What to do with this broken 283 V8

here is a shot of the chip, well below the rings.
engine has hydraulic lifters [bummer].
yanked the heads and found .040 pistons. i was hoping for .060.
i pulled the broken piston out and number one. bores look ok and no ridge. i wonder how many miles since the rebuild?

 

clean the bore up good, spray it with WD-40, and sprinkle flour on it. Then bake at 350 degrees... kidding, no, wipe the flour off, if theres a big crack, the flour will stick in the crack and show it. Now if it passes this test, pull the rest of the rod/piston assemblies, and do the same test on the main bulkheads on either side of that throw. Now, if YOU STILL dont see any obvious cracks, its worth spending the money to have it magged before you start dropping money on machine work. If I was taking bets, I would say the odds are its buildable.

 

okay, sounds like a plan.
i am kinda leaning toward trying to get away without machine work. take it apart, clean it up, meausre it up, find another rod.
possible?

 

Yes, I would say theres a decent chance of that. If it passes the "poor mans magnaflux" clean the edges of the chipped cylinder wall with a die grinder, get another rod, ball-hone it and hammer it back together. Pretty crude and dirty, but you will probably skate by with it. Check the crank too, even if you are doing it on the cheap, I would probably actually mag the crank.

 

These two photos are the same hole? If they are you are probably ok, but I am a bit surprised,the rust in the first pic looks pretty heavy, honestly, I would expect to find some pretty aggressive pitting under there.

 

i am thinking if i ever run across another project, i will stick this in it and tell everybody it has a 289. then wait for the confusion when the hood is opened.

 

can't remember, but i used some wd and a piece of steel wool to knock the "brown" off. can you tell? the chipped cylinder is all the way back by the distributor [note cam gear] and the other one i took off was #1. or was it number 2? long day.
either way, in the very least i have a nice set of pistons.

 

Just an idea.

 

Kind of unusual for a rod to break like that unless you spin a rod bearing causing the rod bearing to seize on the crank journal. Small block Chevy rods are cheap and plentiful and all but the 400 use the same rods. If you're just wanting the vintage look, you can use the heads, intake, distributor, short water pump, pulleys, and such on a later block. I've had several 283s. One was in a '63 Chevy school bus I drove years ago, one was in a '63 Bel Air I had, and one was in a second series '55 Chevy pickup (previous owner swapped it in to replace the original 6, it was a '66 engine). Always liked them. I also like 307s. I'm running one that I got for free in my '38 Ford pickup, engine came out of a '68 GMC farm truck that was low mileage (about 30K) but rusted to pieces. The engine had a double roller timing set, don't know if that was original because it was in a truck--most 307s in cars had the cam gear with the nylon teeth, always throw those away and get a good double roller timing set. The 307 is just a 283 with a 327 crank. Not hard to find, and cheap if not free because few people want them. Of course, I'm not looking for enough power to light up the tires, just something reliable, not too bad on gas, and enough power to run with traffic.

 

Here's what I see, forged pistons, spindly 265/283/early 327 rods. The pistons tell me it's been gone through before. It's stuck because it's rusted up in the cylinders. Doubt that can be saved however with just a hone job. The block is the only usable thing, possibly the crank, but both would need to be checked out by "a machinist". The crank is forged. Hey look at that, the post above mine; I bet El Caballo can tell you everything you ever wanted to know about a 283 since we just did this with his. You've also got 2 barrel heads on the engine. Those old Thompson pistons are heavy, and I don't see evidence the assembly was re-balanced. What's the bore at? I am Butch/56sedandelivery.

 

Not really. as 56sedandelivery says, 283s and 265's (I have heard they were in some 327s, but personally, I've never seen it) used a rod that was skinnier across the beam than other small journal rods, and of course, 307's, late 327s, 350's ect use large journal rods.
It seems likely you would probably find the skinny rods in a 2 bbl 327 with the 520 heads, all the 327's I have personally had apart were 4bbl motors with camel bumps.

 

My guess is this hole will need to be bored, but you cant really be sure till you get it apart and get it cleaned up.


No sign of a spun bearing there, crank is probably usable.

 

Rust pitting does not necessarily mean a bore job. Unless there is a pitted area big enough to snag the rings. You can hone it and put new rings in, it will burn a little oil for a while until the pits fill with carbon, then it will be ok.

Not the hot setup for a performance motor but, if it is a budget rebuild for a street driven car it will be ok. I know of motors that were overhauled this way, they had no problems because of the pitting.

 

Unless it was stored on it's deck, that's a weird place to rust unless there's a crack somewhere in the bore...take a good look. BTW........
Waaaaaay back in the summer of 63 some of my classmates were tuning Scott's 56 chevy on the deserted old hiway outside of town. One of Scott's buddy's talked him into letting him blast it through the 1/4 one time and it broke a rod. They went to town and hit the local auto parts store for a piston, rod and bearing...came back and replaced the bustted rod/piston and reused the old rings. They were working in the sagebrush next to the [abandoned highway] strip and fired it up after a few hours work.......drove that 56 'till Scott rolled it with my sister one night..

 

motor was stored, i think, bell housing side, down. [?] it is really stuck. i did notice that the wrist pins on the two i took out are STIFF.
are thomas pistons good? they look different than others i have seen. i was surprised at how little the rods looked. the break, at the piston end, looks clean and straight. [flaw?]
thanks for all the replies! it is just fun to see what can be done with what is here.

 

Spontaneous clearance notch?

 

I say sell the engine to someone who thinks a 283 is something special....350's are boring? The real difference between a 350 and 283 for street use is the 350 always makes way more usable power and will rev silly rpm if you want to build it that way...

 

Scott rolled the car or your sister?

 

^ ( ! ! ! )

 

did you miss the post that started "i love 283's"?
not that i don't like the 350........

 

I like flathead Fords... Yeah but 350 makes more power..
Check it out, I have a 235 six with... Yeah but a 350 makes more power...
I finally got the ring kit for my 364 nailhead... Yeah but a 350 makes more power...
I bought finned valve covers for my 348... Yeah but a 350 makes more power...
I put my A banger together with friends... Yeah but the 350 makes more power...

If you find yourself always coming up with that answer to any period correct engine, you have lost the plot for this website.

BTW, an LS makes way more power than a 350.

 

If you can get the pistons out it will need to be align bored and have the cylinders bored at a minimum. You will need to radius the bottoms of the cylinders where they are chiped, that is only of the rings don't travel to the damaged area, not likely that they do.

I would probably try and save it or save what I could because I am bone assed stupid, but you are not me so you will need to make that decision on your own..

Another option is to save the crank find a 327 block and buy a decent set of H beam rods to go with it. 301 and change or 302 baby babam.

 

If It where mine I would go the cheapest route.I would buy one of those $100 re ring kits you find on E Bay. hone the cyls and polish the crank. You can polish the crank yourself with diesel soaked 600 grit wet or dry sandpaper and a length of string. get a good rod and put it back together. And your engine has a steel crank. the wide parting line is a steel crank. A cast crankshaft has a narrow parting line. I think lots of folks are not happy unless they are spending lots of money. that chip is below the travel of the bottom ring it will not effect anything. radius the edges of the chip. Myself I would change all the rods. Because I have a set of the better small journal 327 rods that have the extra metal at the rod bolts.

 

LOL let me stir the pot a little bit, just because I haven't harassed you lately. You should send him this rods.

I usually align bore one or at least check it when there is something catastrophic that happened to the bottom end, but in the event that it was hydrolocked it probably didn't distort things as much as if it was spinning @ 7K. I have seen them break a rod when hydrolocked and not hurt a thing other then the rod.

 

You can lay a machinist straight edge on the mains and check them. If the Crank without rods and pistons turns freely with new main bearings when torqued down the alighn bore is Ok. The problem with alighn boring is it moves the crank closer to the cam. There is some reason why the rod broke? possibly a flaw in the manfacture? Hard to say why? I have several 283 and small journal 327 engines. I never sell or get rid of any of those parts. I once installed a new rebuilt long block 327 in a 64 impala. The old 327 really smoked and had blow by. When I pulled the heads I found the number 7 piston top was burnt. you could see the top ring. I paid the $60 rebuilder ,s core charge. Went and found a used piston and bought new rings for one cyl. Threw that engine back together and it was as good as any I ever owned. I still have that engine.

 

Now that was a burnt piston. I had a destroked 283 once that burned a hole in a piston and burnt the tops on several. It was my bad I replaced the pistons with some left over from an overbore that I did for a guy then made sure the next pass that my timing and fuel mix was up to par.

I usually suggest that people get it checked because sometimes a honing will suffice and others it is not necessary at all but unless I know where they are at its easier to say have it checked. The machinist I use these days will check one for the price of a burger and fries. He'll actually check the main saddle bores for size for 14 bucks last I checked.

 

Bean-o still lives in 1978. Wish I was there...

 

too bad the OP,s engine wasn't pickled years ago. if it hadn't rusted the OP could just change the rod and run it. One time I seen a guy that was fixing a babbit rod 216 chevy. one rod was loose. he pulled the crank out. and after it was out pulled the piston down below the bore far enough to remove the wrist pin. Took the crank and bad rod someplace and had them fixed. And he put it back together. It sounded Ok? The first sawmill I bought. The old guy I bought it from told me sawmilling can be as cheap or as expensive as you want it to be. The log that's being sawed doesn't care.

 

one thing not mentioned in this thread, the 58 to 62 blocks have the thicker wall castings, and are the favored blocks for the .125 overbore/301 engine.

 

LOL Pulled a Lincoln donkey motor down from a saw mill when I was in high school that spun a rod bearing. Pulled the crank from another old motor and replaced the mains. Today I would resize the main saddle but back then it worked fine I didn't know that it wouldn't.