I have not. That's one tool I don't have. I would have to siphon out the liquid I've poured down the cylinders also to get a look.
Not necessarily. Most scopes are fluid tight. A passible quality borescope can be had for under $100. Mine was about $80.
Sepai, the problem with removing rusted studs is (as you say) that they often break. Submerging the assembly vertically in a 55 gallon drum and letting the acid seep into every crevice can't hurt anything. If its ever gonna begin to come loose.....thats what will do the trick. It does take time, so best if you can let it soak longer (a month). If you get it deep enough it may also help with the bellhousing bolts. None of us can guarantee any of this will work, but I'm betting that the citric acid will at least make it workable. Use a cherry picker or a hoist suspended from a tree or a braced rafter and lower it in place vertically. I made my own permanent derusting tank and I can lower stuff in it easily, but you don't need something that big for a one time job.....so a 55 gallon open top drum should do it. If you take it to a machine shop and they twist bolts off in the block, they can be removed......but its labor intensive and expensive if there are several of them. Threads often get further damaged unless the shop you choose has a "disentigrator". Most don't so its back to manual labor. Easy outs usually don't work well, and sometimes the only thing you can do is try drilling them out. That usually results in off center drilling and messing threads up. Try the acid and I'll bet that you get decent results. My derusting tank As for the two you have already broken off, the acid should still seep in and make them somewhat easier to remove. If the two broken ones are flush or near flush, I drill a hole in a piece of bar stock. The hole needs to be almost the size of the stud. Then I chamfer the hole to get the opening wider. Center it on the stud and zap it with a mig (or Tig if ya got one). If the citric helped, great. The heat from the weld may help a little. Then try using the bar you welded in place to turn the stud out. Sometimes, nothing will work except a disintegrator.......but you won't know till you try.
Inspection cameras that hook up to your cell phone can cost less that $20 on that auction site. I imagine one that costs $25 or so would be good enough quality to keep in the tool box. I know stand alone cameras are in the $50 range these days
Well, you have two options, work on getting broken bolts out yourself, or pay a shop to do it. Personally I would take the hit of my time, and deal with it myself. There’s many different ways to remove broken bolts if you have tools to do it and know how to use them properly. Not just hand tools, a welder and O/A setup come in to play as well. If you’ve been soaking the engine for years, surely you can’t be in a hurry just now. I wouldn’t heat things up with cylinders possibly full of combustible liquids, I’d start with an impact gun turned down and rattle tight, then loose…over and over and see if you can start to get the problem ones out. In fact if two have broke, I’d take that approach on all the rest. If you don’t have a compressor, etc, get a 1/2 inch cordless impact. Once the heads are off, look at what’s available to you to remove the remnants of what has broke off.
I would put an impact gun on it, bolts be damned. If it has been stuck this long, with that much penetrating oil in it, the cylinders are probably wrecked.
Bolts not studs leaves you with heat as your best solution. Oxy acetelene and a rose bud. Another option if the head bolts will move a little bit is to worry them out. Turn until resistence in one dorection then the same in the other direction. In time (hopefully not too much time) they will back out. If you can move them enough to get a little gap under the bolt head you can try a little penetrating oil to help you.
Thank you for your detailed recommendation. Everything you say makes perfect sense. The engine won't fit in a 55 gal drum with the heads attached and my property isn't that big to have a large tank like you have. I may find something that works. I have a heavy bag stand for my Kickboxing bag in my garage I may be able to weld some reinforcing metal to to attach a chain come along to. But it would take so much space in my garage.
Sorry that I missed the start of this thread. My advice for the record is, pour oil or diesel into the cylinders and let it soak. While soaking remove the front timing cover and chain. When satisfied with soaking time try turning the crank. The Cadillac flatheads have an issue with valve seizure and crap dropping down from the overhead exhaust manifolds that locks up the valve movement if not seized there as well. Once the crank is disconnected from the cam and valves your chances of success improve greatly. With the timing chain removed you have half a chance of getting rotation/movement. If to this point you were unsuccessful, the old skool guys would follow by removing the heads and lighting small fires in the obviously seized cylinders that will help free them. I am no expert on the fires, but have heard that kerosene was a favourite at one time. Keep us posted.
So a little update. I torched the bolts on the drivers side head, sprayed wd40,beat them with a hammer, and hit them with an impact. It took 4 hours to get the bolts out and I did snap one more. The front cylinder and piston are rusted pretty good but I call this progress. Maby I can get the other head off and get this 346 into a drum.
I got the driver's side head off after 4 hours of torch..hammer lube and impact. Front cylinder is rusted really good.
Get a whole mess of paper towels. Wipe out all of the crud. Get a fine wire cup brush on a drill and clean off as much as you can. Do the same on the other side.
The upside is that it appears (from here anyway) that you do not have a split cylinder. Its costs to replace pistons and to bore but nothing like the costs of sleeveing. I got a late model block here with a split cylinder. Raises the cost of a rebuild but at least I have a good trotline weight.
Very good progress! It doesn't look that bad to me. And good news that the broken bolt / stud has left a bit of length to grab onto. Edit: Get the head gasket off for a bit better view of the matter. It looks like the bolts / studs enter the water jacket, which is probably partly why they are so stubborn.
Those engines have good solid side walls, so boring is fine, but sleeving can be done back to 346 as per Cadillac or 322 as per Lasalle. I sleeved back from 346 to 322, out of personal choice as I feel 322 is a better configuration IMHO... Check this out: Hot Rod V8 Flathead Motor Engine Run Sound Cadflat Flatcaddy Cadillac Video Series LaSalle 322 346 - YouTube
Those old blocks are hard to come by. Everyone has their tricks to get stuck pieces out of one of those old blocks. I use "Liquid Wrench" cause that is what my grandpa used. it works for me. Mrs. Beaner uses Coke Cola and that works too. Everyone has their own snake oil. The Gimp ( @gimpyshotrods ) gave you good advice. Clean the extra crap out first before you try and start breaking it loose.
The saving grace is that these old blocks took quite an overbore if required. Have you done any research into pistons yet?
.another motor will turn up if you just keep looking....too much money and effort.....strip everything else off ..and you can sell the parts.....
My buddy taught me this method and it works without fail. here is the link How to properly warm up a Flathead - The Ford Barn As far as the broken studs go stick a thin flat washer over the stud and weld a nut to the stud and it will come right out. As I said I was taught this method by a good friend and it has worked everytime without fail. There has not been a motor yet that I have not been able to get unstuck doing this.
Warming up a flathead with fire - unfortunately only people registered on the Ford Barn can see the pictures, but I think I get the idea!
The Jalopy Journal
