Attempting to wake up D8 2U after 30 Years

[quote="Oldcarman"]I'm helping a friend get his 2U running. The pony is running well, cooling system full and not leaking, and have clean fuel to the transfer pump.

We tried to get the main rolling over yesterday. First with pony, then pulled and pushed a bit with a 953B and then back to jogging with the pony. We got it to turn over about 3/4 of a revolution and then doesn't seem to want to budge. Don't want to damage the pony clutch, so we quit for the day. Poured oil down the exhaust stack and gonna let it sit a bit. Would like an easy way to get lube or kroil to each cylinder. Any suggestions?

Could someone confirm that the crank pulley bolt is 2 3/4". Thinking of putting a socket and bar on it to try to jog back and forth, but dont want to buy a socket that is wrong size and it's not the easiest place to get a tape measure in to check.

Pulled the cover on fw and only see a pointer and no way to bar. Is there any other place to bar these over??[/quote]

Is the decompression lever working? I, sure you know his but it should be in the start position. The pony transmission is a two speed on the 2U. Is it in the lower gear? Does it go 3/4 revolution in either direction? If so it could be a stuck valve you are pushing against. I doubt that oil in the stack will help as the pistons are moving. Pulling the valve cover and insuring all the valves are free by pushing them down with a bar may be a cost saving measure. It sounds like the cam is coming up against a stuck valve. Forcing it will probably break or bend something. Is the transmission in neutral and not impeding the engine turning? There could easily be 3/4 turn of engine revolution slack in the gears. On my dry clutch D2 I have used a 5 ft. crow bar stuck in between the thermoid couplings on the clutch to turn the main over in either direction with the compression release on start with relative ease. You will have to remove the front floor cover for access. Not sure if this is the same on the later wet clutch machines. Good luck and keep us posted.

Go back to the timing cover for the flywheel. Remove the pointer and you have access to use a pry bar engaging the ring gear teeth. It's a slow process but provides the rocking action to get things free if it isn't seriously locked up.

You better pull the heads, the damage you WILL do to the bore and pistons if you do break it loose will not be worth the excitement of a few secs of smoke . It is stuck for a reason and will not free up and be all better if you make it start!!....WA7OPY

OM, thanks again for a good tip on the barring point. The compression was released, pony in low gear.

Will see what happens when we carefully go back and forth baring it. The fact that the pony would move the crankshaft suggests to me that it's not a total pile of rust inside, but I will let the owner make the call on how we proceed.

Thanks for the comments!

OM, thanks again for a good tip on the barring point. The compression was released, pony in low gear.

Will see what happens when we carefully go back and forth baring it. The fact that the pony would move the crankshaft suggests to me that it's not a total pile of rust inside, but I will let the owner make the call on how we proceed.

Thanks for the comments!

I've had two tractors whose engines would rotate both directions, but wouldn't do a complete revolution. One was a U series D2, and the other a Massey Ferguson with a Perkins diesel. In both cases mice had entered via the exhaust pipe and deposited enough nuts & seeds through open valves to get crushed by the piston against the head and prevent complete rotation.

Pulled the head, cleaned her out , and all was good. Now every exhaust pipe is covered with a can.

Ok we are back trying to sort out this D8 2U. Even after soaking with oil, no budging the crankshaft with the pony. It probably turned maybe 1/2 rev or so and then locked.

Decided to pull the rear cylinder head first. Found a bunch of mice had been in exhaust manifold so we are getting that cleaned up. Got the head removed and two of the cylinders look good, but one had a bunch of corrosion in it and that is the one that probably had us bound up. I think that the rain cap leaked at some point as that exhaust valve was stuck a bit too. Gonna try to tap the piston back down with a wood block and clean up that cylinder to see if we can get it rolling over. In the meantime, the other head will come off tomorrow. Hoping that only one cylinder (4) is the culprit and we can put the front head on soon.

My questions:- if we end up needing to replace this liner and maybe piston, can this be done without pulling the engine? We have the servicemans ref for D82u coming in the mail but not in hand yet.

Is there any issue with re-using head gaskets if they are in good shape? I do this on early gas engines all the time but not sure about these. What other things are essential to replace when putting the heads back on?

We want to get this running and maybe push some trees down or something, but not going to live a hard life going forward. Don't want to spend a huge amount on it, but don't want to get it back together and wish that we had replaced something either.

I will have pics tomorrow when I get to the machine (100 miles from me).

Ok, we got the crankshaft to move again. Originally had tried to roll this thing over with the pony, crankshaft moved and then stopped and wouldn't budge.

Ended up pulling the heads- cylinders 1, 2, 5, 6 look very good. #3 will clean up nicely, #4 looks pretty awful in my book. There was a whole bunch of mucky rusty crap in cylinders 3 and 4. Rust in cylinders had caused the pistons to lock up as they moved up. We needed to turn the crankshaft backwards to push these pistons down to clean up the muck.

First tried just pounding down on #4 with a hammer and wood block. Nothing would budge. Had a big breaker bar and socket on the front pulley nut and nothing happened.

Then decided to put a bottle jack on top of the wood block over piston, welded up a square tube with a pipe stub to go over the jack and put a chain through the tube. Tied chains to the lift arms and put some pressure on the piston. Got scared of really cranking up the pressure on the jack and snapping a chain. There was nothing moving.

Plan three- I cut two 14" lengths of 3 x 3" x 5/16 wall square tubing. Drilled two 1" holes 10 7/8" spacing. Dropped the tube over the big head studs and clamped down with wood and aluminum disk spacers on top of the piston using a stack of flat washers to keep working down the studs. We put it on #4 cylinder and tightened it up, and it broke free. We cranked the #3 & 4 cylinders down to near the bottom of the stroke so we could clean up the mess. This method worked really well.

Water had corroded #4 cylinder liner pretty badly. I'm sure the rings are stuck. First we are going to chip out the rust flaking and see if we can get the engine to turn over freely. I expect we need to pull #4 piston and maybe find a piston and liner?

I need some suggestions from some experienced gents here. This is new territory for me. I've done many many gas engines, but this is out of my wheel house.

We just want to get this thing running reasonably well, this is not a restoration project.