for that u dont trust stock sleeves

dan

DC Love

I am looking to hit 600. For the track of course. Plus I already have the sleeved block.

Will it be ok to run it like this again? Is there anyway to clean the jackets?

chubz0r

Hope you get everything figured out man.

DC Love

Anybody else?

DC Love

???

PHDZINE

To Golden Eagle for backing up their work. I've had a bad experience with another sleeve manufacture that made me pay for another set of sleeve that sank twice...good thing they moved!

DC Love

They somewhat backed it up. Lol. I still had to pay, it was just discounted.

So, nobody has answered my question yet. Will my motor be ok to run like this again? Ill just try to clean it up a little bit....

ninesecrx

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by DC Love &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">They somewhat backed it up. Lol. I still had to pay, it was just discounted.

So, nobody has answered my question yet. Will my motor be ok to run like this again? Ill just try to clean it up a little bit....</TD></TR></TABLE>

I would not run the motor like this. It could be 1 of 2 things. A sleeve either leaks down on the underside between the sleeve and the block or at the top which a sunk sleeve can be an issue. The way to tell a sunk sleeve would be with a bridge with a dial indicator to see if it is below the surface. The only way to tell if the sleeves leak below is to pressure test the block. If the engine has been like this for awhile, you can usually see some sort of coolant snail trail coming out from under the sleeves. Looks also like you might need some more coolant because that rust is pretty nasty.

DC Love

You think it could have sunk a sleeve again? They guaranteed it not to happen again

And the rust is my fault, I ran it with 70% water (from the hose!) and 30% coolant...

Is there any way to clean it? or any way to get rid of it? To pressure test the block, do I have to disassemble it?

Thank you!

ninesecrx

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by DC Love &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">You think it could have sunk a sleeve again? They guaranteed it not to happen again

And the rust is my fault, I ran it with 70% water (from the hose!) and 30% coolant...

Is there any way to clean it? or any way to get rid of it? To pressure test the block, do I have to disassemble it?

Thank you!</TD></TR></TABLE>

You would have to have the proper tools to see if the sleeve has sunk. As for pressure testing, yes...the block would have to be taken apart. As for the rest, not sure, maybe someone else can chim in?

The sweed

I had my b16 in an engine dyno here in Sweden when it was newly built with the older style GE sleeves and it leaked a ton of coolent.. It leaked ALOT in the buttom of the sleeves. I thought the whole engine was garbage by then.. I put ALOOOOOT of work in it too.. I thought I try to make it through the dyno session with some Bars leak (liquid sealer you put in the coolent) and it held up for over 100 pulls and making 600hp. I had only test drived the car with the engine in it but i think that if I flush the engine maybe onece a year and put some new bars leak in it, it will hold up. I´m amazed that it held for the dyno pulls..

MidwestAutoWorks

Where can a guy buy just the sleeves

SD_Lurker

iTrader: (4)

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by MidwestAutoWorks &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Where can a guy buy just the sleeves</TD></TR></TABLE>

What kind of sleeves? Don't quote me on it but I am pretty sure that GE only sells their sleeves if you are sleeving your block through them. However, Darton will sell you any type of sleeve you want and you can have whomever you want install them. There are tons of machine shops capable of installing Darton sleeves but just make sure they install them correctly.

boostedgsr1234

would you guys say its worth sleeving? im looking for around 500whp on my street car but im really looking for reliability at that power level... all this talk about sinking sleeves worries me

Steve D

I'm Steve from Race Engine Development. I want to clear up a few errors in your post regarding sleeving.

I work closely with Darton on sleeve design, R&D and so on and do their installations here on the West Coast. I am one of the patent holders on the MID line of sleeves along with Dave Clinton who owns Darton and Gary Cyr who runs the shop at Darton. Combined, we have over a hundred years of experience in building racing engines, sleeving blocks and making sleeves.

You stated that aluminum expands three times faster than steel. This is true for most aluminum alloys vs. steel. Most cylinder walls, sleeves however, are made from either gray iron or ductile iron. The graphite in these irons makes for an excellent wearing surface for rings. Golden Eagle does not use steel for their sleeves, neither does Darton or AEBS. Steel is not a good bearing surface for rings and must be coated or plated. Perfect Bore makes thin wall steel liners with nikasil coating - very expensive.

Golden Eagle uses Encore Metals ductile iron extrusions 80 55 06 as far as I know. Darton's proprietary centrifugal spun cast ductile iron material made specifically for cylinder walls is roughly half again as strong at 120,000+ psi tensile vs. the 80,000 psi tensile of the Encore extrusion. Darton decided against using the extruded material because it was not strong enough to hold up to super high boost alcohol drag race engines, top fuel nitro methane engines or 100+ pound boost tractor pull engines nor is it designed to be used specifically for cylinder walls as is Darton's proprietary material.

In any case, your assumption is still incorrect regarding expansion rates. I had the same misconception early on so don't feel that I am slighting you. The proprietary material that Darton uses has a very high expansion rate for ductile iron. The sleeve actually grows as fast or faster than the aluminum block. This due to the material and because the sleeve sees the heat of combustion and is thus much hotter than the block in operation. Thus pressure against the head gasket actually increases with heat. I discourage leaving the sleeve proud of the deck surface for this reason. All you end up doing is distorting the cylinder head which causes the valve seats to go out of round along with the main bearing bores as you pointed out.

Any sleeved aluminum block should have the main bearing bores checked with a deck plate and gasket installed and torqued to spec. regardless. The bearing bores will most likely need to be resized (align honed or bored).

Regarding sleeving is only good for race engines. Not true with the Darton MID sleeve. All MID sleeves seat on the water jacket floor on a substantial ledge. It is almost impossible for the sleeve to sink if is properly installed. I have sleeved hundreds of MID Honda blocks not to mention hundreds upon hundreds of other brands of blocks (Nissan, GM, Suzuki, Ford, Dodge, Porsche, Viper, Ferrari) for street use with no sleeve drop come backs at all. No chance of coolant leaking into the crankcase either since the sleeves have three orings sealing them to the aluminum block. The MID sleeves are not pressed into the block. Pressing any wet sleeve into the block is guaranteed to cause distortion of the sleeve. Read a Ferrari service manual or any diesel engine service manual.

All Darton MID installs are guaranteed against leakage. The sleeves are guaranteed for a year against defects, sinking (not going to happen anyway) or any other material defect.

Your other remarks regarding tuning, building are to the point. Many build engines for pump gas street use with too much compression for the boost they plan on running. It is always best to be conservative on these builds for longevity as you pointed out.

Steve