I don't have too much to put in, but good work overall. I'm following the progress, and it'* really interesting to see how this is coming along. Nice work with the "puller."

Also, I remember you had a whole lot longer hair. If I'm right, you got one heck of a haircut.

Pics of the crank and Rods will come over the weekend, all I had time to do after the most recent pics was I turned the block over and pulled the oil pan off that night. Sunday was hectic, I didn't have time to clean up my mess, so now mom can't get her Expedition in the garage And now I'm back at my grandparents place for the week.

Dad said he went ahead and pulled #5 and #6 Pistons out, leaving the other 4 to me. He said he was interested to see. He only told me that by the looks of it he doesn't think the pistons are useable anymore
We shouldn't need them but, dang

lol, not sure we're gonna get the balance shaft out of that block. it probably should have been done before i pulled the timing chain, or cam, it slipped my mind at the time...now it spins freely and nothing to hold it to break the bolt loose

I thought it was ridiculous how tight some of the bolts were on that motor. Had to shove a pry bar though the flywheel and get a breaker bar and a 3ft long pipe on top of that to get leverage and put all my weight on it to break the bolt on the HB loose, the bolt on the timing chain/cam sprocket was the same way.

Dad was really surprised to see roller lifters in there though.

Wow, that is amazing. How do you think you'll be able to get the bolts and nuts back on there? Same method? I found that a junkyard (or your own) strut bar on the end of a breaker bar works just fine, too. Is that longer than 3 feet? When I imagine what you did, I see a pipe too wide for the breaker bar, so that'* why I'm suggesting the strut bar.

Good work so far, and thanks for keeping us so closely updated. Your dad seems to be a cool dude. Way to spend quality time together!

Well this motor surely wont be going back together, I'm striping it down to learn and see what to expect when we tear down the other motor for real and for the second time. Already made a few mistakes with this one, good thing it'* not going to be reused

Good to know. Well, have fun.

More progress has been made, dad went ahead and pulled the pistons/rods and crank.

All of the rod bearings look fine, a little scuffed from some of the trash in the oil but no copper is showing at all. However the Crank bearings on the front and rear of the motor are trash and even more obvious than the cam bearing was . The top of the front crank bearing and the bottom of the rear crank bearing are clearly copper colored, the middle two bearings are still completely usable. it seems that the crank was misaligned in the block and/or the Balance shaft and the timing chain tensioner really do put a good deal of stress on the bearings.

The pistons are not usable anymore, all of them are scuffed on one side, and the #6 is scoffed on both sides. They had some play inside the cylinder wall. The bore is incorrect or off, if this block was to be reused it would certainly need to be bored over. Also requiring new pistons. But this block will likely be dumped unless someone else wants it (Highly Doubtful).

Dad has all the pictures on his computer, I'll get those up tomorrow afternoon to show/explain in a little more detail of the findings.