kohler bearing shells?

Don B.

Member
I have a K321 in the machine shop as we speak. Having bored out 0.010", valves done, etc. Pretty basic stuff there. but I have an issue. The crank is already 0.013" under, needs to go 0.020" to clean it up and make it usable. The machinist has suggested taking an old rod (of which I have a couple here) he can bore it out and put inserts into it all the way to 0.040-under.
I have definitely heard of this (largely among the puller guys) and am interested since the only "20-under" rods I can find are aftermarket offshore sourced parts. I honestly do not have much faith in aftermarket offshore parts, and even though it costs more, try to stay with OEM internals.

All that said, anyone else here ever done that to a Kohler rod? All I need is a part number for the bearing. I have heard that the bearing they used for these, was standard issue in an old Continental engine (which I also know that you do not see in use much anymore, these days)
 
I've got several of those engines still running that had the rods bored out by an old machinist for what he said were Continental bearing inserts, no issues.

Shouldn't be very tough for a machine shop to figure out a part number if they still have a stack of paper catalogs around listing parts by dimension.
 
Had my new Alcoa forged rod machined for a Clevite 77 rod bearing insert for a Continental 4 cyl engine. Knowledgable parts guy should be able to find the right bearing.

The guy that did my machining on the rod has a popular website for mostly Cub Cadet garden tractor pulling, No, not Midwest Super Cub, but he did a terrible job machining my rod. Looked like he ground it with a Dremel tool. Miserable to deal with too.

Kohler used an Alcoa forged aluminum rod in the K-361 OHV engine in certain applications. Dave Kirk's website has the part number. I doubt there's any left. I bought mine 15 years ago. Couple of us built Killer Kohler K-321's instead of Dave Kirk's K-301. And K-341's were WAY too darned expensive back then! Any block without a hole blown in the side by a broken rod was $500+. I paid $125 for my K-321 with std bore, std crankshaft, carb, pto clutch, gas tank and all tin.
 
ok I think I found it, though all of the DIY auto parts websites and the Clevite site shows "no parts found" when I punch up the number. I did find a set of 4 on EPay though, have them coming... std., 0.010, and 0.030 seem more popular... Its a 62 cu in Continental... there is a "up to" and after" serial number break, I got the "after" though I did not see any difference in pics between them.
found a single for $32, got a set of 4 coming for $72 delivered with no tax.... I have another 14 (this one a Magnum version) and a pair of K341s to do once this K321 is done...
I remember seeing something a few years ago on Brian Miller's site and wondered then if it was a legit setup for a tractor that would be worked vs one that would run a few minutes at a time as a puller.....
 
ok, next Q....as long as my rod doesn't have any signs of fatigue or overheating, I figure it oughtta be OK to reuse. In talking to others though I keep hearing doom and gloom stories about reusing a rod... I'd rather have good old US made craftsmanship than made-overseas cookie cutter, spit em out-as-fast-as-possible, whether they are a quality part or not mentality, I figure a used OEM rod, modified for an insert "can't" be any worse than some of this offshore crapola people are selling now a days, right?

I also like the idea of changing the insert for a different undersize than to change the whole rod..... I have a few of these engines to rebuild, that means I can use any of the rods I have on any of my engines with just an insert change....
 

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