Murphy H. Gasket Progress. UPDATE. Bad Lifter Q.

[Sonicfrog]

Here are some of the details on the job so far. That post is two weeks old. I have been busy with school and stuff and the gasket job has been on the backburner. One thing I left out. The long intake manifold bolt broke off in the passenger side head, and one of the hollow bolts that provides coolant to the turbo also broke off in the same head. Any one questioning why I named the car "Murphy"???

 

PS. I am supposed to go to the "Yard" tomorrow with a friend. I am thinking about picking up an 86-ish old school dash and the apropriate sensors. Have the FSM diagrams that were posted by Subie81 ready for the job. Wish me luck. And then, some time down the line, I WILL put a 5 spd hi/lo tranny in the thing and ditch the A/T forever:headbang:

 

PPS. Will have to fix the A/C though, before it starts getting warm here in CA.

[Sonicfrog]

It's the next day. Went to the junk yard. I pulled a long intake manifold bolt and the hollowed out cooling bolt for the turbo. I also got the oil pressure sensor for the analogue dash. I did find an 87 analogue dash that was in a turbo hatch, but I'ld rather have the 85 - 86 dash with the orange backlights, so I didn't get it. Plus it started to rain so I called it a day.

 

PS. I did get a replacement electric window switch for the mates' 99 Cougar. The original was shorting out. Fun car to drive, but man, when Ford designed this car, they really didn't make quality job one... or two, or three for that matter. And if you're going to make a car that breaks a lot, at least you could make it easy to fix.

 

PPS. There was a 92 SVX at the yard. Pretty trashed. I was sad when I saw it.

[Sonicfrog]

UPDATE: Finally had time to pull the driver side head off. One hydraulic lifter (on #1 I think) is a bit squishy. Any way to rehab it? Also what is the recomended way to remove carbon deposites from the piston heads?

 

Oh, and can a bad lifter cause a higher than normal CO2 reading on a smog test???

[kayakertom]

It's easy to pop off the caps on the lifters, disassemble and clean them. The spring inside is not very stiff, so squishy is good. If there is debris/dirt they do get hard to compress or pump-up under oil pressure. If the lifters are not acting properly, then it will definitely affect emissions and power. Reassemble the lifter cap using a socket and a light hammar tap.

 

I rotate each piston to top of stroke before removing carbon and never get anal about removing all of it.

 

UPDATE: Finally had time to pull the driver side head off. One hydraulic lifter (on #1 I think) is a bit squishy. Any way to rehab it? Also what is the recomended way to remove carbon deposites from the piston heads?

 

Oh, and can a bad lifter cause a higher than normal CO2 reading on a smog test???