Well, my 81 is good for the road right now but it wont see it until april. My 80 is't that far from finish it needs body/paint and few other minor things. My 78 is on a waiting list for full restoration.

 

lol alright man sounds like your pretty much good to roll once spring comes around, hopefully I'll be that way by then too.

 

alright, for now these are the pics I've got.
This is right after Ipulled the valve cover




I couldn't find the rod or lifter lol it's an easter egg hunt! who can find it first!, I'm still betting on its in the oil pan, I'm pretty sure the lifter is what went through the pan it was either a lifter or a socket and I'm not missing any tools so yeah lol I'm actually excited for pulling the engine so I can dissect it and see.

 

Turning the crank is not polishing it with sandpaper. It's actually what Damon said about having the main and rod journals turned down in .010" incrmemnts. Often you'll hear someone say they had their crank "turned 10-10, or 10-20". That means they had either .010" off the mains, and either .010" or .020" off the rods.
Bearings for rods and mains come in various thicknesses for whatever the crank needs to be turned to. Run from any shop that will turn a crank more than .030" since taking more than that off severely weakens the crank.
Align boring the mains is the same as sizing the rod caps; you simply trim metal offf the mating surface where it meets the block, then run a hone through the entire 5 mains and align them back to factory size and spec.
Sizing the rods is a two part thing. You hone them for roundness and also stretch or shrink the length to get them to factory specs.
If you want to get really carried away you can have it balanced and blueprinted. That involves every part checked and adjusted to get to exact factory specs, then every rotating part balanced and matched for weight. Very spendy, and not needed for most street engines.
All this is stuff you need to have done by a machine shop, as it takes equipment most of us don't own or know how to operate.

 

took the heads off the 400 today took some pics left sides good and clean, right side not so much





Idk if its nasty from water or coolant getting in there from the open spark plug hole or if it was from before from a bad seal.
But on the pistons I'm guessing they were flat tops bored into dished tops. But I'm gonna need new ones most likely, the nasty one is pitted and chipped from corrosion so that bumps it from a $200 rebuild kit to $500

 

First Vall is right I used sandpaper like it was the only way to machine a crank. I just didn't want to type everything I ever learned about a crank lathe. I seen one with a stone wheel on tv today. It was a long post without that. All good.

What is not good? That piston turned 45* in its bore.

OMG Dude I don't know what to tell you. Your luck sucks. That motor needs help in a major way. I thought, ahh a crank polish and a new set of bearings and he'll be on his way. After looking at that. Holy Sh** You need to autopsy the 400. The reliefs for the valves, those eyebrow looking things. Need to and always will be in line with each other. The rust in the cylinder head indicates moister from somewhere.

 

I keep flipping back and forth and can't see what caused all those dings in the piston top. The piston being turned like that means its not attached to anything anymore. Or the rod is bent in the same way. Time to flip it over and see what really happened.

As for your other motor, you might be right. Like I said I'll never say it won't happen because stuff flies around pretty fast in there.

 

lol slow down, slow down, to much to fast. I'm gonna guess at what you mean okay.
#1 the piston turned 45* in its bore I take it your refering to the nasty one thats turned slightly clockwise?
#2 reliefs for the valves??? they're gonna need work I figured that, probably will use my 350 one's though idk.
#3 eyebrow looking things? being aligned?
#4 moister could just be from the plug holes being open but idk
#5 dings in the top of the piston top I can address, alright so they look like originally they were flat tops with the dimples like this pic Or this one but imo it looks like they bored them out into a dish top piston like this one idk why to lower compression I guess
And as for getting it flipped and looked at It'll be awhile, till I get my stand but I gotta get the balancer off first lol how do I do that? the bolt is already out I need a puller yes?

 

oh I get it now the valve reliefs are the things in the piston top. Well what dings do you mean then? if on the nasty piston, what I'm supporting my bored out flat top to dish top piston theory on is the bad grinding looking nics on the top of that piston and a couple others
But yeah it has issues, in the left head theres something in the water way lol some random crap that I can't get pulled out that just rattling around in there the pic I took doesn't really show what it looks like though
in the pic you can only see the cylindrical leg but thats attached to a triangle type thing with another cylindrical leg offset on the opposite side

 

Those look like run of the mill dish pistons. Stock maybe. No stampings in the center to say there oversized. I never hear of any one "boring" a dish into a piston. The rust could be from the plug being out.

The valve reliefs look like eyebrows, right? They should be straight across. The pics you posted of pistons all have a pin in them. The wrist pin keeps the rod and piston hooked together. Know think of how all that is oreintated inside the engine. The slight rotation of that piston says something came apart.

And for that piece in the water jacket, beats me. I almost thought it was a tube of some sort. But then you say its loose? As in floating around in there? Pull it out and get a look at it.