farmal 1956 100 freeing frozen engine

Anyone have any magic way to unfreeze a stuck engine?

A lot depends on how and why it is not turning.

If it was running, and seized or locked up, nothing short of a tear down and autopsy will fix it!

If it stuck while stored, sometimes they can be loosened up by soaking the cylinders with light oil,like ATF, penetrating oil, etc.

Again it depends on how bad it is stuck. If just condensation, good chance it will break loose. But if it sat with liquid water entering the cylinders, or was submerged in a flood, probably not.

First thing to do is try to get a look into the cylinders. If there is water in them, try to blow it out best you can. Then get some oil in the cylinders and let it sit for a few days.

Loosen the oil drain plugs, engine, transmission, hydraulics, anywhere there is an oil reservoir, let any water out before trying to turn it over. If there is a lot of water in any reservoir, be sure to go back and change the oil if it does run.

The safest method of breaking it loose is with the starter and a good, hot battery. With the plugs still out, start bumping the starter, see if it will move. Once it does move, there is a good chance there will be stuck valves. Best take the valve cover off and look things over.

Also, expect the carb and fuel tank to need attention, the governor may be stuck, the points will need cleaning, change the oil immediately if it does start.

There are other methods to break one loose, like prying on the starter gear, pulling it in a high gear... But there is a danger of breaking something. Generally if soaking the cylinders with oil and hitting the starter doesn't do it, it will need to come apart.

I've heard that a 50/50 mix of ATF and kerosene works well.

If I would find any water in the oil pan I didn't fool with oil in the cylinders. I would take the head off to see with my own eyes what I was dealing with.

This is what I find most of the time.

Eh, a little WD-40 and some Crisco and you're good to go! *LOL*

One of the things I do a lot of is free up locked up engines and have had pretty good luck but one has to do some trouble shooting before trying to do so.
#1 you need to make sure the cylinder do not have any water in them. If they have any water in them at all you need to remove the water first or nothing will free them up.
#2 if dry fill them with ATF and let it sit for a fee days. Pull one plug at a time them put the spark plug back in to keep dirt etc out. Once all the cylinders are full pour ATF down the exhaust pipe if it has a vertical exhaust.
#3 then after a week or so pull the plugs out and set a 12 volt battery in it and use short fast taps on the starter button. Watch the crank shaft pulley for any movement. If it moves some keep the short fat taps on the starter. If no movement wait a week longer and trey again. If it does not free up after sitting a month that way it will only free up if you take it apart

also heard from an old fellow a trick that may work he said it worked overtime with out fail
soak old burlap sack pieces in deisel fuel set them in the headless block light them let them burn
to out them gently turn the crank back and forth till it went once around then disassemble clean
and do what ever needed to reassemble new running able condition ( hone replace rings etc)

No water in engine, valves aren't stuck. Been soaking in atf for about a week with no lubk
Been trying to turn it with hand crank with spark plugs out. No luck. Been thinking about putting it in gear and bump it with my truck.
What kind of damage can I don't by bumping it?

If you do a search for stuck engine in the archives you will find lots of cases to study, as well as examples of what happens when you get impatient and try towing. A far easier alternative to the hand crank is to jack up one rear, put it in low gear and try rocking it. don't rush it. Switch to another project and just try rocking the rear tire every other day or so.

Pulling it or bumping it that way can break rods which is not good. Does it have a starter?? If ti does that is the way to go to free it up

Thanks that's what I been doing.

Yes it has a starter, tried that, but my battery not up to speed. Used a charger to bump it but not quite the same as a fully charged battery.
I'm gonna keep rocking it for a while to see what happens.
Is there anything else in that engine that can be stuck besides the pistons, like the governor or hydraulic pump? Those are all driven off the timing gear.

Not likely to be anything in the engine but could be a locked up transmission so it would be a good idea to block the clutch pedal down when trying to spin it over. As for the battery use one out of your car or truck

Chackbay, I am giving you credit for having enough smarts to not figure out some way to rock it hard enough with a rear wheel to bend or break something. Patience is the key.

Dam sure don't want to break nothing. Bad enough I have to change the fuel tank and grill. Retirement don't give you much fun money.

I have had good luck with a couple of frozen or setup engines with first using a concoction such as OLD suggests, then letting it set for a day or 2, then prying on the flywheel teeth with a small prybar in one direction and then back the other direction and eventually gaining a little over several days until it came free. Typically it is the rings that are sticking due to rust. The first attempts often amount to just putting a little tension in one direction and then in the other.

Before jumping into the deep end do you know the tractor isn't locked in 2 gears or the starter is stuck against the fly wheel?

Pretty sure transmission is not locked up, I can shift it in and out of gear. I can roll the tractor if transmission is in neutral. Been rocking it back and forth in gear trying to unstick it. Not sure about the starter.

Here is a bad stuck engine that in rebuilding it about seven years ago that I only used new rings, bearings, valves and some new gaskets that I couldn't cut myself. I found used sleeves and pistons that were in spec. Filed and fit the bearings to a used crankshaft that was undersize a little but within .0015 of round. It took more time than buying new parts but was to prove you do not need all new parts to build an engine that will give you the same service as spending lots of money. Since the rebuild it has been my main mowing tractor for six years. It helps to have the tools. The link will take you to this engine but you can look around at more pictures of other engines and tractors as well.
By Click Here

A set of tools, a hydraulic press instead of a sledge hammer and a gasket/bearing set. After you clean the dirt and rust from the engine you will be glad you did not attempt to rotate it.
The engine was not in factory fresh condition when parked, it has not improved since. Yanking, prying and jerking will break parts $$$ and not save money.

Yes!

(quoted from post at 07:14:15 03/18/17) Yes!

Click to expand...

have a 42 B that had the same symptoms your describing couple of old timers told me the starter was locked up. pulled the starter turned it over with the hand crank with no problem. put the starter back in and it fired up with the starter. no idea how the starter could cause the problem but its only two bolts to find out . saved me a lot of fixing

First off, I'm going to say I would NEVER try to roll a stuck motor with the starter. EVER. A problem motor doesn't need more work by chipping or breaking flywheel or bendix teeth, nor does a starter need to be pushing against a locked load, putting "locked rotor" currents (upwards of 400A, even at 6V) through just a couple poles of the commutator for an extended period, unless you want to replace the starter too. That's just me, and some (here and elsewhere) will gladly tell you I know nothing. Read on for further proof.

Except in instances nearly as rare as hen's teeth, a stuck motor, for whatever reason, is not going to fix itself even if you get the pistons moving again.

I recently picked up a Super A with a stuck motor. Took it to a buddy's garage (because he had some free space). First thing I did is pull the head. Two of the cylinders showed some pretty significant surface rust (though not nearly as bad as Dick L's photo). Scraped out what i could, soaked it with penetrating oil in the cylinders and gave it a few days to set.

We put the tranny in "high" (4th) gear (not "low", because in "high" you are pushing the engine as slowly as possible with the rear end) and rocked it GENTLY back and forth, and sure enough, it broke free. Yay, right? Nope. Dropped the pan and pulled the pistons, found 3 stuck rings: 1 on #2, 2 on #3. Checked the sleeve bores and piston dimensions - sleeves .0015 to .002 over maximum spec. Pistons .001-.003 undersize and slightly oval. Rod journals .0015-.002 under min spec. Haven't measured, but wrist pins seem sloppy as well.

Could I have just "gotten it free and run it"? Probably, but it would have done nothing for the stuck rings and other worn parts, other than gotten to a point of needing a complete rebuild in a very short time of use, if not causing even more significant damage, like the #2 rod journal that was starting to gall.

In short, if an engine runs acceptably, I'll keep up with the maintenance and keep running it. If it hasn't run in a while, the odds are good that it needs at minimum a through inspection, from the inside. If everything checks out alright and all it needs is gaskets to put it back together, so much the better for knowing it's OK, not just a hope and a prayer and the privilege of paying extra when it fails, as it will. It's that "ounce of prevention vs pound of cure" thing.

Just my couple coppers. YMMV. Your tractor: your choices.