freeing H engine questions

redforlife

Well-known Member
Engine froze from rain water entering hole in manifold. Been sitting about 4 years. Rusty
water found in number 3, and blown out by way of spark plug hole. Filled with ATF to soak.
Near as I can tell, number 3 is sitting somewhere about bottom dead center, so no way to
get crank out from underneath rod by just removing the pan and rod cap. Drained a
considerable amount of antifreeze out of oil pan. Crank will turn about a 1/4 inch or so
back and forth, presumably its just from play in the crank being in the BDC position moving
back and forth over center and the piston is not moving. Feels solid solid. Been rocking a
jacked up back wheel back and forth with tractor in high gear to figure this much out.

My questions are-- any ideas for freeing it without tearing it down? If cylinder wall is
broke from frozen water it should be outward and still able to free. Thought about
hydraulic pressure through spark plug hole of an up piston, or rocking the tractor back and
forth in high gear. But up for any other crazy ideas if you know of anything that works.
Also, what are my chances of head gasket or broken head being the culperate of antifreeze
in pan? Frozen piston chamber seems to be holding the ATF. I am not wanting to remove
engine and then the crank on this project and trying to avoid that if at all possible. Any
thoughts, ideas, or suggestions on this matter much appreciated. Especially anything that
you know that works from experience.
 
They are a dry sleeve engine. This means the cast iron block has cylinders that are lined with sleeves. It is very rebuildable if the Cast iron is not broken.
The first thing I would do is to take off the water jacket cover to look inside at the cast iron cylinders. If it is broken on that cylinder it might be able to be seen. If it is broken, decision time for a different engine. The reality is more harsh than you want to hear. With the crank at or near BDC, the forces applied to the rod can and will bend it before the piston moves a mm. Were it mine, I would make the commitment to take the engine out. The sleeve in that cylinder is pressed in to a degree, and with age, get really really stuck. It takes a real puller with a puck on the bottom and a 3/4" threaded rod up and out the top pulling on the block deck surface to get them moving if not rusted. You will likely be breaking the piston out of the cylinder with a chisel to clear the bore. Then using a arc welder running three beads of modest intensity down the sleeve at 120 degree spacing. This shrinks the sleeve and allows it to be removed. Then if the native block is cracked, it must have the original cast iron bored out to receive a repair sleeve, then that is bored out to receive a new standard dry sleeve. Sorry about the news, and I hope it works out. Jim
 
you cannot avoid an engine tear down once it is stuck and has rusted cyl's. listen to Jim. and from this engine sitting 4 years with water u are dreaming if u think it will run by something other than a tear down. i have torn a lot of stuck engines down. i get kinda amased when somebody even thinks of the impossible, and thinks it will work. and that is my experience.
 
Sounds like a boat anchor to me a replacement engine will be the quickest, cheapest and easiest option....... Almost guarantee that there's cracked cast iron Block, head of both
 
Was planning a tear down if freed. Trying to free before the tear down though, to avoid block/crank removal. Tractor has to be split to do that. If free, a tear down is possible leaving block/crank in tractor. BDC position on a stuck piston pretty much makes a tear down on an H impossible without crank removal. Its kind of sad, but if block is ruined on this tractor, it will be parted out and scraped. In other words, a replacement engine won't be considered. So block removal is not really being considered either.
 
I know it has to be torn down if freed. At least head off, and possibly piston/sleeve. That is possible without block/crank removal, but not at current crank position. In a nut shell, if block has to come out for tear down or engine replacement, this tractor will be parted out/scrapped. If I can get even 1/8 of a turn out of crank, then rod can be removed from crank making a block in tractor teardown possible.
 
Yes, worst case scenario is broke sleeve and block. Hoping for stuck piston, broken head. Would be willing to replace head, but if engine/block has to be replaced, tractor will be parted/scrapped.
 
I've heard of bending rods with extreme force. But wouldn't the rod be the strongest at BDC or TDC when it is straight up and down? I would think it would be the weakest halfway in between.
 
TDC or BDC is the point in the stroke where the crank can apply the most pressure horizontally to the rod and piston. Not sure if I can do to good of a job at explaining it in geometry terms. Looking at the front of the tractor think of a vertical line drawn through center line of the crankshaft and piston wrist pin. As the crankshaft rod journal moves out of that centerline the distance it has moved away from it is the leverage the two have working between each other. So let's say you have moved the rod jounal centerline 1/4" out of the true centerline you now have a 1/4" inch of actual stroke. So imagine if the crankshaft stroke was actually 1/4", the amount of leverage you would have on the piston while turning the crankshaft. Now add in the wedging action of the rod as it pivots on the axis of the wrist pin. If you can visualize all of this you can begin to understand the possibilities of breaking or distorting a rod. If it helps any, in the opposite of this when the engine is running when the crank rod journal is 90 degrees to T or BDC that is when the piston exerts the highest force to the crankshaft. So taking into account some of your comments about scrapping the tractor for parts, my recommendation is to pull the head. Then you will see that 4 years or water setting in a cylinder will cause pitting that will not be sealed by rings if that is your thinking. And antifreeze in the pan is somewhat concerning. I would say a parts tractor is what you have there if you have no sentimental connection with the machine.
 
Nope. The rod is as strong as it can be at all positions. The position of the crank near BDC is the issue. The rotation of the crank can be through several degrees while the piston barely moves at all. This force is hundreds of times more than the force 1/2 the way up the cylinder where every degree of rotation moves the piston an eight of an inch. rods bend when they are hitting something in the chamber near TDC(like incompressible slug of water) or at the bottom when trying to turn a stuck piston. If you want that piston out and do not want to remove the crank, it will need to come out in small pieces, and it is dramatically tough to do that. Jim
 
Take the head off. Hone as much rust as you can get at out of the cylinder. Roll the tractor outside and away from buildings. Pour a cup of diesel fuel in the stuck cylinder. Light it. Let it burn out. See if it's freed up. If not, burn it again. It might take 3-4 tries but eventually the heat might break the rust loose.
 

Red, this actually happened to a JD model A when I was a kid. It had sat uncovered in a field for lord knows how long. It had had so much water in exhaust the pipe rusted out at the bend going into the manifold. Dad tried cranking it and it was stuck. He pulled the plugs poured in MMO and put plugs back in. For about a year he'd check on it monthly. After a few months the mmo level went down. Dad poured in more MMO and let it sit. BTW it wasn't ours at the time but was for sale.
We went to check on it and I sat in the truck while dad and my brother pulled the plugs. Dad was looking in the cylinder as Jr leaned on the flywheels,rocking it back and forth. It came free and soaked dads face with oil! We laughed..dad not so much, and dad bought it next day. We got it running, it ran strong and used little oil, we never took the head off. Farmed hard with it, 40 acres of sandy bottom land melon crop. Dad had a stroke, stopped farming and a neighbor did some dozer work in trade for it.
It took a year, for the mmo to soak thru, much longer than most want to wait, but that's a true story that I saw firsthand, not opinion or speculation. Good luck, if you're not in a hurry it can work, but your mileage may vary.
 

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