Matt Wilson

Ok, good point, will do.

My machinist is now saying that the welding process itself is risky because it can warp the crank, which would be a problem because the crankshaft has already been ground to final dimensions everywhere else. I'm thinking spray-welding would be less likely to cause that kind of problem, though. I'd be a little surprised if no one else on this forum has ever run into this problem, so I'm hoping someone will chime in with their solution.

That's interesting. I've seen three different cranks from 230's, and a 251 crank and I've never noticed those pock marks. In the area where my 265 crank is rough, it's also brown like rust. It's a 1/8" wide band of rust-looking stuff all the way around the circumference of that area, so that's why I think it was caused by moisture sitting between the seal and the crank surface.

I didn't know that the belt devices were called crankshaft polishers, but I thought the same thing - I know those hand-held belt devices will fit right in there. It may take a while to use one of those to knock down a welded area to be smooth and flat with the surrounding metal, but it seems like it should be an option. I'm going to mention that to the machinist. Also seems like a spray-weld operation would be a good candidate for this type of repair, and wouldn't require as much metal removal afterward to smooth it up and bring back into dimension, so I'm going to mention that to the machinist as well.

I agree with that!

Ok, thanks for the enlightenment. Sounds like it's pretty crucial to get it right. Vintage Power Wagons suggested it may be ok to take off a couple thousandths (or maybe more?) from the shaft, and still have the seal fit snugly enough to do its job, as the seal is normally pretty tight against the shaft. But if it comes down to it, I'll look into installing one on the backside of the block.

I've been happy with this machinist so far, other than this issue. I've had much worse, believe me. Still, it's hard to think that he can't make a suggestion on how to remedy it. He just says "that's a common problem with old engines" and says that some engines can be fitted with an alternate seal that is a little smaller diameter than original, so that they will fit a shaft that has been ground down a few thousandths undersize, but I doubt anything like that is available for these engines. As for how rough it is, it seems fairly bad, but it's hard to say for sure without attempting to polish the surface. I believe it got roughened by corrosion, after moisture collected between the seal and the shaft and sat that way for a while, repeatedly for years, most likely. I've seen that before on other crankshafts.

Yeah, I'm surprised the machinist didn't agree, too. By the way, he's not the one who said the thrust flange acts as a slinger. Other folks who have thousands of miles and decades behind these engines are the ones who told me that, so I think it has some credibility, although it's definitely not my first choice to rely on that.

My 265 flathead is at the machine shop, and I dropped in the other day to see how the work was progressing, and I saw that the crankshaft rear main seal surface was rather rough-looking, even though the rest of the crankshaft has been re-worked already. I mentioned it to the machinist, and he said it would be difficult to get that surface looking good. He said he will try polishing it a bit, but that it may not get much better. I asked him about taking it back to the shop that welded the damaged thrust flange, and he said welding it would be feasible, but grinding it back smooth would be the hard part because the shop that did the welding and grinding work does not have a grinding wheel that narrow, and he said such narrow grinding wheels are not common. The area between the flywheel flange and the thrust flange is about 1" wide. The seal is a neoprene type, with the upper half fitting into a recessed groove in the block, and the lower half fitting into a recessed groove in the rear main cap, typical of the later flatheads. If necessary, I suppose I could adapt a seal of the type that bolts to the backside of the block, but I've heard those are not as good as the type I have. Anyone here have any other suggestions? One other point: I've read a couple of posts by people saying that it's not critical for the rear seal to be in good condition on these engines, because the thrust flange acts as a slinger, and by slinging the oil outward from the crankshaft, the oil doesn't have much chance to escape out the back of the engine. If so, then it may not be that important for the seal and seal surface to be in excellent condition? Thanks.

What a great tribute to your dad. I'm sorry for his passing, but it sounds like you have valuable memories of him. And by the way, I love the look of your truck.

Another thing I will add is that, while I don't have any personal experience with cracked blocks, or repairing them, I do remember one time seeing an airport tug with a Chrysler/Dodge flathead six, which apparently had cracked some time earlier in its life, and had been welded. The weld ran along the side of the block, just under the deck, where it mates to the head, from the very front to the very back. The engine seemed to be doing fine, and was in daily use. As best I recall, it didn't have the appearance of being a recent repair, so I got the impression it had been in use that way for quite some time.

Fowl Jeff, I have another suggestion for you, and that is to try Bob Stahl at Veteran Vehicles in Wrentham, Massachussetts. Super-nice guy to deal with, and I know he has 230 bocks for sale. I'm not sure what his return or warranty policy is, but if he says he will take things apart and take measurements and assess the condition of anything, then you can be sure that he will. Of course, he won't have the capability of checking for cracks, but he may be willing to check other things. I seem to remember his prices on engine blocks being significantly lower than those at VPW. Bob does not have a website, but just do a search on "Bob Stahl Veteran Vehicles" and his contact info will come up. Tell him Matt Wilson from Texas sent you. He'll know me. Another option is John Bizal at Midwest Military. I'm pretty sure he has 230 blocks. I've bought a few things from him and always had good service, and numerous other people rave about his quality parts and excellent customer care. I believe he is in Minnesota, and he does have a website. Beyond that, I suggest you go to www.dodgepowerwagon.com and go to the links and suppliers sections, and you'll probably find even more places to try. Good luck! Please let us know how it turns out.

It's possible I misunderstood him, but it seemed pretty clear at the time, as I remember being surprised at him saying that. I was talking to him about performance mods, although not for a super-hot rod, just performance street use in a truck. Maybe he meant that he only uses cast iron heads on performance street engines, and saves the aluminum heads for the real racers. He didn't get into that kind of detail or try to clarify what he might have meant, but by the nature of the conversation, it didn't seem like there was anything else that needed clarifying, and it didn't seem like he was telling me what I should do, but rather it seemed like he was telling me what HE does. What he said seemed more than clear at the time. He said he just shaved the cast iron heads till the compression ratio was where he wanted it.

Thanks, I'll be interested in hearing what your machinist says. Having said that, I also went by my machine shop yesterday afternoon and asked the machinist about this, amongst other things, and he said it's not uncommon for engines to have the valves and seats so close together, and not even uncommon for the seats to overlap some, requiring one of them to be cut to accommodate the other seat, and he said this doesn't cause a problem with the fit of the seats into their respective bores. Unlike your seats, mine were in pretty decent shape, and probably could be re-machined, but I had the same thought as you, regarding the future of fuels. I'm hoping better intake and exhaust seats installed now will prolong the usefulness of my engine as fuel chemistry and quality changes going forward. Plus, the fact that I'm hopping up the engine somewhat seemed to warrant better seats. I'm even getting the exhaust seats replaced with new seats that are supposed to be even harder than the already-hard originals that came in our engines. My valves and seats are made by SBI, which I had never heard of, but my machinist says they make really good products. The valves are made of 21-4N, which has been around for a long time (since the 60's, I believe), but is still considered a fairly premium material for street engines. I'm going to try to find out what material the seats are made of.

Good info. How many miles would you say you've put on your 265 in all that time? Thanks for the input!

One other thing: New out-of-the-box valves should receive a very light cut (skim cut) to make them true. Valves often have a less-than-ideal surface finish on the sealing surface, so the skim cut addresses that. Also, this surface is not always true relative to the stem, so good machine shop practice dictates the skim cut. The cut should only remove a half-thousandth or so. Then you should measure the edge margin (edge thickness) of the valve head afterward, to be sure it meets the required minimum.

Thanks, Elwood. Sounds like you are hedging your bets, like I am. Intake valves and seats are not terribly susceptible to early wear, like the exhaust parts are, but I'd rather have that insurance as long as there's not a great deal of risk involved. Did your machinist make any comment about how close together the intake and exhaust seats are? It seems that there would not be much block material remaining between the exhaust and intake seats after cutting the recesses for the intake seats. Makes me wonder if the interference fit will be as good as it should be, and I want to be sure there's not going to be much of a risk of having a seat come loose later. With all these questions, maybe I'm worrying over nothing, but these are the questions that come to mind.

I think you may be talking about the exhaust seats. Those were definitely hardened from the factory, but I don't think the intake seats were.

Hello all, I'm building up a 265 flathead for my Dodge Power Wagon, and I'm planning to have the machine shop install hardened intake seats, which I bought from Vintage Power Wagons. I've talked to some folks who are of the opinion that these are better than the original cast iron seats that were machined into the block and should be installed for use with today's fuels, especially when doing a performance build, as I am doing (mild or moderate performance build, that is). I don't doubt that they would last longer, being hardened, but I'm having second thoughts and wondering if the benefit warrants the risk. By risk, I mean cutting into the block and possibly running into a water passage. I know people have fitted these engines with intake seats, but you never know when you might have that block with a casting core shift. Cutting into a water passage would ruin the block. So with the above in mind, I'd like to ask how many miles you guys get out of your intake valves and seats before needing replacement. Do you often find much wear of the seats when doing rebuilds? Have you seen much difference do you see in performance engines or under hard use? I suppose another question is how many of you have installed intake valve seats? Did you or your machine shop run into any issues? If I use the stock setup, I can always do a valve job later on, but I'd rather not have to rely on that, as it means I have to either take the block back out of the truck and to a shop, or find a portable valve grinder, or find a shop that has one and is willing to come to me. I intend to keep this truck a long time (already had it 27 years, hopefully another 40 to go!), and I intend to drive it several thousand miles per year, so I want this to be a long-term rebuild. Thanks, Matt

Not as far as I know, but that's a good question. I'll contact them and find out. Thanks for bringing that up.

Well, I spoke too soon. I tried out the new washers I received from Vintage Power Wagons just now, on a 265 rod and a 230 rod, and they are not the right size. They are a little too big. I called VPW just now and they apologized and credited my card on the spot, and said I could return them whenever I get around to it. I appreciate their good service. I spoke with Jens (pronounced Yens) and he said he was pretty sure they have some of those washers, but he actually strongly recommends not using washers at all. He said he recommends having the caps machined to remove the little recess where the washer goes and just use the stock nut directly against the cap, with no washer at all. That is also what Steve from VPW had recommended to me a couple of months ago when I spoke with him about possibly wanting to buy washers. I've been back and forth on this subject and I believe this is the path I'm going to take. I spoke with George Asche, who has rebuilt hundreds of these engines over the course of nearly 70 years, and he said he has always used lock washers if the rods came with them, and never had an issue, but I've heard from other folks who have found broken washers when they disassembled their engines. I don't think it happens that often, but it does happen. They were lucky enough to find them before the joint started loosening, because once that happens, the bolt will almost certainly break before too long. The bolt relies on the pre-load and if that drops much at all, then the bolt starts seeing loads it was never meant to see. Jens at VPW says that Chrysler/Dodge did not use lock washers in their rods in later years, and that most of the rods he has seen, and has in his possession, do not have them, and do not have provisions for them. I have one data point that agrees with that, which is my early 60's 251 (Power Wagons were still using the 251 through most of the 60's), which had no lock washers and no recesses for lock washers when I disassembled the engine, and I'm just about 100% convinced that the engine had never been torn down, so that was the factory original setup. Anyway, my point is, you might consider having your rod caps machined to remove the recess for the washer, so those areas are flat, and then just run stock washers directly against the cap. Torque them to the usual recommended torque (George Asche says he uses 45 ft-lbs, while all of my manuals says 45 - 50 ft-lbs, so there's some range). George uses engine oil on the threads. Jens at VPW uses Loctite. I may use ARP Ultra-Torque fastener assembly lube, but haven't decide completely just yet.

Vintage Power Wagons also has new ones. I just ordered a set of them and they arrived a couple of days ago.

To prime the pump, you need to completely submerge it in a container of oil and spin the shaft until all the bubbles are gone. After that, you need to prime the oil passages. Since the oil pump has a gear that meshes with a gear on the camshaft, it's not possible to stick a flat-bladed screw driver on a drill into the engine to spin the oil pump, like on many other engines, so some other method of pressurizing the oil system is needed. Some people do that by installing the primed oil pump, removing the spark plugs and cranking the engine until they see oil pressure on the gage. With the plugs removed, the engine doesn't develop compression, so the bearings won't be damaged as the engine spins - or so the theory goes. I did that with my first flathead rebuild, but I think there are better alternatives that are less risky to the bearings. Some folks have pressurized the passages with pressurized air tanks that force oil into them. I don't know the details of these setups. There is another option that I plan to use when I'm ready to start my freshly rebuilt engine. I have a spare oil pump, and I removed the gear from it by knocking out the pin that holds it to the shaft. I plan to install that pump on the engine and since the gear is removed, I should be able to spin it up with a drill and a flat-blade screw driver bit. There is a slot in the pump that normally engages the distributor, which should accommodate a flat bit. I'll spin the pump with the drill until I get good oil pressure readings for a few seconds, and then I'll rotate the engine a few degrees by hand, and I'll repeat this until I've rotated the engine at least a couple of full revolutions by hand. That should ensure the oil gets to all the passages. If you have your old oil pump, and if it produces a decent amount of pressure, it would probably be suitable for this purpose. I would take it apart and clean it up well before using it. After pressurizing everything in that manner, I plan to remove the oil pump and prime my new pump and install it onto the engine and then use the starter to spin up the engine (with plugs removed) to further ensure that everything gets well-lubed. The only areas that may not get so well-lubricated by these methods will be the tappets and valves, since they are not fed by pressurized oil, but you will no doubt be coating the tappets and their bores and the adjusting screws and valve guides with oil during assembly. I would recommend you also put oil into the cast cups that are behind the valve covers, which feed the tappets. Also, the cam lobes and the tappet surfaces that contact the cam lobes will need to be coated with cam lube for proper break-in. Usually, an engine with a new or freshly ground camshaft needs to be run at about 1800 - 2000 rpm for something like 20 minutes to ensure proper cam break-in, but follow your camshaft supplier's recommendations. Good luck!

Thanks again for the info. I'm still contemplating this, but will probably have to put it on the back burner for now. I have enough expenses (and labor) associated with the other things I'm doing to my truck at the moment. I think I need to get it up and running first and then see where things stand before I take on another significant job, but the OD still intrigues me. I'll be interested to hear people's experiences with installing and driving with these OD's.

By the way, I'm sure you know this, but others may not. The vehicle must not be driven in reverse, or allowed to roll backwards with the overdrive engaged. There's a sprag or overrunnimg clutch type of arrangement that apparently will be destroyed if operated in this manner. This is based on other research I've done in the last couple of days. The cars equipped with these OD's were setup with electrical lockouts and such, which prevented this type of thing from happening. One could install something similar in our old vehicles, if desired, or at least a bright light on the dash to shiw when it's engaged, to serve as a reminder not to put it into reverse. Also, I understand the OD is not really meant to handle the torque generated with the transmission in the lower gears, and probably should only be used when the trans is in high gear. I read that the clutches will wear out somewhat prematurely, otherwise.