Motor advice

[mx3matt]

Okay so yesterday noticed that my motor has ablown head gasket.

I already have a DE that I've partially torn down.

I've got push forward and get it finished.

My thought is to tear it down and re-ring and hone the cylinders. New oil pan and remote oil filter and cooler setup, that's all I was gonna do to the bottom end.
As for the heads im gonna have the heads checked by a machine shop and new valve guides installed.

What's my best plan of attack. I'm not confident enough with this motor to do it all myself,but I still can tear the heads and oilpan off...I've already stripped off all the pulleys and belts. Only external piece left is the oil filter and cooler assembly which is a piece of cake.

Of course this happens after I drop almost $800 on megasquirt lol. So obviously I'm looking for the best price. I'm not looking to spend anymore then about $800.

Only things left to purchase are rings, master gasket set and valve guides. I'm only looking for the bare essentials at the moment. I can do the fun power adding later.

A guy on the boards has klze pistons and rods with new rings....so I am considering bumping the compression for a Lil extra power.

[mx3matt]

Something else I'm considering in the interim is a kf motor......

[atx_mx3]

You CANNOT be cheap when it comes to budgeting an engine "build". GOOD ----- FAST ----- CHEAP <---You can have 2, but it wont be the 3rd.

Secondly, I don't see any reason for you to run megasquirt on a stock rebuild. Unless you are trying to make the most amount of power..... refer to above statement.

I would find a machine shop, in your area, that is confident assembling the bottom end. Again, a cheap machine shop is not always a good machine shop....especially if they resurface heads on a 20yr old belt sander, or concrete(true story).

I have been building, fixing, maintaining and killing cars as a profession for about 11 years. I have seen REGULAR people rebuild/Build motors in their garages, with not machine shop help, using a ball or blade style hone and "universal" standard size bearings and they work great. On the other side, I've seen a TON of people build/rebuild motors and they turn out like crap from the first start,.

The good thing about taking the motor to a reputable machine shop is that if the motor turns out to be a piece of....You can always go back to them and be compensated one way or another. If you do it yourself and it smokes....or rod knocks....not much you can really do but pull it and do it all over again....there goes the budget.

Hope this helps.

EDIT:I know very little of the KF, but I remember seeing a couple threads where parts/gaskets were hard to get. I would say do a forum search but.....yea.

[mx3matt]

so at this point i've decided on just pulling doing a refresh on the stock klde.

i'm still gonna start collecting ze goodies, just take my time and find the goodies i want and pick and choose the best deals instead of rushing.
this week i'll yank the heads off and send them out for decking and a refinish, around here its between 50-80 a head at my cost. gonna leave the bottom end untouched other then the oil pan. decking them should also bump the compression slightly which isnt a bad thing and should net me a couple hp's.

i'm hoping i won't have to replace the head bolts until i do the full blown rebuild.

[atx_mx3]

so at this point i've decided on just pulling doing a refresh on the stock klde.

i'm still gonna start collecting ze goodies, just take my time and find the goodies i want and pick and choose the best deals instead of rushing.
this week i'll yank the heads off and send them out for decking and a refinish, around here its between 50-80 a head at my cost. gonna leave the bottom end untouched other then the oil pan. decking them should also bump the compression slightly which isnt a bad thing and should net me a couple hp's.

i'm hoping i won't have to replace the head bolts until i do the full blown rebuild.

That's smart. Take your time. Be sure and check the deck to make sure its not warped. I know that there are factory tolerances in the service manual. A straight edge and feeler gauges will tell you if the block is warped.

As far as the head bolts, I didn't replace them when I did the heads on my first K8. That doesn't mean they didn't need to be replaced....i was young, dumb and broke. Good luck!!!