Okay, I took the head to a local machine shop and he noticed right away that one of the exhaust valves was too far into the head. He said the seat was wore down and I needed to have a harded seat installed in all the exhaust ports. Also of the couple of valves he took out while I was standing there, the guides were wore pretty badly. He showed me how there was a "liner" installed inside the guide to shim it back out. So he is going to install new guides also. After all that, I came home and took the other head off to have worked on also. One of the exhaust valves was sunk in just like the first head. So now it will be about $300 for the head work plus gaskets and such.

Long story short....DON'T buy HESCO engines!!

 

glad you are moving along so well.

don't you think you overheating the 'hesco' engine did it some harm?

if you did not overheat it maybe they would have fixed it for you.

have you talked to them at all?

hope it does not turn out too expensive for you.

 

Well they put three of the heat tabs on the engine. One on each head and one on the block. Two of them have fell off, but luckily the one on the driver's side head was still in tack and not melted. It did come off after I was looking at it, but at least it proves I did not over heat the engine. I have left Hesco a message and I am going to try to get a hold of them today. Hopefully they will at least cover the expense of the one head that was leaking through.

I'll keep you posted on the progress.

 

I talked to Hesco and they are sending me another set of heads through the Napa store that I bought the motor from. I asked if they could just give me some money to get mine rebuilt because I really did not trust anything they sent me, but they said that is the only way they will do warranty work. So they are suppose to be here on Tuesday and I will take them to my machine shop and let him take a look at them before I install them. He said they will reimburse me for the gaskets and such and also pay me labor to do the job. Maybe the labor will make up for having the new heads worked on.

Does anyone know the labor rate (time) that is required for both heads? The warranty says they pay up to $50 per hour for all labor.

I really would rather just pay to have them done right than to go through all this again in 17k miles. But hopefully the ones they send me will require less work than the ones I have now.

I will keep you posted.

 

sounds like they are working with you.

try not to get mad at them.

you are doing all you can do and it will work out just fine.

if you need any torque setting for anything just ask.

 

The new heads came in yesterday. They are in very good condition. Only two valve guides in one head have the liners. The valves look like they are all brand new. I am having the two guides with liners in them took out and new guides installed.

I am still not sure if they will honor the warranty or not because of one of the heat tabs being gone. Anyway, I am going today to get a gasket set and oil, anti freeze, etc. The head should be done today or tomorrow so maybe I can get it all done by the end of the weekend.

I still would like to know the amount of time that the official repair guides say to pull off both heads and reinstall them. I want something to go by when it comes time to get paid for the labor.

 

alldata should have that info for you.

go to a library that offers the service in your area.

 

If you want to run 2XPlat, W/stock gop, A/C delco 2XPlat Finewire RapidFires is the best plug I've used especially if if you run w/ timeing bumped up a bit. Look for a hairline fracture of your cap. If I had an engine right out of the crate, I think that would be a good time to upgrade to a brass cap & rotor. The higher compression resistance dosen't mix well w/ poor spark output.

 

motorcraft copper plugs are the best for this engine imho.

 

These were until I tried the Finewires. they run pretty cool for Plats. At 14 BTDC w/ 87 octane and no sign of ping. For gap stretching though, it's back to Motorcraft.

 

Remove & Reinstall both sides: 9.3 hrs. with A/C: + .2 hrs.

 

Thanks ymeski56!

Finally, I have it all together and running. Everything seems to be ok. I have a little valve train noise, but maybe no worse than it should be. The truck runs as good if not better than it ever has. I did get some pinging at WOT but after filling up with 93 octane that has went away.

I drained the oil and put cheap Napa oil and Napa filter on then drove it 20 to 30 miles. Then drained it again and added 5W30 Mobil 1 with the motorcraft filter. The coolant level was a little low this morning after driving it for the first time last night. I know I probably got some more air out of it but hopefully it is not leaking out. (I am very pessimistic after having all the trouble I have had).

A little quick history:

The oil pressure idiot gauge used to work just fine. When I installed the new motor I installed a new sending unit and it showed great pressure for the first 12 miles then went real low (sometimes way below normal). I never heard any excessive noise so I let it be. This time I put on a manual gauge and showed 55psi at cold idle, about 35psi at warm idle, and about 45psi at warm 2000 rpm. The needle jumps back and forth too (I don't know if that means anything or not). Then I installed a new sending unit and the pressure has generally been right in the middle. But as I was coming home a few minutes ago from a long drive, the needle went up to the upper range and then would drop back to a little below the middle. It did this a few times. I thought the gauge just showed 'some' pressure if it was reading at least 7psi. If that is the case, why would it move around?

Anyway, all seems fine and Hesco seems to be honoring the warranty just fine. I will keep you posted on that.

Thanks for all the help.

 

glad you got her back together.

it's miller time!