A Cheap and Cheerful Build - Geoff

[coffeegoat]

Cont -

Pull the power steering pump. There are two bolts hidden behind the pulley, rotate the pulley until you can fit the socket through and onto the bolts. There is another bolt to the rear of the pump. Tie it up of of the way.


Pull the AC compressor, it's a huge pain with several bolts in hard to reach places, good luck….


Get that AC Compressor out of the way


(Note I rearranged steps into a better order, don't mind the magically reappearing AC Compressor&#8230
Remove the large aluminum casting from the front of the engine with the fan belt idler.

Pull all the plastic timing belt covers from the front of the engine. Be careful with that little dangly wire, it's attached to the crankshaft sensor and is both important and expensive.

Pull the harmonic balancer bolt, it's another pain in the butt. I tried my impact driver and no dice, eventually I used a breaker bar on my fan belt wrench and pinned it against the side of the engine bay and used a four foot breaker bar to break it free.


Disconnect the alternator.


Remove the timing sensor wire, and the last timing belt cover. Mark up the timing belt assembly with your paint pen. Label all the timing marks, rotate the assembly counterclockwise until the marks are all lined up. Spend 15 minutes reading the instructions in the FSM regarding the timing set up. Stare at the assembly for 10 minutes, read some forum posts on timing, rinse and repeat. This may take two or three cycles till you get it, don't rush this step or you'll be one of the many that buggers up their timing and shows up in the forum asking if they ruined their valves. Best case scenario scenario you'll just get to repeat this breakdown to do it right next time...


Loosen the tensioner pulley carefully, and pull the timing belt.


Remove the water pump assembly, this will be quite a large flood of coolant, be prepared for a mess.


Carefully separate the timing gear and sensor plate. This is an expensive component and quite a tight fit.
Judging by the application of rtv sealant it looks like my oil pan was pulled at some point.


At this point if all you're doing is the timing belt/water pump you're all the way there. Start cleaning crap up and replacing seals etc.

I would definitely consider cleaning the hydraulic lifters (it's only about another hour of work) and potentially even the valve stem seals using the rope method. After you finish those, start the rebuild process. If you're heading to a full head gasket continue onwards.

 

[coffeegoat]

Cont -

Remove the cam shaft gears, I used a strap wrench and my impact wrench, it worked much easier than with a ratchet.


Looking good, almost there, probably 3-4 hours in now, reading the manual and taking pictures is slowing me down a bit.

OK, go ahead and spray the exhaust manifold bolts in penetrant. Get the manifold cover, head bolts, and don't forget the downstream connection to the catalytic convertors.

Afterwards, go ahead and drain the engine oil, and grab a beer, you're going to want to wait for a bit before you tackle those bolts.


Do both side, have another beer you've earned it. - Seriously, don't rush this….


OK after you've sobered up a bit, unbolt the exhaust manifold. I used my compact impact wrench with a wobble adapter and a few extensions. If I'm honest I'm not sure I could have gotten it without it. If you don't have an impact wrench I might coat the nuts with penetrant and then leave it alone overnight.


Pull the valve covers, in my case someone replaced the passenger valve cover gasket and didn't bother with the spark plug seals. It may be difficult to pop the cover free. Just take your time with a putty knife being careful to not damage the sealing surface. Whoever did mine last time put a nice gouge in it, jerk...


Unbolt the heads - unbolt all the miscellaneous crap attached to the back of them. Lift them out and set them on a nice clean bench covered with paper towels - they're going to hemorrhage oil like crazy. BTW- they're really heavy, I'd figure 35-45 lbs and awkward, be careful you don't injure your back. One -


Two -


What's left of the engine, that's a suprisingly clean block.


The annoying cross-over pipe on the back of the engine (at least it wasn't leaking)

 

[coffeegoat]

Cont -

Let's explore a bit - apparently these guys weren't running Iridium plugs...


Yep, those are shot


Alrighty, get a nice big table ready and start unbolting the rocker arms, get everything nicely laid out on a clean table. Get yourself some dixie cups to hold all the different parts (label them appropriately). There really isn't anything special about these bolts, just take your time and be careful to keep track of everything.




But wait - How did you get those valves off?

Unfortunately it was a bit complicated - I started off with a conventional valve spring compressor from harbor freight like the one below, it didn't work. The problem with this variety is they don't really grab the springs well, they slip off and don't fit well with the spark plug tubes. I got 2 valves taken apart in 2 hours and gave up.


The next tool I tried was one of those fancy Lisle 36200, it worked OK for removing the valve keepers but in the tool finish was terrible and it broke trying to install valve keepers. It just didn't work well enough for the cost of a uni-tasker tool for valve removal and it flat out failed during reinstallation. It's entirely possible I just suck at using it, but nonetheless I decided to do something else.


Finally, I decided, that really, all that needs to happen is to depress the valve and get the keepers out. And ideally whatever I used could hold things in place while I either removed the keepers or installed them - the lisle tool and some of the lever style tools don't allow for this you have to get it right the first time. What I came up with was the tool below, it's just a quick clamp with a couple of pieces PVC pipe attached - one end pushes on the bottom of the valve and the other is a notched piece which pushes on the valve retainer.


When you use the tool it looks like this on the valve:


This is how it looks on the actual head it worked really well, I haven't figured out to make it work with the heads on the truck, but seriously for a dollar worth of PVC it worked brilliantly. The best part is that unlike a C-Clamp (or G-Clamp for you Aussies) the tool doesn't rotate while still maintaining holding force without you doing anything (not I'm not holding it in the picture). This gives you time to faff about trying to get the retainers correctly seated.


Pull the valve stem seals, I didn't get a good picture, sorry. I just used channel locks (offset pliers) and carefully wiggled them out. It worked really well. One tricky aspect after you've pulled them is which valve seals go where. The OEM ones are different colors on the exhaust vs intake, the green ones go on the exhaust. It's hard to see on the pictures, it's hard to see in real life too..

 

[coffeegoat]

Cont -
Once everything is apart it's time to clean, and when I say it's time to clean, this is basically a full six pack. It took me roughly 2-2.5 hrs per head to clean everything. My basic operation was to soak everything in hot water and dishwashing soap for roughly 2 hours (not counted in the overall time) then scrub it with a scotchbrite pad, then hot water rinse, then a brake fluid cleaner rinse (mostly for drying purposes.) Dry stuff out with compressed air.

For the really nasty stuff a brake cleaner rinse first (before soaking) helped, I also have a dolly mounted tankless hot water heater connected to a garden hose that made a huge difference with how easy it was to get stuff clean. Blow out any small oil channels with brake cleaner and compressed air.


After cleaning, lay everything out on a table, looks pretty huh?


The valves even look pretty good, I decided I should lap them anyways, because, well I was already in there. Note - the exhaust valves have this little groove around the stem where it transitions to the expanded section, it was full of crap on all mine (before the cleaning) and it looks like erosion damage, it's not - the new ones have the groove too.


Grease the valves up with assembly grease and put lapping compound on the lip of the valve


Then use the little lapping tool (spin it between your hands like you're starting a fire)

Get tired of doing it by hand and attach the suction cup to a drill - don't forget you have 24 of these to do…


Get everything cleaned up after lapping the valves, be sure to clean all the grease up and especially the lapping compound.


Go ahead and place the valve seals, lube them up with grease and then press them on by hand with a socket. When they're fully seated they look like they're up from the base by about ⅛”.


There is a few really good tutorials out there (this one is my favorite). The basics are pretty simple though - get a pin type doohicky, I used a key from a bathroom door, and a bucket of cleaning fluid.


Submerse the lifter into the cleaning fluid, I used methanol because I had it around, and pump like crazy. A whole bunch of crap comes out, and eventually it will pump smoothly and no more crap will come out, it might take a while. After you've cleaned them you'll need to make sure they're full of a lubricant, diesel works fine as both a cleaner and a lubricant but if you use something else flush them out with motor oil. They should be very stiff and not depress at all (without the key), if they don't hold pressure they need to be replaced. One of mine had a broken retaining ring and needed to be replaced.


My replacement has a slightly different design. Weird, but it apparently works fine.

 

[coffeegoat]

Go ahead and reassemble everything, I used assembly lube on everything it worked nicely both to lube stuff up and it helps stick stuff together. I used the same valve compression tool to reinstall everything - it worked great. Note the non-symmetric aspect of the rockers, they won't fit the wrong way so you'll figure it out. Also, be sure that you orient the rocker axle with the oil ports correctly and tighten the bolts down evenly or you can bend the shaft


In the case of the 2001 one of the rear cam seals is actually not an o-ring, it's a gasket maker type gasket. I picked up some fancy “ultra copper” RTV sealant and it worked pretty well. Just follow the instructions on the tube.


Post installation before trimming:


Fully cleaned and assembled - Hot diggity time to reassemble right?


Just kidding! Both exhaust manifolds are cracked, so in my case they need to go to a muffler shot to get welded up.


Cracked manifolds (both of them)


Post welding:




More more irritation, my engine overhaul gasket kit did not include the exhaust manifold to catalytic converter gasket and I couldn't locate the correct ones. These Fel-Pro units were the closest I found and then trimmed them to fit.


Post install - note how the inner seal lines up but the bolts don't. Apparently I forgot to take a picture, but I used anti-seize on all the high temperature bolts, it makes a huge difference in actually being able to remove the bolts later. Bolt friction should not actually help the bolts stay on, so lubrication (like anti-seize) can make a huge difference in assembly and disassembly.

 

[coffeegoat]

Cont -

Removing the front main seal: There were several approaches I found for removing the front main seal, the tricky part is that it's a metal reinforced seal so it's pretty difficult to actually remove. Most approaches risk scoring/gouging the housing or the shaft, so I went with this approach to avoid that. Basically you install a sheet metal screw (has to be self drilling for this to work) and then pry the seal out. It should come pretty easy, it worked pretty slip but it was a bit nerve racking.


Reinstalling the front main seal is pretty easy, grease it up and carefully push it into place. I found a piece of PVC pipe worked really well for this.


Alrighty - let's start reassembling! Go ahead and clean everything as well as you can, I didn't pull the anti-knock sensor or polish anything, just simple green, paper towels, etc. You'll want to wipe down the inside of the cylinders with oil (I used assembly grease for this) and then loosely instal the exhaust manifolds. Finally, put your head gaskets in place, they only fit one way.


Attach the exhaust manifold gaskets to the heads, again they only go on one way so take your time and figure out the orientation. Anti-seize the exhaust manifold bolts and find you lifting belt.


Ok, lifting the heads into place is challenging, you need to very carefully align the exhaust manifold bolts, the head alignment pins and the head gasket. Any one of these items can pretty easily derail the process. I actually crawled into the engine and stood on the engine mount and axle to lower them into place. The heads are not light and leaning over the fender to try and place them is a huge hassle and could easily hurt you or damage the new head gaskets. Bolting on the exhaust manifolds is one of the single worst tasks in this project - seriously - after I finished them I had to call it a night and have a couple beers.. (don't forget the catalytic converter connection)


Anti-seize up the sparkplug threads and hit the ceramic section with a bit of dielectric grease to avoid corrosion.


Install the spark plug gaskets and valve cover gasket. I went ahead and poured a quart of motor oil over the valve train assembly since I need to add several quarts anyways and I figured this way I'd have a nice coating over the entire thing.


Install the water pump, be careful as you line up the gasket but it isn't a big deal.


Now we're talking - start hooking up all kinds of goodies. The lowest inlet manifold casting, the timing belt crankshaft gears and camshaft gears. Word of warning, I was missing some water pump gaskets from my “Engine Overhaul Gasket Kit,” I checked around and couldn't find them so I ended up using gasket maker. One issue I also noted is that I should have replaced the fuel injector gaskets, mine looked fine, but I didn't realize they could/should be replaced until after everything was back together. You'll also see the coolant pipe attached, and behind it is the cross-over pipe. Turns out the installation of these items is a huge pain, it's right up there with the exhaust manifold - again - relax, have a beer….


The timing belt installation has been beaten to death elsewhere but a few tips that I found helped out. First off, figure it's going to take 3 hours, it probably won't, but it helps sets the stage so you don't get frustrated. Putting the fan belt on is simple, putting the timing belt on is not. First thing, get good lighting, I used a trouble light hung down behind the condenser. Second thing, mark the timing belt indicators with bright paint, it makes a bit difference. Third thing, get some cheap strap wrenches from harbor freight, it allows you to easily make adjustments. Finally, it's been said before, use OEM parts for this, it's too much work to do again and worst case you could break stuff.

My process was pretty simple, set the timing marks correctly, this is easy on the crank, it's a hassle on the camshaft. They want to rotate one way or the other - my approach was to fiddle with them, eventually I got them lined up. Once they're lined up and you have the belt setup it's time to set the initial tension - the two pins on the tensioner pulley. The amount of required tension is really low, the torque on those two pins is only like 4.5 n*m, which is just a 3.5 in”lbs. After tightening the tensioner pulley the tensioner lock pin should slide out easily.

 

[coffeegoat]

Cont -

Keep going - attach stuff like crazy, I bet you're happy you labeled the wires now… The front casting goes on pretty easy, the alternator and steering pump go on pretty easily, the compressor is a bit of a bear, but oh well. In retrospect I think I should have cleaned and lubed the bearings on the fan belt idlers, oh well..


Attach the crank bolt and torque it correctly, I had to go out and buy a new torque wrench to actually hit the right value, it's pretty hefty. I used a universal fan pully wrench to hold onto the harmonic balancer (GearWrench 3900 Universal Pulley Holder) it worked really nicely. Also get middle section of the intake manifold installed don't forget to get the EGR hooked up - this is another item I used high temperature anti-seize on, it makes it much easier to get it to seal up.


Reattach the final chunk of the intake manifold, now would be a good time to make sure your throttle body is nice and clean if you haven't already. This is another place where you “don't have to” swap your EGR valve for a new one, but you probably should. There were a few other gaskets in this spot that weren't included in my “engine overhaul kit,” I picked up a fel-pro kit for the remaining intake manifold sections, they looked exactly like the OEM ones.


Reattach the fan belt, it should go on easily, no bit excitement here unlike the timing belt. If you haven't already connected up your spark plugs to the coils, you should get that taken care of now.


Actually bolt the fan into place, it just needs to be on there loosely to attach the fan belt.


Get the radiator installed as well as the hoses, move on to the airbox and air intake, almost done!


Battery in, fill the radiator, and we're done!


A few closing thoughts, the first time you start it up it's going to smoke a bit as the anti-seize sets and give it plenty of time to warm up gently, you'll need to top off the radiator as it flushes air out of the system. The very first time it starts up mine was a little noisy as it was getting oil distributed through all the rockers, cylinders, tappets, etc, after about 5 minutes it quieted down nicely, and since then has been way quieter than it ever was before. Also, I originally had a minor oil leak, I tracked it down to a single bolt that had not been properly torqued on the front of the engine.

If you take your time and work carefully, you'll get there, this was my first deep dive into a modern engine and it took me about 5 weeks of work on/off depending on my schedule, lots of secondary trips to the parts store, waiting for OEM parts, and reading forum posts along to way to get there.

I think from an hours perspective, it was probably ~20 hours for a first time job (lots of breaks in between) and if I were to do it again, I wouldn't be surprised if I could cut it in half. You might think that once you're into the water pump you're really close to doing a valve job, but, with all the cleaning, required you're probably only half way there. Doing the valve seals (rope or air compressor method) and cleaning the hydraulic lifters is a really quick/easy add-on to the timing belt/water pump job, but as soon as you think about pulling the heads you're in for a long long road.

Let me know if there are any questions, I'd be happy to add/fix anything in the guide, cheers

 

[coffeegoat]

Oh - at this point the running budget total:

Purchase - $3750
Engine Refresh - $1470
Tires - $850
Shocks/Struts - $405
Battery - $180
Brakes - $235

So running total - $6890, which means I still have over $1k left in my challenge to build a completely refreshed Monty for half the cost of a used (off the lot) GX-470, it's looking pretty good.

 

[EyeInTheSky]

This is excellent. Your time estimations are making me think I might finance my mechanic's kids' college careers....but the detail you put into this is swaying me back toward doing it myself. Great write up coffeegoat.

 

[jlocster]

Nice detailed write up coffeegoat! May you enjoy many trouble free miles!

 

[coffeegoat]

EyeInTheSky - I wouldn't worry too much about the time estimations. If I were to do it again, I wouldn't pull the heads, that would basically cut the time in half, and if you aren't documenting as you go, that's probably another 25% and if you have someone to give you a hand you're dropping another 25%. So, with all the tools and parts on hand, with a friend to help label ziploc bags and cable labels, you could pretty comfortably finish the water pump/timing belt/valve seal/hydraulic lifters in 5-6 hours. Lots of stuff (like the lifters and valve seals) can be done in parallel, and even just knowing what comes next is a huge speedup. I spent lots of time back and forth between the truck, the forums, and the FSM, if you have another person to be reading ahead while you're working on the AC compressor you can make substantial improvements in speed.

For example, when I was tracking down that oil leak at the end, I pulled the radiator fan, fan belt, ac compressor, power steering pump, and battery - traced and fixed the leak - and had it all back together in <45 minutes. Things go quicker when you know what comes next.

 

[snare]

OK, so I know I have a bunch of updating to do, suspension to install, and pictures to post etc... But I didn't feel like working on the computer so I finally got around to changing my transmission fluid with SP-III last night.

HOLY COW - what a difference! I know it shifted rough before, and the old stuff looked pretty gross, but I would have never guess the tremendous and instantaneous difference. I mean when you change engine oil the engine usually sounds a bit happier afterwards, but this felt more noticeable than my full engine rebuild.

I think it's going to go on my list as the best cost/performance improvement item you can do to your monty.

Do you do a transmission flush? and if so, how did you do it?

 

[normal_dave]

This was a good post from our Aussie friends:
https://www2.pajeroclub.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=15879

Be sure to get genuine SP-III spec, (diaqueen overseas...) not an equal version, it really makes a difference. You can also use Hyundai/Kia SP-III, I bought Hyundai from a local dealer for a decent price.

 

[Offroadmuch]

That engine refresh job was great. Many good learning points. For clarity it was on a 3.5L 6G74?

Can anyone post a link to a similar job on a 3.8L 6G75? Or point out any differences?

 

['round n' back again]

this looked really good very meticulous
when doing this i always shop out the heads to a competent shop that works with japanese aluminum.
they come back clean ready to install, but most importantly with flat mating surfaces to easily accept head gaskets

what kind of head gaskets did u decide on?

i really like the look of that engine. design wise its my 3.0 revised. i wonder if it would fit in my gen1?