I have a 97 f250 diesel with a motor that needs a rebuild or be replaced. I found a place where I can get the rebuilt block and heads for $2800 which seems reasonable. I was told that diesels are simple to rebuild in comparison to a gas motors.

would it be worth buying the rebuilt block or rebuiding the motor myself?
How easy is it to rebuild the motor?
Where can I get a good rebuild kit?

 

Are you sure it needs rebuilt?
Many times people think that their engine needs rebuilt, but were misinformed.

 

IH sells a good rebuild kit. also you can get the IH rebuild kit on Ebay from what i hear. its not terribly hard to do the rebuild if you just take your time and pay attention. especially if this would be your first time to rebuild an engine. you need to check all your clearances. for this you can use plastiguage. i would get the bottom end balanced to within 2 grams while your doing it if you can find somewhere to do it. this will help the engine a little with power and durability. the cam and cam bearings shouldn't need to be replaced, but if they do the cam bearings are pressed in so you would have to have a machine shop change the cam bearings for you. also get the block honed or bored and when you do give the machine shop the pistons your going to use in the block so they can get everything just right for your pistons. this way you don't have one bore to big or too small. they can cut the bores for your pistons(no 2 pistons are just EXACTLY the same size, but they are very very close). get you a good manual to look at when your doing this so you know you put the rings in right and everything so you don't have compression leaks. getting heads rebuilt will cost you around $700 or so. i got a set decked w/ new seats, stronger valves, performance valve job, etc and i got out of there for about $1000, but this was performance instead of stock. so i paid more money on springs and seats than you normally would for stock parts. so i could see spending $2000 easily to do a stock rebuild on the bottom end. you will probably spend more than that actually but you know the parts in there will be good if you use IH parts.

if you get the other stuff for $2800 i would just check and see what parts he is using. if he is using IH parts then thats a very very GOOD price, but i don't see how it could be that cheap. just make sure the parts they are using is parts you can trust.

I'm with Phil, why are you thinkin you need to rebuild it???

 

thanks for the response. Actually I bought the truck with the bad motor. The guy i bought it from said the motor always ran funny and one day it stopped. I asked if it would crank and he said no.

any thoughts?

 

Check your engine by putting a socket and breaker bar on the crank and turn it over by hand, if that turns over with ease then check your cranking system. Maybe it will not start because the starter is shot. If you can get that engine running and find that its missing on a cylinder or two, check the UVC harness or valve cover gaskets to the injectors, but untill you get the engine running, anything at this point is a guess. Get that starter working FIRST either by replacing starter, bartteries, battery cables or any combination of the 3.

You'll have to get the cranking system working regardless if you put a new engine in it anyways.

 

The guy I bought it from said he replaced the starter but I'll check the crank and wiring. Thanks

 

what direction should I turn the crank.

 

clockwise

 

I turned the crank clockwise and I got it to move a little. It was enough to move the other pullies. Is that enough info to know if the motor is worth saving?

 

I would try and make a full revolution of the motor with the wrench and if that works move on to the starting system

 

How many miles are on the motor?

 

~160k, to me this motor went out to early

 

Wow, 160K. That's not even half it's life. I'm like the others, theres probably something going on otherwise. I wouldn't think that the motor needs broken apart with only 160k on it.

The crank will probably be very hard to turn due to compression. Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I think these things run at about a 13:1 ratio.

Like someone said in a previous post I would start with the starting system, you will have to have that even if you do a rebuild, then go from there. I feel like once that is done then you should find that the motor will turn over.

Unless someone has treated this motor really bad and filled it with water and let it sit or something. You should be able to get it running.

 

Wow that's not many miles for that motor.

 

ok ok... you know your stuff guys. you're correct, the crank turns, did a full revolution and maybe more. Starter system is next...