i had a brand new start short out and fried the other day when driving. when i took the starter back to advanced auto the guy noticed that the pilot ring ( about a 1/4" in height) on the starter that mounts in the bell housing plate had been ground down to the mounting surface of the starter. It looks like the fly wheel had ground the half moon shape out of the starter pilot ring.

There just so happend to be a mechanic from a ford dealership in the store at the same time and asked if my fly wheel had been replaced? I told him i just had a well renowned transmission shop locally install my clutch assembly and they had turned my fly wheel to resurface it. He then said that the bearings that hole the crank in place axially were probably worn out and was causing the flywheel to move axially resulting in destroying my starter. he asked how many miles were on the truck and i told him 301k....he shook his head and said he would bet that thats exactly wahts wrong and the only way to fix it was to pull the motor and replace the crank bearings.

i went back home and looked under the hood and i just so happen to look at my serpentine belt and saw that a few rows of the serpentine belt had been shaved off. this makes me believe that what he said is highly possible.

has anyone had this issue before or know what else would be causing this?

 

Trust bearings are badly worn down or even gone, with a manual trans every time you push in the clutch the main shaft is forced forward in the block. Thrush bearings prevent that.

Some motors drop the pan find the trust bearings laying in it, not common but happens (dependent on type of trust bearing too). Gone on to point tear up the block, requiring build up with weld then machined to accept/fit new bearings.

Take a suitable bar, pry the main shaft froward as far as you can easily move it, then pry it the other way to the rear, do best you can to get a measurement how far it moves.

If you can visually see yourself drifting it fore and aft in the block? you can actually do so in the truck fully assembled? yea you gotta problems you're gonna have to deal with.

 

Another possibility the shop resurfaced your flywheel taking off so much to true it they had to shim it back to make of for some or all of the material removed. If so new FW would have been the better option if had to go to that extreme, needing that much removed.

Went to far or simply far enough to work yet but to cause starter clearance issues with the teeth on the flywheel when bolted in place, nose cone just a tad too long now.

You'd have to ask them about it, odds are they wouldn't notice and or even check for trust bearing issue reclutching one.
They'd have to know about it going in or suspect it something they seen during the process at some point causing them to investigate further.

 

i talked to a few motor heads at work and they seem to confirm that the thrust bearings are probably worn out and thats whats causing the crank to shift forward and backwards axially...always something!

So now that it looks like i will be pulling the motor and replacing them...i have a wild idea to just do a 408 stroker kit and rebuild it right since ill have everything apart. I talked to Brian from ADP (did a bunch of research on his porducts) and he pointed me to the cast steel crank stroker kit

Scat *Special* 408 Street Stroker Kit [1-94165] - $1,099.00 : AD Performance, Your Source for Longblock Performance Parts

if i were to purchase this, anyone else have any advice what else i would need to make this a bullet proof build? I would def like to upgrade my heads and cam. anything else i should take into account?

 

another alternative is to just do a stock 351w rebuild and bore out to .030 and get the block all cleaned up and some new forged dish pistons and all that jazz. just trying to figure out whats the best combo to do to beef up the motor with some awesome TQ. any suggestions?