1995 Montero SR Build

[LaOutbackTrail]

Wow. I've been endlessly inspired buy your truck. I have a 1991 Pajero that needs some suspension work. Bought a set of procomp 9000 to get me by for now and I'm hoping to have the 33 in tires on soon. You had mentioned putting heavy weight springs in the back. Because of the speed at which I browsed this forum, I think I missed some facts. First you mentioned you were going with OME rear coils but then later I saw something about ordering springs from trdparts4u or some thing like that. Were they infact the OME coils that you used to replace the factory springs or a Trd equivalent.

Howdy. Glad to know my rig has been inspirational...

I did indeed buy Old Man Emu (OME) heavy springs. I bought them from a great company who deals with a variety of overlanding parts (ARB products among others). That company is TRDparts4u, give Jacque (aka Coonass on ExPo) a call and he can hook you up with anything ARB supplies. They get frequent shipments so get your order in before the the ship leaves.

I will update my first post with details.

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

I've said this once, and I'll say it many times again....

It was a tight fit, but I got it in there!

 

[off-roader]

Perfect fit. You even have a couple of inches for bigger tires should you elect to go w/out a roof rack...

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

Oh, that's without the roof rack and I was still about three inches from the garage frame... Thought about airing down the tires.... but they'd have needed to go down 5 inches to clear rack.

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

Was a lot easier than I anticipated....

Notice the flat tires??

 

[Clem]

Nice Work!

:Wow1::luxhello:

Glad the extraction went smother than planned. Looking forward to reading about your experience with all the R&R work.

Clem

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

Cleaned the engine bay today...

And pressure washed the truck... going to prep for paint this week too.

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

Well, thank goodness we did some exploratory work on the montero... with the intent of fixing any issues we came across. Wellllll I'm glad that was the intent.:Wow1:

So here is a set of happy cylinders and piston heads.

With obvious signs of oil burning/leaking.

This set of cylinders and piston heads.... not so happy. What you see in the cylinder to the right is the effects of pressurized steam cleaning of the piston head as a small amount of coolant enters the cylinder which is hot from the burning fuel and compression. I still have a lot of cleaning to do but, we need to determine if the aluminium cylinder head needs to be replaced due to warping. I hope not.

And a closer shot...

I still have a long way to go, lots of cleaning.

 

[zukrider]

that head gasket is F*&^ed. good you caught it. a new set of head gaskets should be just fine. warpage usually only comes from actual over heating. to the point that the front cover bolt holes are warped.

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

that head gasket is F*&^ed. good you caught it. a new set of head gaskets should be just fine. warpage usually only comes from actual over heating. to the point that the front cover bolt holes are warped.

Yeah. So my mechanic friend (who practically disassembled the engine in my garage for me), his dad think the injector on that side may be a problem.... causing the clean piston head. I'm going to have the injectors cleaned. just in case.

I already have a japanese head gasket kit as we anticipated pulling the heads.

I've learned a lot in this process and can't thank my friend enough for helping me! As surely I would never worked on the truck by myself and the head gasket would have blown completely.

 

[Clem]

How many miles on your rig? Any warning signs?

Glad you caught it!:Wow1:

Clem

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

The truck had 115k when I bought it and it just turned 122k.

Yeah, thinking in retrospect, I do recall a few warning signs...
-When I bought the truck, the owner recently replaced a cracked radiator...
-Once when offroading it in July, It began to overheat, so I blasted the heater with windows down and got off the trail as quickly as possible...
-It began puffing light colored smoke while just off of idle and when driving around town (more than just the valve seal smoke)....
-A few weeks ago when backing my loaded trailer up the hill, it began belching light gray smoke practically filling the yard. But engine temp was fine...

 

[theicecreampeople]

get that thing done .....we leave for PINS friday ,,,,

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

I'll have to venture a guess that I'll probably MISS the PINS trip....

 

[LaOutbackTrail]

Btw, I was able to buy a new intake plenum second hand... when we removed the plenum, you could shake it and hear the butterflies rattling around!!!:Wow1: I'm going to try to take a vid so you can see/hear them.