1967 International COE, Small Adventure

I was thinking Whistling Kitty Chaser would have been better after I posted. Seems I was still only close.

There was a famous bush plane on the West coast of Canada called "The whistling E36 M3house".

In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :

LOL, being COE it would literally sound like your bunghole is whistling. 

Whoskerdaddy

I'm still wandering around CL for no good reason. This one has a built in slide for the kids, so that's a plus. 

Edit: I keep staring at this picture. The thing I love about these trucks visually is the rear doors, which are clearly front doors. I can imagine someone in design asking "won't that look too ugly?" and the response being "not to the kind of people that buy them".  There is a brutal utility to it that's endearing. 

In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :

That seems like a huge amount of truck (both literally and figuratively) for the money.

It suddenly dawns on me that one of these things is close to being able to do a new twist on the classic GRM drive-there-and-tow-home, wherein you load your existing car onto the new purchase for the return leg...

mazdeuce - Seth said:

I'm still wandering around CL for no good reason. This one has a built in slide for the kids, so that's a plus. 

Edit: I keep staring at this picture. The thing I love about these trucks visually is the rear doors, which are clearly front doors. I can imagine someone in design asking "won't that look too ugly?" and the response being "not to the kind of people that buy them".  There is a brutal utility to it that's endearing. 

Not to mention the bottom lines savings in execution/design versus appearance sake......keep them doors a comin'  

https://sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/cto/6420255020.html

Figured you would enjoy this since you have the COE and Airstream. 

I had a plan today. Install cam bearings. Drink some coffee, and install cam bearings. That's it. 
Start with this guy. This is the bearing right at the front which requires you to take the engine off the stand and set it (carefully) on the floor. If you notice, the web of metal isn't even at thick as the bearing on this side. I was pretty sure I was somehow going to break it and have to start over again. 

And then I stopped picking up my coffee. Unfortunately I also stopped picking up the camera too, and before you know it I was here. All the cam bearings in. New main bearings in. Cam in. Even got the timing marks lined up first try. 

So I calmed down, tightned the mains to 10 ft/lb and spun things around about 200 times just because it was silky smooth and I was excited. 

Rods? 8 Rods? 

And Pistons? 

Got carried away again and it's together now. Yesterday morning it was an old bare block and now it's an assembled short block waiting on me to acutally look up the final torque specs. It rolls over at least as well as the R63 did. 
I feel like a jack in the box that was being wound tighter and tighter over the last few week and then POW! 
I need a nap. 

well done. sometimes keeping your head down results in a lot of work getting done in short order.

I love it when I zone out and then BAM! All of a sudden there’s an engine in front of me, where there used to be a pile of parts.

In reply to stafford1500 :

Indeed it does, just not how I usually roll. Bit of a break from my usual contemplative work. 

In reply to Recon1342 :

I've ver had an assembled engine appear in front of me before today. It was cool. I could get used to it. 

That's usually how it goes for me. 

Walk outside with coffee to make a game plan. Two hours later my coffee is cold, still nearly full, with a layer of scale/grinder dust on top. 

Seems to happen that way whether I'm doing fabrication work or not. 

OK, kool when do we see elevens out front????

Big truck, 1111's.

Awesome work. Awesome writing. Awesome pictures. 

Assembling an old school v8 is an experience that is becoming rarer all the time. Seeing a pile of parts start to resemble a functional machine is always special to me. And these old pushrod engines have a simple elegance I find very appealing. My dad said it best when I was hanging out with him in his shop as he was putting a new 350 in his new to him work van. "An LS is superior in every way to this 350 except for one thing, simplicity. Thats whats cool to me. I like when things are simple."

In reply to barefootskater :

Thanks, I'm having fun. With the exception of the cam location, it's fun to look at how similar V8's separated by 50 years are. They had the basic design down a long time ago. 

Quick question for everyone. I need to move the automatic transmission and transfer case out to the shed. I don't anticipate using either one any time soon, but International has it's own bellhousing, so I'm not willing to throw away something I might have to hunt for in the future. Just yet anyway. Should I remove the gear from the transmission and throw it in with the transfer case? Fog them with WD40 or similar, bag them and forget about them for a while? 

Maybe reattach the two once they're in place to eliminate one source of moisture infiltration for the T-case. Then bag and fog would be my choice.

Like you mentioned, trying to find replacements in the future would most likely be challenging!

In reply to SaltyDog :

Turns out the transmission is WAY too heavy for me to move without another person so they both got shoved up against the wall. I'll wait until the next time I have all the cars out and then use proper tools to wheel them out the front. Job for another day!

Spent some time thinking about what I need to swap from the 304 intake (on the left) to the 345 intake (on the right). I think I just need to swap the big necks and then plumb in a small line for the vacuum advance can. I think. I'll need to stare at it some more. 

Also wire brushed one of the exhaust manifolds and gave it a couple coats of header paint. May or may not last. Either way it'll look good for a few minutes when I put it all back together. Is there anything special about the bolts that hold manifolds on? All 10 of them are currently pretty crusty and I'd like to not have them get crustier and break off like the 304. 

And lastly, now that the pistons are in their homes, I moved the other head onto the bench and disassembled it. Did I mention that I love this valve spring tool? I do. I love it so much. 

I need to go clean up and think of an excuse other than "I bashed it with a brass hammer because I'm stupid" for why I have to wear a band-aid on my hand to Mrs. Deuce's company Christmas party tonight. 

Wear a Michael Jackson glove?

It'll give everyone something to talk about.

Leave the gaping wound exposed and when somebody asks simply reply you should see the other guy

Because you're an International Man of Mystery?

Is there any reason not to use the intake from the 304? If you're using the simpler Holley carb, it might match better.

Enjoying this build, even though I have no interest in COE. Nothing like throwing an engine together and having it actually run!

In reply to llysgennad :

The 345 is essentially a "tall deck" 304. This means the heads are up higher so V is bigger so the intakes are unique. 

I would give some thought to replacing the exhaust bolts with studs and nuts, and probably use brass nuts. Add a little of the least locky locktite or rtv to the studs when you screw them in the head and it should be just about impossible for it to rust up so much that you can't take it apart.

That's probably a good idea. Where does one go to shop for random SAE hardware?