58 641 Ford

[Steve255]

I bought this tractor for 1100 bucks. I was told it was a 57, but based on the serial number I think its a 58. Anyway, it was described to have a "miss". Cylinders 2,3,&4 have 95 psi, I had no compression in cylinder #1, I tore the engine down to find that the head is in great shape, and i have a hole in the center of the piston. All cylinder walls look great, the crankshaft bearings seem good. Do I just throw a piston and rings in cylinder 1? All 4 pistons? Do I need to re sleeve? This is my first tractor. Good fun so far

 

[old]

I would put new rings on all the pistons, if not do a complete rebuild with new sleeves etc. If all you do is put in a new piston and new rings in #1 you will unbalance the engine and it might run strong on #1 and weak on all the rest

 

[Steve255]

That makes sense. Every engine kit i see comes with sleeves, i wasnt sure if that was a standard practice, my cylinder walls are in good shape. So I need Pistons, rings, do i re use the wrist pins, bearings?? Thanks.

 

[john_Bud]

(quoted from post at 18:16:59 04/01/09) I bought this tractor for 1100 bucks. I was told it was a 57, but based on the serial number I think its a 58. Anyway, it was described to have a "miss". Cylinders 2,3,&4 have 95 psi, I had no compression in cylinder #1, I tore the engine down to find that the head is in great shape, and i have a hole in the center of the piston. All cylinder walls look great, the crankshaft bearings seem good. Do I just throw a piston and rings in cylinder 1? All 4 pistons? Do I need to re sleeve? This is my first tractor. Good fun so far

"Good shape" and "95 pounds" don't mix. You are at a point where it is nearly worn out with only 95 pounds of compression. How have you determined that the head and cylinders are in correct shape? Did you measure with a micrometer, bore gauge, etc? It's real hard to say what is good just by eye. "BAD" and "NEW" are easy to tell on sight, the stuff between is hard (at least for me).

I don't mean to be yippity, but it's a lot of work to rip a tractor apart and you don't want to gloss over a step and potentially have to do it again. There are good pictorials on the net showing how to measure bearing clearances with plastigage, bore size with a new compression ring and a few other tricks that can help you out.

While many people do replace just 1 piston, it is a risky thing to do unless you KNOW the exact weight of the pistons. I pulled out one piston/rod from a tractor that was 98 grams lighter than the rest. That un-balance harms things. I would replace all 4 pistons, put in new rod bushings, bearings, rings and have the head gone thru by a shop. Often NAPA stores have a small machine shop in the back. Typical 4 cyl head is 250 or less depending on what they find. Do take special note of the direction mark on the piston and how that relates to the direction mark on the rod. It does matter.

good luck!
jb

 

[Steve255]

Your knowledge is appreciated. My plan is this;
Replace all four pistons, rings and wrist pins.
Replace bearings on both ends of the rods, and
have a shop go through the head. Pretty much
what you are saying. I slept on it, and while i
am cheap, i also dont like doing things twice.
Replacing 1 piston just sound like a bad idea.
I'll keep you posted, thanks.

 

[showcrop]

Does your engine have sleeves? I don't remember where the break was between sleeved and parent bore. Any way have you measured cylinder taper? even though the wall looks good it can still have considerable taper which will result in loss of compression and power.