stevealien

iTrader: (1)

well im a dick
didnt check the oil on my mitsi l200 daily driver for months
drivin it lastnight,when all of a sudden its starts knockin like fuck.
quickly pulled over and checked oil level,nothing registered on dipstick although no oil light came on.
so i got some oil brought to me,put in 4 litrs and tried to fire it.
it runs but sounds like a hammer in a bucket.
so im assuming ive done the big ends in??
anyone ever done them?

can i do them with the engine still in place?
my mate seems to think i can leave the crank in situ and slide in new shells if it hasnt damaged the crank.

dunno wether to just buy a new lump or go for the rebuild
either way,xmas is soooooo cancelled cos my rs is blown up tooo
sooooooooooooo fucked off right now

answers from people who genuinely know please not people tellin me its fucked.

sorry if i sound ratty,but i am,gutted by this.

first_cosworth

They are known to do this even without running low on oil,so a used engine is as usual a gamble,but the price is high for a known good one,so is the price for a rebuild!

Maybe you drove into some flood water and fecked the engine that way !

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

how does sayin i drove into flood water help my situation mate???

rsfido_1989

Not knowing 100% about this but seen before on net, could you pick up a 2nd hand lump. (Even a spare truck to break) My worries would be further damage on bores with lack of oil. My rs dropped a bearing then the rod and crank parted company. The crank was gouged and rod was too. Im no mecanic but good luck buddy. Defo not needed before xmas!

3FRD

iTrader: (2)

Insurance

My advice would be to check or oil lol

saph4be

Since when do insurance pay for engine repairs and it most ceartainly damaged the crank!

RS Grant

iTrader: (1)

Been a lot of crap weather recently, localised flooding in places too I heard.

FWIW, if you decide to shell out (pun intended ) for the repair yourself... I'd go for the rebuild, since you'll know it's been done correctly because as someone above mentioned, these aren't unknown to blow anyway so buying a replacement would be too much of a gamble for me to take TBH.


Cheers,
Grant

RS Grant

iTrader: (1)

Surely it'd be classed as an accident and therefore able to claim??


Cheers,
Grant

first_cosworth

Yup.

Might write it off though.

tee-rex

One of the boys at work did a set of shells on a l200 few weeks ago, engine stays in place but i can't remember if he jacked the engine up or dropped the crossmember down, IIRC the sump pan won't come out without doing one or another.
I know it had spun a big end shell on no3 and with some minor polishing the crank was o.k. i think its a minefield trying to find a good engine for these.

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

car only ran for a max of 2 minutes knocking.
would this be long enough to fuck the crank?
knowing my luck,yep

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

so was the crank polished in place??

tee-rex

Yes m8 it was, there were 2 very small marks left in it not ideal but only a regrind would take them away and the customers budget was really tight (new baby and redundancy) we changed the oil on it last wednesday as it has done about 600 miles and they oil was very clean with no metalic tint so hopefully it be ok for them.

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

so what did you use to polish the crank?
and did you replace all the shells or just the damaged ones??
cheers m8

tee-rex

polished the crank with strips of 800 wet or dry then 1200 grade, we changed all the big end shells took a couple of main caps off to inspect and they were ok.
so all the parts they had to buy were a set of big end shells and a sump gasket, their engine just started knocking on the overun and they ignored it for a month or so and spun a shell on a cold start up engine had done 145k 03 plate warrior. TBH mate you might aswell pull the sump off it might not be as bad as you think, or if you are gonna get a local garage to do it you should be looking at about 8 hrs labour + parts.

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

appreciate the advise here
gonna take it apart prob tomorrow and see whats what

xr2wishy

iTrader: (2)

take engine out and get to the crank properly, you may just need a set of shells, but may as well get crank out for regrind for peace of mind IMO.

YOREVOL

are you sure its the big ends? did it quieten down with the oil top up?

Lambchop

iTrader: (1)

4 litres?! Holy shit! What's the capacity?

dug112y

iTrader: (1)

take the engine out IMO. you cant polish a crank properly in place.if it has done a shell/big end there will be bits all through the oil system and if you try and build it in place and miss that it will wreck your newly rebuilt engine.plus there could be other damage ,cam etc

DO IT ONCE ,DO IT RIGHT.

saph4be

Not to mention of it has spun a shell it could off ovaled the con rod too!

langer

iTrader: (1)

Having a garage of my own we regulary get cars in which the insurance pays for engine work especially seized one etc

stevieturbo

if it's making that much noise, it's fucked. Plain and simple.

And regardless of what the crank looks like. If a bearing has spun in the rod, the rod MUST be replaced. If you simply throw in a new bearing, it will fail again within a very short period of time no matter how ok the crank journal looks.

And chances are the noise you hear isnt just the lack of bearing. Often it's the piston hitting the cylinder head because there is no bearing anymore.

before you spend any money, find out if bearings are even available. Manufacturers like Mitsi can be wankers and sell bearings with no indication of size. Just a colour which means fuck all to any normal person.

Although if failure is common, a short motor might not be as expensive as you think.

botters

iTrader: (2)

ive polished a few cranks in situ and just thrown shells in and never had on fail again after tho ive never done it on one that has actually spun a shell, just ones were the shell has worn

stevieturbo

Once it has spun, it's fucked.

The crank journal can and may still be fine to use. But the rod itself is damaged. Often you cant even see any damage. But you should be able to see if the bearing has spun.

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

Well I've taken it apart today.
Here's how the bearings look on 2&3.





Crank looks fine to me.
Is there a chance I've been lucky ?
And are these shells likely to be what's causing the knocking ?

dug112y

iTrader: (1)

Obviously there fucked but not to the point of a severe knock. What's number 4 like... And 1 I guess. 4 is furthest away from pump so I'd expect that to be wrecked.drop the middle and next along main and see what there like. Is there no scores at all on crank??

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

4 has some line scoring in the bearing but journal looks ok,and 1 is the mintest of all.
havent looked at mains,didnt know wether to or not.
thought the big end shells would be ruined to get to the mains??
crank looks pretty mint,theres a few lines on a couple of journals but you cant feel em with your nail and they seem smooth as ever.

stevieturbo

Did any of the rods feel loose on the crank before you took it apart ?

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

i wiggled everything and nothing felt loose.
would there be blatent play then to cause knocking?
whats sort of tolerance are we talking about to cause knocking??
1 thou?10 thou?

1.9 xr2 on 40's

ive had knocking cvh's and they didnt have as much damage on the shells as that but then cvh cranks seem to mark up really fast so the cranks i removed were always toast

if everythign looks good i think i would be very tempted to chuck a new set of anything thats busted (gotta check mains really huh) and see what happens

a squick scan of ebay shows Ł40 for a set of big end and i would change the pump too, most of my cvh's have been killed because of the pump, i even had a brand new built cvh only thing left un renewed was the block crank and oil pump and yup the oil pump killed it (guy who built it was pissed off so i bought it from him lol)

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

Thanks for all the helP so far guys. Much appreciated.

Big ends are in.

I've taken the cambelt cover off to find that the balance shaft belt has snapped.
I believe the l200 is prone to this happening. The belt snaps and gets caught in the cambelt and makes it slip teeth.
Cambelt feels very slack , and could well have slipped teeth at the tension it's at.
I've been told not to put another balance shaft belt on as it's not needed on the l200 anyway and runs fine without it. Anyone else done this ?

And I'm guessing my knocking is my pistons hitting my valves through timing belt slipping ?

Don't know wether to retime it up and fire it up and see or take head off and check valves.

saph4be

re time it up and turn it over by hand if it feels fine then start it!

stevieturbo

If there are bent valves, you'll be able to feel this very easily turning the engine over by hand as there will be no compression on that cylinder

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

So should I take a glow plug out and feel the compression on each cylinder ?

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

Update


I discovered the timing had slipped 4 teeth.
Put new belt kit and tensioner on , retimed it properly, all new aux belts ,new big ends , full service, then came the scary moment of turning the key.

She runs sweet as a nut.
Guess I've been lucky I didn't ruin the valves or pistons.
Over the moon , cos I expected the worst.
Cost me Ł350 in parts and did the labour myself.
Saved myself a fair few squid.

Thanks for all your help guys

LHD220Turbo

iTrader: (4)

nice one, could have been alot worse

tee-rex

Oil and filter change in a couple of hundred miles and hopefully it will run for years

stevealien

iTrader: (1)

That's the plan bud.
Thanks again for helping