Engine advice

Happy days are here. I just got my newly acquired super a engine. The fella I bought it from said he ran it for a few minutes after been sitting for a couple years and it smoked. Not that uncommon i guess. Do you have any advice for assessing the engine prior to putting it in the tractor? It is for a super a.

Sometime that smoke will go awy aftr you run her and get her good and hot afew times. Change tha ol and filtr if ther is no strnge noize than she be good to go.

What would you recommend for oil? I think it takes 5 quarts, is that correct?

Good question!

I'd get it on a stand and give it a basic going over. Pull the plugs and the valve cover, and turn the engine with a crank and check valve clearance and operation. Scrape and wipe up any congealed crud up in there. Do your best to get any gritty stuff away, then finish with a parts brush and kerosene, and let your solvent run down to the pan. A little flush of kerosene down over the push rods to help flush any loose crud off that might have washed down to the cam would be a good idea.

Drain your pan and keep an eye for any water or antifreeze. Drop the pan (pay attention to where the four long bolts go!) and clean any sludge out. Also use your brush and keroene to clean any gunk of the screen at the bottom of the oil pump. Pull the rod and main caps and eyeball the crank journals for any excessive wear. Some wear wont' hurt and you could put them right back, and you'll have an idea of their condition if you later decide you have more work to do.

Put the pan and valve cover back on with new gaskets, and put in five quarts of oil. Change your oil filter and gasket (you may have to dig the old gasket out of the groove in the base -- they have a habit of getting hard, stuck and taking on the appearance of metal -- the groove should be about 3/16" deep with no gasket in it).

It couldn't hurt to have a peek in through the inlet and outlet of the cooling system. (This means more gaskets!). Pull the upper outlet/fan bracket and the lower inlet or water pump. A light and an eyeball will tell you some, but getting a strong stream of water in there will tell you more. There can be sediment the length of the head and the water jacket, but if it's built up, it will tend to be at the rear. A strong jet from a garden hose nozzle is enough. You can use a wide-pattern pressure washer nozzle with the regulator on the pump dialed back and being careful to keep your spray pattern horizontal so as not to blow by the o-rings at the bottoms of the sleeves. See how much mud you get and flush until basically clear.

At that point you can try spinning the motor with the crank (plugs out) and have someone watch the gauage to see if you can raise oil pressure. You can't always spin it fast enough, but its' worth a try.

Also, if the clutch is present on the flywheel, it's be worth removing the cover and making sure the friction disc is free. They have a way of binding to either the pressure plate or the fllywheel if they're left to sit too long.

If you've corrected any problems you find in that going over, it'd be worth mounting and running.

What all of that doesn't address is the smoke. Was the engine ever stuck? The smoke could be from rings broken in getting it free. But it could also be perectly good rings stuck in their grooves that might be loosened up by running it with a dose of a product like Seafoam in the crankcase oil and some more in your fuel. Apart from tearing the motor down completely before putting it in, only time will tell that story.

Anything you know about the history of the motor is more than we know, so it's hard to say just how far to go before installing it. The things I've suggested are pretty basic, and I'm sure I've probably overlooked something that others will fill in.

If you get it in and running and the smoke doesn't clear up then you're probably looking at pulling it back out and doing at least rings and maybe pistons and sleeves, at which point it would be advisable to have the crank miced and turned if needed. But if you don't see any excessive wear or any signs of internal damage from water on the oil side at this stage, I'd put it in and give it a go.

Iv always usd 30 weigt in my A 5is rigt for it.

Hey Scotty, I never done it but can't he get that running on the stand? Save that puttin' in an' out? I have a gasoline IV that I use on those of mine that have integral gas tanks to the hoods. Other than that just a battery, right? Just askin' cause I'm curious. If it were me I would like to hear it running before I wrestle it into place.

Since you don't know anything about the engine other than that it smoked I would pull the engine apart and put in a new sleeve/piston kit.

Have the block cleaned, crankshaft measured for wear and ground undersize if it needs it, have the local auto machine shop furnish the new bearings. Have the head reworked. Then it will be good for a long time. You can check the clutch for wear too. Hal

A battery or a hand crank depending on his ignition. Not a bad idea, but it depends on the stand.

I thought about it with both the IH motors I've gone through, but didn't quite dare to. Mine is a fairly lightweight stand (1000#) to begin with, of the usual design of two legs sticking out from the endwith the rotating mount. It did a perfectly adequate job as far as holding the motor up for the rebuild, but still bounced quite enough, thank you (and whew!), just beating the stuck pistons out of the sleeves. I could have rigged a gas tank to either motor just to see if they would fire, but I worried about running any length of time just because there would have been a lot of vibration and I couldn't be sure how the stand, on its narrow axis, would react to the torque from revving and the like. Folks better schooled than I in such things may be able to jump in, but I think there's probably some difference between an engine stand for holding it up for work, and a test stand. I just never quite dared. Maybe with a heavier-rated stand with a wider stance . . . but still not a long run.

In Mark's case, I think he's confident that it will run and fire, but he's rightly concerned about what's making the smoke and I suspect he'd have to put the motor into the tractor -- that or get on some sort of test stand (that might include a dyno to load the motor up and let it run for some time) to get an idea whether his problem might be broken rings or merely stuck with a hope of freeing them up.

For a short run just to make sure it will fire, yeah. But I've got a feeling it would shake enough that it's not anything that a regular work stand is up to for a run long enough to actually evaluate anything.

I am with Scotty. I have had a couple of engines smoke (still in tractor) that had sat for quite a few years. In each case, the engine had been running fine. sat for a period of time (years). Engines were not stuck.

All smoked at first. I worked the BN for a bit after changing oil, filter, plugs, points, etc. Used a quart of Rislone in place of 1 quart of oil for the first oil change. Ran for 20-30 hours of moderate work. Then changed oil and filter again. Smoking is now limited to start up until warm, then no more.

Other one turned out to need a valve job (guides that is).

Each engine will have a different issue, but the most common one is stuck rings or worn valve guides (if the engine wasn't abused). Since these engines can be redone while installed on the tractor, I would minimally do the overall cleanup on the stand and then install and run it for awhile. Although, if you are not opposed to a rebuild, do it now, and don't give it another thought. If this is going to be a parage queen, then I would just replace the "o" rings on the sleeves, hone them, and install new rings. Valve job. gaskets. bearings, go. If you are going to work the old girl, then now is the time to do a complete makeover.

all in all, Scotty and I agree.

Makes sense. I wasn't taking a load test into consideration. Engine I have in the shop right now starts like a dream and runs great but it do react a little different to a load.