looks like a valve smacked it ...

 

I’ll clean up that wd-40 and the pistons and re-post a picture. No obvious hole.

plan will be to drop the head off at a shop to be checked. I will pull the oil pan and take the #6 and #8 pistons out and plan on replacing rings and possibly honing, depending on how the walls look. Getting a drill mounted hone at that #8 cylinder isn’t going to be an easy time.

then I’ll put it back together and replace the O2 sensor and see about the cat. Sound good?

my worry now is whether I should mess with the drivers side head. Compression was good in all cylinders on that side, but I’m this deep in the engine, should I do anything?

 

Sounds like a plan! Personally I would do all the rings and check the drivers side head, but that's me. Being a broke college student you can just do the two cylinders

 

Alright people. Pistons are out and such a satisfying clean with the chem-dip! I have rings. I’m still not sure about pulling the driver’s side head. I’m donating all this time for free and it’s starting to drag on.

I also got the Hughes plenum kit to repair the plenum gasket mess. Got plugs/wires/cap/rotor for a little tune up. Next steps are to clean up all the surfaces. Rings on pistons.

Oh! Should I replace the piston rod bearings? Some of them are looking a little worn (178,000 miles). Crankshaft journals look very smooth and good from what I can see. I bought a set of bearings. It was like $13. What the.

put the pistons back in (the cylinder walls look pretty good with some faint crosshatching, so I think I’ll skip the honing). Heads back on. Intake back on. Put it all back together. Thanks again for all your guys help. Hoping to finish in the next week or so.

 

Might as well do the bearings since you are there. Cross hatching is good, so you could skip the honing. I stopped working on friends vehicles when they try to blame me for something unrelated.

 

Ok, everything is back together and....surprise, I can't get it to start. I put a new rotor, cap, and wires on. Checked a plug for spark, and it looks good. I'm not great working on newer cars with injection and computers. Is there timing I need to adjust? I've quadruple checked all the wires and connections, and they seem to all be in the right spot. There is gas. I sprayed carb cleaner in the intake without much success. What am I doing wrong? I hate this truck.












forgot to take a pictures after I put everything back together, but you get the idea.

 

No timing to adjust. It doesn't even fire with starting fluid? (I am not sure carb cleaner is even flammable any more......)

 

You sure you are getting good spark and fuel?

 

When you say "There is gas" is that at the rail or the injectors ? Is there power on the dark green/orange wires to the injectors ? Ideally check with a "noid"/low power test light if there are injector pulses.

Another thought: Did you check where the distributor points with cylinder 1 on top of the compression stroke ? Also, try the old cap, rotor and wires, maybe the spark is weak.

 

Won't start even with starter fluid now. Has good spark. (bought a spark tester, which promptly broke). A grounded plug sparks well visually. That damn distributor is impossible to get to. How do I find TDC on compression stroke? Spark has to be off. I'm so sick of this.

Thanks for all the help guys.