A Rolls Royce Silver Shadow found me.

[smileymikey]

davepoth said:

The other way of getting a stuck head off a Stag V8 (many tricks are required) is to feed some nylon rope into the cylinder through the spark plug hole and then crank the engine. If you put enough rope in you should be able to get the head to pop up enough to get a saw to the stud.

Oooooow that's proper garden shed engineering

[Huntsman]

silverfoxcc said:

Huntsman

Are you a member of the RREC. They have a good forum on there that can give advice. If you are not i think the Australian version of the RREC is a free forum ( dont haver to be a member to ask) and it seems they are more into DIY on the Shadow and Spirit variants than over here

I'm not, but this isn't a RR problem, its just a stuck old engine problem.

hidetheelephants said:

Busting the weld before shearing the stud means the weld wasn't up to much; how grunty is your welder?

150 amp, on full bore, I suspect the stud has little iron content and hence the weld wasn't too good. A chap on a RR specific forum said the same thing.

davepoth said:

The other way of getting a stuck head off a Stag V8 (many tricks are required) is to feed some nylon rope into the cylinder through the spark plug hole and then crank the engine. If you put enough rope in you should be able to get the head to pop up enough to get a saw to the stud.

I don't like that idea, no oil pressure, not good for the big end.

Its hanging from the shed roof by a chain block. I've heated it again. Twice. And bashed it many times. And tried to twist it. But not joy.

I paid £750 for the engine, I am negotiating with the chap I bought it from for a refund.

Need another engine. Considering a whole car.

[TooMany2cvs]

Huntsman said:

I don't like that idea, no oil pressure, not good for the big end.

Don't crank it on the starter. Crank it manually. You only need it to go round a few degrees...

[v8250]

TooMany2cvs said:

Don't crank it on the starter. Crank it manually. You only need it to go round a few degrees...

Ben, the rope in the cylinders option does work. As per above, feed rope into each cylinder and crank engine manually. Let mechanical advantage work for you. There'll be no damage caused, it will be slow...just keeping going until head lifts and frees from the stud. You may have keep head under cranked pressure and use heat at the same time to release. Once free/removed be sure to thoroughly clean the head stud bores, a light reaming is the way to go, wet and dry on a long slim dowel will remove the crud to a clean smooth bore, or a correctly sized reamer.

[hidetheelephants]

What they said; as long as there's oil in the bearings doing this will not damage them.

[RemyMartin]

I'm actually hoping for a solution rather than a jack in, I appreciate you have tried alot of things to free the head though.

Btw (and I hope not) but surely the engine seller has a right to say caveat emptor to you and you have to live with it. £750 for a v8 engine seems cheap.

[Huntsman]

v8250 said:

Ben, the rope in the cylinders option does work. As per above, feed rope into each cylinder and crank engine manually. Let mechanical advantage work for you. There'll be no damage caused, it will be slow...just keeping going until head lifts and frees from the stud. You may have keep head under cranked pressure and use heat at the same time to release. Once free/removed be sure to thoroughly clean the head stud bores, a light reaming is the way to go, wet and dry on a long slim dowel will remove the crud to a clean smooth bore, or a correctly sized reamer.

I work in turbocharger development, we do bearing life analysis, there's no way its not harming a plain bearing doing that. Ultimately, it will reduce its life. Furthermore, there's no way I'm putting more force through the stud that way than I am by hanging the whole thing from the shed roof.

[hidetheelephants]

If you don't like that option another one to try is putting an air hammer on the stud while the engine's hung from the roof; the combination of the weight and cyclic shock may well shift it, I've moved stubborn things that way before.

[LewG]

Any chance of removing the free studs with a pair of nuts and then trying to rotate the actual cylinder head entirely on just that one last stud? May unstuck it from the crap enough for it to lift off. You could even make up a plate and bolt it into pre existing bolt holes and add an extension so you can put a piece of scaffolding tube on for extra leverage?

[Megaflow]

The head Dowels will stop that.

[J4CKO]

Would it be feasible to buy a rotten "500" V8 Merc of the late nineties, early 2000's and transplant the engine and box ?

[v8250]

Huntsman said:

I work in turbocharger development, we do bearing life analysis, there's no way its not harming a plain bearing doing that. Ultimately, it will reduce its life. Furthermore, there's no way I'm putting more force through the stud that way than I am by hanging the whole thing from the shed roof.

Where's your sense of adventure

[Slow]

Not a technical person but you said you can raise it up by like 2mm, could you not fit a grinding disc or some type of cutting equipment in? I gather you will still have to drill it out but atleast they are split?

[LewG]

Any luck yet? Do apologise that was a stupid suggestion, I should've thought of the dowels

[Huntsman]

LewG said:

Any luck yet?

Its still hanging from the shed roof by the head...I did 100 cycles of bashing it back down with a mallet and lifting it up with the chin block and no dice. I gave up.

On the plus side, the trader that sold me the engine (on the basis of it being a good usable motor) gave me half the money back.

I'm looking at buying a complete rusty car....

[hidetheelephants]

If you have a compressor I can heartily recommend an air hammer; if nothing else they make a very satisfying noise.

[rxe]

Not sure of the precise location of the offending stud, but have you tried heat? Not mincing about with a B&Q blowtorch, but something like a 5kW oxy blowtorch? Get the whole area very hot, and wallop it under tension. There is a chance you might damage the head, but that would be cheaper/easier than a new engine. A big Oxy Torch will get it red hot in short order.

[Mikeeb]

If you are now looking for another engine anyway, why not try the rope down the bores trick?

[Peanut Gallery]

Suggestion, as nothing else left to loose.
If you can remove the crank, can you pull the pistons out downwards through where the sump should be?
With pistons removed, you might be able to find a large piece of wood that fits the inside of the head, and hammer this directly onto the head from underneath?

Another crazy idea, http://www.petersenproducts.com/Product_Selection_Guide/Selection_Guide_Inflatable_Plugs.aspx
Could you obtain at least two of something like this, a small bag, if it collapses small enough to make it through the spark plug hole, and then connect up to a hydraulic pump?


No affiliation, they came up with a google search of small air lifting bag.

Both ideas I am just trying to use brute force and ignorance to push the head off.

[Huntsman]

None of the rope/bore type tricks are going to exert more force than the weight of the thing hanging from the head.

Heat - I'm not convinced that the CTE of the aluminium is sufficient to create enough clearance, plus, its 300 kgs of ali, its a massive ali heatsink, its not a bolt halfway down an exhaust where you can get masses of heat into it. Its fking great heatsink!

Anyway....I've bought another car for spares....