What are you guys doing as far as cleaning the oil pan, timing cover, valve covers etc. both outside AND inside?
Scrape the gunk off with a putty knife, soak in kerosene, diesel, or biogradeable degreaser, scrub, repeat until clean. Scrub again with soap and water, blow out with air. Sand down any paint. Repaint. Or take them to the machine shop for a dip in the hot tank, get the blasted then repaint.
Yep. I scrape as much crud off as I can with a putty knife and a wire brush and run them through my solvent tank. Get as much off as possible to help make the solvent last longer. I use non chlorinated cleaning solvent available through a local oil company. You can use some big drip pans if you have no parts washer. Lots of elbow grease is some times necessary
My favorite is first like the other's said clean first then get a of bunch of different wire brushes for the 4" grider and a die grider the air kind And go to town cleans any rust or paint. And clean with acetone and prime and paint with a high temp Paint.
That couldn't have been good. Always wondered though, if you took a cheap under counter unit, couple hundred dollars? Cheaper second hand. Plumb it with cleaning solvent and mount it under the workbench. Would it work for cleaning parts? Heated solvent and rotating spray arms sound like a neat trick without the expense of purchasing a commercial cleaning cabinet. Maybe install a couple of inline filters so sort out the gunk?
Hmmm....I have been known to throw an intake in the dishwasher, but only after it was soaked in degreaser, and scrubbed to get the majority of the crud off it, then rinsed thoroughly. It came out really clean, and it had no ugly water spots! Gotta love that Cascade! Oh...forgot to mention....no Mrs. around the house currently....
But don't use it on Aluminum parts, right? What I do, depends on the car I'm working on...if the parts need to be really clean, I take them to the machine shop for a dip in their vat or jet washer. If they are going back on something that it doesn't matter too much, I do the scrape and solvent thing. Which I do, also depends on how dirty they are.
If there are welded baffles etc I would be skeered to grit/bead/even walnut blast them. Perfect cleaning is nigh unto impossible.
You need a rebuild your SBC cheby motor manual. There are dozens. Which will be the number of threads you will start being walked through each step of disassembly & R&R.
Putty knife to scrape the big stuff off, and brake clean to clean the oil & grease off. Use a big drip pan to catch the brake clean as it runs off and then dip a parts brush in it sand use that to scrub them clean. When I was turning wrenches for a living, we called brake clean "steam cleaner in a can". You can always cart them down to the coin operated car wash and hose them down.
Gunk, pressure washer, elbow grease. You never let us know what you found out about the water in the cylinder deal, btw.
It works awesome, had a friend that set 1 up that way, he rebuilt transmissions, used the dishwasher. Small hot water heater, shop had water, drained into a simple buried rock pile septic drainage, his urinal was hooked into the same drainage. Obviously he lived in the country, it would not pass code.
No parts washer? Make friends with someone that does! Buddy with a shop has a Safety Kleen type sink and uses mineral spirits. I scrape off the caked on stuff first to keep on their good side.
No, it's fine on aluminum castings and, in fact, is a really good way of cleaning them if you need to do any weld repairs.
No parts washer? Discarded bath tub and mineral spirits or whatever solvent you like lets you clean anything up to an engine block in size.I did that for several years and it worked fine.I used diesel for solvent because I couldnt afford mineral spirits then.
The Jalopy Journal
