The 396-6.2 swap project

[randyscycle]

I'm thinking the cam did break and sowed its remains into the bottom end. The rockers all askew were probably from when the valves and pistons contacted

My bet/guess/conjecture is that the timing chain gave up the ghost and started the whole chain of events.

[Barrman]

This thread should be sub titled "Money and time wasting snow ball repair effort."

The welding teacher stole the camera back and I don't have any pictures today. Here is where things are:

The 396 is fully apart and all the parts are clean. I will take them home and start trying to sell them to pay for this swap. The crank looks great except for the #3/4 rod journal. Just a bit of a groove between the rods. All the bearings were shiny at spots. Rods and mains. I never had less than 35 psi oil pressure at idle and never dry started it. Yet, it was not a happy engine inside.

My theory is the machine shop. I had the crank turned, cylinders bored and all new valves put in. Those of you at the 2006 FE in WITC remember how I couldn't climb a hill worth a darn because the engine kept bogging down. I found all the valve guides were so bad I could wiggle the valves around just by putting my hand on them. The shop redid the heads in 2006. They said the guy that did all my work was fired between the initial work and the rework. I have a feeling what he turned my crank too and the bearings they gave me were not the same size. I didn't do a plastigauge because I trusted them. Live and learn.

I picked up a 6.2 from Warthog in July 2011. It was in the military shipping can condition not known. It did turn by hand and it has been sitting at my place waiting for me to put a starter to it. There are no brackets for mounting stuff on the front.

Sermis came across a M1009 pull out engine with all the alternators, power steering pump and starter. The engine was locked up though and the oil pan plug gone. The story was the engine "ran when parked." Did it get drained before they parked it or after they parked it? I figured between the two engines I could probably get a complete set up.

I removed the HMMWV oil filter 90° elbow and put in a standard 6.2 oil filter, screwed hose barbs into the oil line fittings to loop a hose between them for test firing and added oil to the 6.2C (can) engine.

We pulled the glow plugs from the 6.2L (locked) engine, poured transmission fluid down the holes, let it sit a weekend and then I gave my biggest student a large pry bar to start making that engine turn over. A week later and a regular screw driver on the flywheel could turn the engine. There was 1 spot that was tough, but the rest felt ok.

With a mechanical oil psi gauge on the 6.2C engine, the glow plugs pulled and the 6.2L starter installed after an exhaust manifold swap. (Just so you know, a direct drive 6.2 starter will not fit with a stock HMMWV exhaust manifold.) We did a compression check on the 6.2C engine. 300-315 psi on all 8. I would count to 5 as I cranked and kept watching the oil psi gauge. I never cranked longer and the gauge never moved.

I pulled the mechanical tach drive and tried turning the oil pump with an air ratchet. Nothing. We pulled the filter and it was dry. I figured the oil pump was bad and told the students to pull the pan. Of course, we had to get the 6.2C engine on the engine stand to pull the pan which meant the 6.2L engine had to be off the stand. Which was good because the 6.2L engine needed to be in the engine cradle so we could try starting it.

An hour of engine swapping along with the starter and exhaust manifold swap over again. Plus the oil psi gauge and the oil cooler line bypass and we could test out the 6.2L. I pulled the vacuum pump and tried getting oil psi from the ratchet. 60 psi. Cool.

We put power to the starter and the engine spun over pretty good. There was a pretty loud knocking sound about once per revolution and the oil psi was at 60 psi. The knocking had me bumbed until I notice the starter Bendix was stuck on the flywheel. I brought in some shims and with two of them, the engine turns fast with no noises. The starter nose has no markings or DO NO SHIM written anywhere. It needed some room.

We did a compression check yesterday and it wasn't good. 150, 0, 40, 60, 20, 80, 150, 160. Even the good ones are bad and the bad ones are terrible. However, I suspect the harbor freight diesel compression gauge which is the only thing I can find for less than $300 that will fit the 6.2 might be part if not all of the problem. The one that read 0 blows my finger off when I try to hold it over the glow plug hole. I guess it was a single engine compression gauge set.


I figured the best way to really see about 6.2L was to fire it up. I am using a 24V starter and to keep it simple figured to install the 24V IP cover from the 6.2C engine. That got done this morning. I rigged up a fuel filter and ran supply and return lines to a Gerry can full of diesel. With the glow plugs out, 24V to the IP and the engine turning I now have fuel at all injectors. We have no class this afternoon or tomorrow. I will put the 24V glow plugs in it and try to fire the thing up Friday.

Meanwhile, 6.2C has the pan pulled and everything looks great inside. That is when I looked at the oil filter mount and the filter I put on there. By pulling the elbow and putting a stock 6.2 filter on there. I blocked off the ports. The elbow got put back on and the pan will go back on Friday. If I can remember to bring in some oil, we should see if I screwed that one up myself. Of course, if it does have psi, then we get to put it back in the cradle and test fire it. After swapping all the stuff back over again. If I go with the 6.2C engine, we will have to pull the pan again anyway.

It turns out the oil pan is different between what goes in a M1009 and a HMMWV. The HMMWV pan will not clear the front axle.

That is the engine saga so far. We have removed all the OBA lines, wiring and tanks from the M715.

The day I first found the 396 not starting I was bringing it into work so we could check out the brakes. I had a lower pedal and was hearing metal to metal from the front. Since the truck was finally here, it was a good time to put in new shoes. Only I couldn't find my spare set of good shoes! I have been digging through all my piles of parts and was convinced I either threw them away or gave them to somebody. I found them Sunday while digging out all my old 396 stock parts so I can sell them in one big bunch. Why I had 715 brakes in the tote for the 396 is something I can't answer.

We started with the passenger front brakes. The old shoes looked pretty darn good but we pulled them off anyway. The backing plate got cleaned up and I was trying to show my students how the pistons move when I couldn't make them move. Yet, both were frozen solid. Now I know why those pads looked so good. They hadn't been doing any work!

We got that wheel cylinder off and apart yesterday. The brown goo was everywhere. When I swapped over to BFS in 2009, I just flushed with alcohol and everything felt good. Guess the DOT 3 got some rust started and I should have taken it all apart. Now I get to.

I was convinced I wanted to go 12/24 like the CUCV's since I had a complete engine wiring harness with 6.2L. The power in stud on ALT 2 is stripped and turns free though. But, a rebuild is easy and I can keep my gauges, the good starter and still play with the other trucks when it comes to slave starting. As I keep telling Jennifer when she asked how the engine swap is going. "Nothing money can't fix."

[randyscycle]

Sounds like you are right on schedule and everything is going according to plan!

Any project like that usually ends up taking about twice as long, and costing twice as much as you initially figure. That's why we don't give estimates anymore for restorations, until the bike is here and has been gone over with a fine tooth comb. Inevitably, the same factors come into play on a customer job as you've already experienced, and because of it, I've just pretty much resigned myself to doing total and complete restorations, rather than any partials anymore. Its actually easier to do everything, rather than some of it.

I know that doesn't make your project any easier or cheaper, but I feel your pain......

[Barrman]

Thanks Randy. However, I wasn't trying to complain. I am having fun working on the truck, my students are eager to get to class and work on some part of the project and I really don't have a time line. Sure, I would like to have it on the road. But, besides wanting it for an airshow in May, I really don't care when it gets done. Even missing the air show isn't a big deal. It didn't make it this year.

[Barrman]

Well, I am a self destructing idiot. We got the pan back on the 6.2C engine, the proper oil filter elbow and just turning the pump over by hand had oil flying out the oil cooler fitting. That engine probably is all the way good. Unless, I turned a bearing doing compression checks with no oil psi.

We put fuel to the 6.2L engine and tried to start it this morning with the 24V glow plugs in. It wouldn't turn over fast enough at full compression. I imagine at least 1 cylinder has some rust in it that was the cause of the lock up and is the cause of the slow turning.

We will swap them around between the can base and engine stand again next week and swap everything needed to make one run over as well. Next week should give me a running engine. I hope.

[Flingarrows]

Keep the updates coming Tim

[Barrman]

Well, I got the 396 parts home last week and then had a student go snatch the camera back today. 396 pictues are at home now. I was camping all weekend with my Scouts, so no time to get them loaded up.

Here is the 6.2C engine on the engine stand with the big HMMWV oil pan that might or might not clear the front axle:


This is the 6.2L engine sitting in the shipping can base ready to fire up, but not turning over fast enough. We are going to play musical engines this afternoon and put the Can engine back in the can:



That is about all I have for today until we get them all swapped around again.

[Barrman]

We got everything swapped around and cranked the starter to 120° trying to get fuel to the injectors. That was how far we got Tuesday. I was out yesterday taking Jennifer to the doctor. I figured glow plugs would probably help, so I made up a wiring harness to fit the 24V HMMWV plugs. It took about 15 seconds, but it made a puff of black smoke instead of the steady blue while cranking. It even burped a bit.

Once I turned on the fans and opened the doors, we got it to fire this morning. The smoke cleared up in about 2 seconds, the engine idled great, had no visible blow by, 40-60 psi oil pressure and no weird noises. I let it run for 2 minutes and shut it down.

By the time I trained a student on how to work the video camera and let the engine sit for 10 mintues, it wouldn't start again. We kept trying and the starter got hot again.

I decided to test the glow plugs. 1 of the 8 was working. Maybe that is why it got pulled from the HMMWV? I tested the 12V plugs on the 6.2L engine and found 6 that work on 24V. 2.5 seconds from dead cold to red hot!

I must have smoked at least 4 of the 24V glow plugs because they had swollen and were hard to remove. We put them in Tuesday with ease. One is still stuck in there. I don't have the puller and don't want to buy one. What to do?

"Everybody stand over on this side of the room and we will start it up to blow that one out." New ends on the made this morning glow plug harness and we had working glow plugs again. I figured to fire it up, let it warm up some with the swollen plug tight. Then, turn it off, loosen that plug and then fire up to see if it would shoot out.

It fired up like my driving 6.2 engines with 2 seconds of glow plug time. I was reaching to turn it off at the 2 minute mark when it got rough, bleched black smoke and died. One of my students had pulled the fuel line out of the Gerry can!. We got the starter hot trying to prime the system again. Maybe tomorrow I will get a video of it running and get the glow plug out.

Looks like I have an engine now. Just need to start buying all the other stuff needed to make it work.

Oh, we got the passenger side front wheel cylinder rebuilt, back on and bled. One of my students broke off the little bitty hard line on the drivers side cylinder as we were pulling it off to clean all the crud out of it. I think I have another of those little lines at home. I hope.

[randyscycle]

Tim, do yourself and your starter and battery and other stuff a favor and pick up a cheap electric fuel pump from the parts store. Feed that 6.2 with it, turn on the fuel solenoid for a bit and crack all the injector lines at the injectors. I keep one around the shop for just such things.

It also makes things a lot easier if you do run out of fuel, or are starting a dry system. When I do my 6.2 in my truck, I plan on using an electric pump instead of the mechanical for that reason alone.

[Flingarrows]

I must have smoked at least 4 of the 24V glow plugs because they had swollen and were hard to remove. We put them in Tuesday with ease. One is still stuck in there. I don't have the puller and don't want to buy one. What to do?

I used a bunch of 60G's that swelled in every cylinder. I bought a pair of angled forceps, then grabbed the glow plug tip in the pre-cup (with the injector out). Then I wiggled/snapped glow plugs off with pliers. I was able to pulled them out of the pre-cup, and hit it with a blast of compressed air through the injector hole to clear any debris.

Not the best or easy situation, but by the 3rd one, I could get them out in under 5 minutes each.

I am using wellmans now, and am keeping my manual preheat to a minimum. I hope I don't have to do that again, but it worked pretty well.