Okay, we took a weekend off

It was cold and we thought we'd be more productive if we didn't do anything on the boat and instead, stayed home and enjoyed ourselves. And that's what we did.

First, of course, we had a little shopping to do, but once home, we dived into making a good dinner or two. Frances makes great eggplant and while it's time consuming to cook, it's also really good. Bill was there to help, although how useful he was is up for debate.

Then we were going to fire up our old bread machine and create a nice loaf. This machine was given to us perhaps 20 years ago by someone who had received it as a wedding gift and never used it, so God knows how old it is. It has worked for us many times in the past, creating cheese bread that will melt in your mouth and appear within days on your waistline. Our kind of bread!

Our selection for today was some kind of nut-fruit-chocolate bread, the recipe for which we found in a newspaper. Sounded great. We poured in the ingredients and pushed the "on" button. The machine turned on and began kneading the dough, so we left it and moved on. How bad can it be, we thought?

After preparing the stuff for the bread machine, our plan was to cook one of our favorite meatloafs. (That must be meatloaves, although that sounds strange.) This recipe is also one we must have clipped from a newspaper, given its title: "Suzy's Sweet and Sour Meatloaf."

Actually, it was pretty good. Very tasty with mashed potatoes.

We've attached a pretty silly video. Probably time to hit the delete when you see it.

The output of the bread machine was not so good. It yielded a loaf that was tough and almost tasteless, although the squirrels in our backyard enjoyed it.

The video is silly but, it's the middle of the winter so that happens.

Colder Than a Witch's T*t

It snowed twice this week but nothing much in terms of accumulation. The second time it snowed, the temperature took a dip from 40 degrees down to about 10 at night. Saturday morning when we arrived at the boat, it was 20 degrees in the sun. No big deal. We can handle that easily. Well, that's what we thought.

The inside of the shed was really cold and even with our little electric heater going, the cabin of the boat was like a deep freeze. We set up the lights and put on our blue plastic gloves with our "fagans" (wool gloves with the ends of the fingers cut off) over them.  Even then, our torque wrench felt like ice. The picture above shows Bill beating on a bottle of dish washing liquid with a wrench. Hard as a rock.

But that's enough complaining.

Our concern was that the rocker arm shafts were torqued down properly. The small block Chrysler engine is unlike the GM small block in that there are no studs on which you mount each rocker arm. Instead, the rocker arms are slid onto a shaft. That shaft bolts down to the head. There are spacers that align the rocker arms properly along that shaft.

The specs calls for the shaft (with five bolts and spacers) be torqued down to 200 inch-lbs. That's 16.6 ft. lbs. and we torqued each side down to very close to that spec.

The next step will be to re-mount the intake manifold. While we were contemplating that, our friend Stu paid a visit. He's the guy who helped us get the heavy parts back up onto the boat two weeks ago. Stu is a GM guy but could see that I was going to have to place the intake manifold back down in exactly the right spot on the gaskets. No sliding around. He volunteered to give us a hand with that delicate move and we're going to take him up on his offer.

The intake manifold gaskets are interesting. Fel Pro's marine intake gasket set for this engine has end gaskets that have a peel-off sticky back. The directions have about 500 words of caution about mounting them, particularly where they overlap the side gaskets. We asked about that on the Chrysler Engine Forum where it was suggested that we also put a very thin film of gasket sealant over both the front and rear gaskets. Apparently, others have had problems sealing the end gaskets so we'll take their advice.

Then there are the side gaskets.

Nice quality, but they show their heritage from Chrysler truck engines. Those metallic pieces in the center of each gasket have to be installed in each gasket, which we did. They are for an exhaust gas crossover that is meant to heat the bottom of the carb and improve combustion, particularly during cold starts. They are completely useless for marine applications. In fact, Fel Pro makes marine intake gasket sets for GM small block engines that block off those passages. Unfortunately, nothing like that for Chrysler small block engines That we've been able to find, so we'll have to use these.

New heads on, finally

It's a good thing that we're familiar with planning because this job has needed a lot of it. Sourcing the parts was fairly easy. Bolts, gaskets, heads, manifolds and sealant were all ordered and delivered, but getting all the heavy stuff (heads, exhaust manifolds) from our house the the boatyard and then getting it all up onto the boat was a new problem.

That last lift from the ground to the swim platform was, frankly, beyond us.

We asked our boating friend, Stu Noelte, (who no longer has a boat but is the art teacher for nearby Portland High School) to give us a hand. He showed up right on time and we lugged the parts from our station wagon to the boat. Amazing how easy it can be for two people.

Now it was time to begin assembling everything.

The last thing to come off was the first to go back on, quite naturally, and that was the heads. We struggled with getting the outboard head in place but eventually did it. The inboard head was a lot easier and we were able to bolt them both down. Torque for each bolt (according the Chrysler) was first, finger tight, then 50 ft.lbs. in a particular sequence, then a final 105 ft.lbs on each of the 20 bolts. (We said 120 ft.lbs on the video but that was wrong).

I think we've forgotten what 105 ft. lbs. really means. That, at least for us, was a big pull, and we'll be sending out for new underwear soon. But, we got it done.

On Sunday, we mounted the rocker arm assemblies. We followed the exact sequence we used in disassembly and every pushrod, rocker arm and bolt is back in its original position. We added Permatex Assembly Lube to every friction point. We also vacuumed out the valley under the intake manifold and soaked up all the oil that was trapped in there. That removed a lot of sediment that we'd just as soon not get into our new heads.

Next up is reinstalling the intake manifold, the last big, heavy engine component, and we'll take a whack at that next weekend.

Good Advice

Before we left our summer slip and knowing that we were going to do this head replacement project over the winter, we asked a good friend if he had any advice. Our dockmate, Ron, took the time to tell us about some things that we'd want to pay careful attention to because he knew a lot about Mopar engines.

Ron crossed the bar in early December and he is missed.

Every time we set a gasket (be careful with certain of them, he told us) or turn in a new bolt (you need all new bolts, just do it, he said) we think of him.

Don't know how much more we can say except thanks. We think of you often, Ron, and will continue to do so for as long as we're around.

Heads off but first, the water pump

We had a great Christmas and spent some time together cooking and laughing. Time well spent, as far as we're concerned.

This weekend we went back to the boat. We'll be lugging down all the new parts, each of which seems to weight at least 50 lbs. The new heads and the exhaust manifold are in boxes, which makes handling them a little easier. The intake manifold doesn't have box so getting it up on the boat will take some careful effort.

As we cleaned up the mating surfaces and got ready to mount the outboard head, we took a look at the raw water pump for that engine. We've never changed an impeller on it in the six seasons we have had the boat and it pumps seawater just fine. However, when we bought the boat it had two replacement pumps on board and, since the pump is (relatively) easy to get to with the upper end of the engine disassembled, we decided to install one of the new pumps. The old pump was a Sherwood and the new one a Jabsco, but they appeared identical.

Its worth noting that these pumps are expensive - $380 each - and it isn't possible to simply change the impeller as you would with most seawater pumps. You can buy a rebuild kit but to use it, you must remove the pump and the pulley, which is pressed onto the shaft. All the more reason to replace it now, which we did. If we have time, we'll do the port engine as well.

Of course, we got to learn all about how Chrysler went about mounting the pump. It has a bracket that  bolts to the circulating pump with two 9/16" brass bolts. The pump mounts on the top bolt and the bottom one slides along a slotted arm so that the drive belt can be adjusted. Sounds good but it wasn't easy. We laid across the top of the engine (mating position, kinda) and reached down under the front to extract and then reinstall those two bolts.

We got it mounted okay but couldn't push the inlet hose back on. Then we removed the new pump completely, coated the inside of the inlet hose with dish washing liquid and forced it in place. Eventually, that worked. Elapsed time about two hours. Doesn't look like we're going to do this for a living.

Before we left on Sunday afternoon, we spent some time cleaning up the mating surfaces on the inboard exhaust manifold that we've decided to keep. It really doesn't look bad at all and since we're  basically cheap New Englanders, we'd really like to re-use it. But, now we wonder.

We're going to give this some thought. It's one of the last things we have to replace so we have some time. $350 for a new one is a half a tank of marine gas. Doesn't sound so bad when you think of it that way.

We've added some video. We've started narrating and while Bill looks like an old vagrant, it does add a dimension that old videos didn't have. Now all we need to get him better lighting, cleaner clothes and more hair.

Heads off

The thermometer in the cabin must have been off because it felt a lot colder than 34 degrees when we arrived at the boat on Saturday.  But, we were there, determined to get the cylinder heads off the engine this weekend. Our little electric heater cranked the temp up to a nearly tropical 40 degrees in no time and we were ready with a large hammer and pry bar to get those heads loose.

It really only took a couple of taps and the inboard side head came free. We had been worried about lifting it but it was really quite easy. We had drained that side of the engine but we still got some antifreeze in the cylinder bores, all of which we got out.

The inboard head really didn't look that bad but the problems are with cylinders 5 and 7 and those are on the other side.

Love  those Puppy Pads for soaking up the grease.

Then we tackled the outboard head, (the one closest to the hull) the one more difficult to reach. It came off, too, and we set it up in the cockpit. (We have better muscles than we thought we had.)

The photo isn't very clear but you can see the rusty #5 intake valve.

The video will show it more clearly, but this is the cylinder with  just 95 lbs pressure. The combustion chamber is also full of crud. The head gasket doesn't look bad but the exhaust manifold on that side might be where the water was getting in. That manifold doesn't look all that good and as part of this project, we're going to replace it.

We've lined up all the old parts so they can be taken off. We're going to wrap them in old towels to make them a little easier to handle but getting them from the swim platform down to the ground should be cute.

We've also been busy after work during the week cleaning up the intake manifold and the two valve cover gaskets, all of which were rusty and coated with crud. We stripped, primed and painted the valve covers and they look like new.

The mounting bolts and washers got the same treatment after we mounted them on a piece of scrap plywood to protect the threads.

The intake manifold was a lot of work. First, we sprayed it with degreaser and flushed that off with a hose. Then we hand-scraped the remaining rust and crud off, and finished it off with a wire wheel. After masking, we used Rustoleum Rusty Metal Primer before the final Rustoleum Sail Blue.

Frances says that I'm a nerd for doing all this extra cosmetic work but I'd rather put clean engine parts back on than take the lazy way out.

We're down to mounting the new heads. We took everyone's advice and will replace not only the head bolts (that must be replaced, as we understand it) but all the mounting bolts and washers on the exhaust and intake manifolds.

That effort started us hunting for bolt sets for the Chrysler 360 engine. The usual suspects such as Summit Racing had them but at a price that we thought was way out of line. Then we remembered our last engine rebuild project more than 10 years ago when we went to Bolt Depot www.boltdepot.com in Weymouth, Mass. for what we needed. Bolt Depot is a real, family operated retail store and they had every Grade 8 bolt we needed on their beautiful website for less than $30. They are going into our boat maintenance folder as a great source.

Waiting for winter

The weather has been excellent and when we left the boatyard on Sunday, it was warm and clear. Before we left, we took some still photos of some of the boats, most of which were covered in shrink-wrap,

We know many of these boats, having been here, at least in the winter, for almost 30 years. And we knew their owners and their propensity for Budweiser.

But, time passes and we still have our boat here for the winter.

Sometimes, when we leave, we take pictures of the boats in storage. Most will live again next spring. Some are owned by a bank that probably shouldn't have made the loan in the first place and some others will never see the water again. Those are the boats that are seeing the last years of their life. We think about how much fun people must have had on them; how many kids learned to steer at that now discolored helm; how many people caught and bragged about their big fish from that deck.

These old boats have memories and as hard as we listen, they never give up their history. One can only imagine...\

Removing the head bolts the hard way

How would you like to find these 10 bad boys in your bed? Three lengths, depending on where they go. It took us about an hour to get all 10 out, We used a 6-point, 3/4" socket on a 16-inch breaker bar and we have to say that they were difficult to bust loose. Our bet is that they've been in there since this boat was built.

We began by taking off the rocker arm assembly from the hull-side of the engine and stashing those parts away with everything kept in the same order. The pushrods - actually all of the valve train parts - looked fine and quite clean.

We also removed the alternator and a couple of other cooling hoses that will get in the way once we pull those old heads off.

When we got down to those inboard head bolts, our morning friskiest faded fast. Those bolts are hard to get off. Next step is to get a longer breaker bar or, failing that, a quick change of underwear. We really don't want to walk funny for the next week.

We're also going to have an issue with getting the old heads off and the new heads onto the boat. The heads weigh about 35 lbs. each and we're going to have to get some help picking the old ones up to the cockpit, then up to the deck and then down a ladder to the ground or to the swim platform, where they can be taken off.

Sunday: A bigger breaker bar does it

It's amazing what happens when you use the right tool. We bought a 25-inch, 1/2-inch drive breaker bar at Harbor freight on our way to the boat.  $12.95 well spent. The remaining head bolts gave up without any issue. Size does matter, it seems.

We also disconnected lots of little things that were bolted to the heads such as the dipstick tube, the lifting rings and the box that contains the engine circuit breaker. Once the heads were completely disconnected, they didn't exactly jump of the block. We pried and tapped but no, they aren't going to come off without a fight. We'll put some muscle behind it next weekend and see if we can get them off.

Yes, this is taking a while

We know that some of our dock mates could change these cylinder heads in a weekend or less but unfortunately, we can't. We captain a desk all week, thinking of amazingly effective promotions for our clients. On Saturday morning, we put on our old clothes and headed to the boat. We haven't swapped heads in more than 15 years so we've gotten a little stale (and older). Don't worry. We'll get this done.

In the meantime, we post these blogs and their associated videos, which we enjoy planning and editing. No Academy Awards, but it still helps us keep up with how video is done these days, and of course, for those of you who know us, it's a way to keep in contact over the winter.