I wish we would tear apart my bro in law's '03 Hemi sitting in his garage that's no good. Started with oil pressure issue's, worked itself into a full blown rebuild (all but the cam) and new oil pump, still had problems. It actually caught fire once. Anyway's, it sounded just like a diesel, we pulled the crank sensor (or cam sensor?, think they may have one of each if I'm not wrong) and there was about 1" of metal shaving's stuck to it, and I found a crack in the block on the top towards the front of the motor, wouldn't that be some show and tell

 

Yeah, save the head rebuilds, I'm doing most of the rest myself. Will be my biggest project to date, but I have completely rebuilt a 4.0 I6 out of a Wrangler but that was kid's play compared to doing a OHC modular engine.

I will be helped by a guy with 17 years at a Jeep dealership before FIAT took over and pulled the Jeep line from the place he worked for and gave it to the full Dodge line dealer down the street. He's getting spotty work and will be helping me during his slack time at a really good hourly rate, not to mention it gives me someone to check all what I do before I f*ck something up to the point of no return and of course he has any of the special tools I don't have.
For sh*ts and giggles I estimated I'd have about $2200 in labor alone in paying a shop at about $80 an hour (book calls for 28 hours for a complete rebuild). Obviously the more I do the less I have to pay him, but we are figuring he's gonna get about $400-500 for helping and doing the tricky sh*t I probably shouldn't mess with on a daily driver. If this was an old beater, weekend play toy, I'd try it 100% myself, but if I mess up, I lose my DD. I figure $500 is way better than $2200 and like said, this gives me someone to check over everything I do plus it's worth it to me to learn from someone who's worked on Chrysler engines for so long.


I'd like to replace the intake manifold because the obliterated valve seat went up through it to the other head. I know there is debris in it and I'm afraid no matter how much I get out there is gonna be some imbedded which may come loose over time but the HO has a different manifold and the '02 is unique as they changed it for the '03+ HOs. Chrysler stopped producing in '08 and I can't find one anywhere...

 

Update in our Jeep section for any of y'all who are interested:

https://dodgeforum.com/forum/jeeps/3...ml#post2819920

 

Glad you got it back together. Rebuilds should be to increase power....shame they have to be for those "Oh S**t!" moments!