Venderbroeck's engine build

[venderbroeck]

As requested by several people, I will keep a build log of my engine here.
There's a few things I plan on doing with this, some of which will be revealed later 
It all started a few years ago when I decided I wanted to do a very quick build on the original engine of my '94 onyx green volvo 850 t5.
The plan was to just fit some h-beam rods, and new big end bearings.

Some time later the plan evolved into using the rods to build the broken RN engine that came out of our '00 c70 which had a missing big end bearing.
I picked up the idea to hone the cylinders, and fit new piston rings as well.
I think everybody knows where this is going... 

In the end (after saving, and trading parts for almost 3 years) it turned into a full rebuild.
So some specs of the engine then:

-rebored '00 bt5234T3 single exhaust vvt engine
-OS1 Mahle pistons
-cx racing H-beam rods (139,5 mm)
-later lighter crank, as the original was shot because of the missing bearing.
-All new Volvo bearings
-R manifold
-clutchnet fiber carbon friction plate combined with a volvo 850r pressure plate.
-lightened flywheel

I will first swap it in, while keeping the stock hardware for now.
Somewhere in spring I will upgrade the turbo to a Holset hx30w, and add some more toys.

First I (painstakingly) polished the combustion chambers, and smoothed out some of the casting flash in the intake runners.

This was a lot of work, but it's shiny at least, hopefully it will reduce knock susceptibility:

Here's a phone pic of the engine block right after the rebore:

So after thoroughly cleaning all of the parts, the time came to mount the crank and the main bearings.

Here the crank is already in, and I'm rolling on the liquid (well more like chewing gum like) gasket on the intermediate section:

Fitting the main bearings shells in the intermediate section:

Of course the bearing surfaces where liberally oiled before final assembly.
This is how it sits at the moment, the crank is rotating perfectly with no binding or irregularities:

 

Furthermore I attached the cx-racing h-beams to the mahle pistons today:

I took the time to weigh both the rods and the pistons before assembling them.
The pistons are dead on, and  two of the rods where +-1 gram lighter than the others.
Negligable differences I would say. I will weigh them again before I mount them to position them in their final order.

That's it for now. Tomorrow I have to get the car itself through the Dutch equivalent of annual smog testing.
Once that is over with I'm picking up the head from the shop (I had it professionally cleaned), and dropping off the flywheel to be lightened.
Saturday I hope to torque down some arp big end bolts.
 

Edited December 1, 2017 by venderbroeck

[Napat]

Where did you get OS1 Mahle pistons and piston rings? 

[Andzey]

Please describe how did you polished the combustion chambers. Handheld sandpaper, dremel or something else? 

I wouldn't rush installing crankshaft while after shaving meat of the flywheel it would be beneficial to rebalance the whole set- crank, flywheel and pressure plate. 

Is this buildup planned to be used in a 850 m4.4? Will delete exhaust vvt? 

What are the tolerances of the bore to piston ? Recommended by mahle or your workshop?

 

[venderbroeck]

I got the pistons from autoteile-teufel.de (germany).

The polishing was done as follows:

-120 grit flap wheel in a hand held drill (shaft of flap wheel was too thick for dremel)
-150 grit sanding paper for the parts that could not be reached by the flap wheel.
Up until here is by far the most work (several evenings).
then:
-240 grit sanding paper (one more evening of work)
-320 grit wet sanding paper (using water)
-400 grit wet sanding paper (using water)
-600 grit wet sanding paper (using water)
The 3 higher grits where done in one evening.

Is it worth it? I don't know yet. I'm happy with it though, and I don't regret doing it.

I will not be balancing the whole assembly. My dad has done it this way before without any issues.
The flywheel itself will be balanced by the machine shop. I am not planning to run it at very high rpm.

I will run the engine in my 850 using a heavily modified m44 ecu. I'll be controlling the vvt using m44 as well.
Ill post about my modifications when I get around to coding them in.

Bore to piston tolerance is 0.02 mm, as recommended by mahle.
The machine shop said they where quite tight in the bores, until he heated the block to 60 degrees centigrade.
Then the tolerance was a little wider.

Edited December 1, 2017 by venderbroeck

[apeacock]

Excellent, now make more awesome Volvo electronics!

[Commander Riker]

Will definitely be following this one.

[venderbroeck]

Haha, more cool volvo electronics are in the works. Later though..
First the results of today's work. :)

After asking around a bit, I decided to take off at least one piston ring to check the clearance.
Mahle states that the rings have been pre gapped to the correct size so you should be able to install them.
Measuring them, they came up fine for the 350-400 hp range I'm shooting for.

Then came the time to line everything up to prepare for assembly:

I weighed them again, and again 2 of the piston rod assemblies where ~1 gram lighter than the others.
I put them in position 2 and 4.

To install them, the big end bearing caps have to come off, and that turned out to be a bit of a challenge.
After trying to pull them off for a while, to no avail, we had to come up with a different tactic.
In the end I put some cloth over the handle of a hammer and inserted it through the big end.
Then I screwed the big end bolts in leaving them slightly proud of the hole.
After tapping the bolts lightly with a small hammer, the caps came free:
 

You have to make sure you put the caps back on in the same orientation as they came off.
Installing them rotated 180 degrees would be disastrous.
Luckely the serial number is stamped on the same side on both the cap, and the conrod, so that can be used as a marker.

Then we proceeded to install them into the block.
I didn't take any photo's of the process, as we were concentrating on not making any mistakes. Especially the first piston took some trying to get it all right.
In the end the process was as following:
-With the block upright, put the crank at bdc.
-Clean bearing races of the big end very thouroughly
-Use oil to lubricate the piston, the bore, and the piston ring tool. Also wet the piston rings with oil.
-Put piston into tool, and tighten the tool until the piston rings are compressed enough to fit in the bore.
-Make sure the tool is square, and put it on top of the bore.
-Make sure the piston is oriented correctly, with the arrow pointing to the timing belt side of the engine.
-Use wooden handle of a hammer to gently tap the piston into the bore
-Push the piston in far enough so the big end bearing can be installed (rotate crank to make a little more room if required).
-Make sure the bearing races, and the backs of both bearings are spotless.
-insert the bearing shells. Mine where marked at one side, I made sure that the marks of both the bearings where pointing at the timing belt side of the engine.
-lubricate the top bearing shell, and push the conrod into position on the crank, with the crank again at bdc.
-lubricate the bottom bearing shell, and insert it into the bearing cap.
-place the bearing cap on the crank, completing the big end. Make sure it is oriented correctly with respect to the conrod.
-Put some arp assembly grease on both the threads, and the bottom of the head of the arp 2000 bolts.
-Screw the bolts in finger tight.
-In my case (lacking a stretch meter) torque them down to 55 lb/ft, which is 75 nm.

Rinse and repeat.

We managed to get 3 pistons in today, the rest will follow later on:

 

 

Edited December 2, 2017 by venderbroeck

[venderbroeck]

Didn't have a lot of time to work on my engine, but I got some things done.
I fitted the remaining 2 pistons, so the engine now has 5 pistons again! ^^

I also noticed a little valve in VIDA which is located in the sump. It has part no 463963.
It's in the oil filter area, and its function was quite mysterious to me.
After some searching around I found out that it's function is to quickly vent the air from the filter after an oil change. If oil then tries to push through it it has to close up.
If it's worn, or if there's any debris stuck in the valve, it could cause to valve to remain open, and bleed oil back into the pan.
This results in a loss of oil pressure, which is something I defininately don't want.
The advice is to just replace it. It costs about 30 euro.

I decided to take it apart to take a look at how it functions though:

As you can see, you have to drive out the little pin, after which the plunger and the spring will come out.
I inspected the plunger, and the inside of the valve for wear, and it all seemed to be in good condition.
After cleaning everything thoroughly, I put it back together and the plunger seems to move smoothely, without any binding.
I'm feeling confident that it will function just fine.
Just a little bit more info about its operation:
You can't close it by blowing through it, as the spring is keeping it open. It only closes if a fluid flows into the valve with sufficient pressure.
If the spring were to weaken, it wouldn't result in loss of oil pressure, as the valve would only close easier in that case.
If there's debris in your oil, the valve can get stuck open by the debris. Another reason to run good quality oil, and keep an eye on your oil changing frequency.

I also removed the old seals from the tube in the sump, and from the oil pickup:

The two seals on the right came from the tube in the sump,and they were the same shape at some point in time...
The right most one was very loose around the tube, and also quite loose in its seat. I think these may have been responsible for killing this engine.
I can't say for sure, as the bigend bearing was already shot when we bought the car it came from.
One thing is for sure, these must absolutely be replaced at a rebuild, and maybe even earlier, or they can cause loss of oil pressure.

To close off, a shot of the reassembled pan, with the valve installed on the bottom left on top of the oil filter housing:

 

Edited December 6, 2017 by venderbroeck

[gdog]

On 12/1/2017 at 2:40 AM, venderbroeck said:

The polishing was done as follows:

-120 grit flap wheel in a hand held drill (shaft of flap wheel was too thick for dremel)
-150 grit sanding paper for the parts that could not be reached by the flap wheel.
Up until here is by far the most work (several evenings).
then:
-240 grit sanding paper (one more evening of work)
-320 grit wet sanding paper (using water)
-400 grit wet sanding paper (using water)
-600 grit wet sanding paper (using water)
The 3 higher grits where done in one evening.

Wow, should be able to see yourself in that combustion chamber! 

Assume you're getting a valve job after that; anything special there?

 

On 12/1/2017 at 2:40 AM, venderbroeck said:

I will run the engine in my 850 using a heavily modified m44 ecu. I'll be controlling the vvt using m44 as well.
Ill post about my modifications when I get around to coding them in.

Very interested in progress on this front.. please keep us updated.

 

On 12/1/2017 at 2:40 AM, venderbroeck said:

Bore to piston tolerance is 0.02 mm, as recommended by mahle.
The machine shop said they where quite tight in the bores, until he heated the block to 60 degrees centigrade.
Then the tolerance was a little wider.

That's tight (yeah, i know; what someone said..)!  Less than 0.001"  

Were the pistons heated up to 60 degrees with the block too?  I would think the heat expansion ratios between the block and pistons would be similar, no?

Long slow break-in planned, or quick and dirty? 

Looking forward to more progress reports.. 

 

BTW: assume you plasti-gauged the big-end and crank bearing clearances?  What did you see there?

Edited December 13, 2017 by gdog

[venderbroeck]

19 hours ago, gdog said:

Wow, should be able to see yourself in that combustion chamber! 

Assume you're getting a valve job after that; anything special there?

Almost, I would need to use metal polish to accomplish that, but that is going way overboard :p
Right now they are oily / greasy so not quite so shiny.

19 hours ago, gdog said:

Were the pistons heated up to 60 degrees with the block too?  I would think the heat expansion ratios between the block and pistons would be similar, no?

Long slow break-in planned, or quick and dirty? 

Both the pistons and the block where heated. We have good experience with this machinist, so I trust his judgement.

19 hours ago, gdog said:

BTW: assume you plasti-gauged the big-end and crank bearing clearances?  What did you see there?

I used the correctly colored bearings using the markings on the block and the crank. It turned out I needed all yellow bearings which was convenient.
I didn't plasti gauge them though, but volvo's tolerances are generally quite good. 

About the valve job, it's funny that you should ask.
Today I finished the 3 angle valve job on the intake valve seats.

The process went a bit like this:

First I inserted a (slightly oiled) guide pin in the valve guide:

A cutter can then be slid over the guide pin, which centers it on the seat.
Also notice that the cutting bits of this 15 degree cutter are adjusted such that they exactly reach the top edge of the seat.
The other cutters are less critical, but they need to be adjusted so they can reach the surface they need to cut.

This is the resulting 60 degree cut marked with the little blue stripe:

After that came the 45 degree cut (red stripe).
This is the actual contact surface of the valve seat. I put it at 1.5mm at the narrowest point, which is slightly above the minimum spec.

And to finish off the 60 deg cut (little green stripe):

To the right you can still see the original seat vs the newly ground seat on the left.
After this I'll take a good look at the outlet valve seats to see if they need the same treatment.
After everything is done I will lap them in, and check if they are leak free.

As I have solid lifters I might have to adjust valve lash which is tedious with these heads unfortunately.
I'll document my struggles when I get to that as well.

Edited December 13, 2017 by venderbroeck

[gdog]

Cool; DIY valve job!  Are those neway cutters or something else?  Last time I was doing valve work (Hmm; friggin loooong time ago) we used the stones.  You've had good luck with the low speed cutters like this?  I would think the exhaust's would need more refreshing than the intake side.., no?

I used to work on motorcycles (again, long ago) with solid lifters, but they had cam bearing journals which were separate from the valve cover, so it was a much easier job to adjust valve lash; can't believe volvo didn't do that once they went to solid lifters..  don't envy you on that task..

Edited December 14, 2017 by gdog

[venderbroeck]

I believe they are, but I'd have to ask. They are not mine.
This is actually the first time I do this. My dad has done the same thing on his head though (the tools are his), so I have seen it done before.
I like the low speed cutters, as they are quite controllable. These seats are hardened, so I want to remove as little material as possible.
Also because of the solid lifters ofc. 
I expect the exhaust valves will need the same work, but I gotta clean them up first to see.

For the valve lash adjustment I have a little trick up my sleeve which will potentially make things quite a bit easier.
I will share it once I work out the details ofc, and describe the process.

Edited December 14, 2017 by venderbroeck

[Andzey]

What head gasket are you planning, regular or MLS? Will you resurface the head?

When I did cc polishing of my previous version I removed that meat around the spark plug. That was like a trend back in 2010 :) 

[JaredR1]

On 12/12/2017 at 10:39 PM, gdog said:

On 12/1/2017 at 5:40 AM, venderbroeck said:

I will run the engine in my 850 using a heavily modified m44 ecu. I'll be controlling the vvt using m44 as well.
Ill post about my modifications when I get around to coding them in.

Very interested in progress on this front.. please keep us updated.

+1

[Commander Riker]

On 12/13/2017 at 5:24 PM, venderbroeck said:

 

 

 

The stock seat is on the right?  The deepest angle looks uneven.