I recently purchased an 88 Aries Wagon with a blown engine for a turbo project. I have previously turbo'd a Plymouth Horizon and a Shadow convertible. They aren't huge feats as the platforms have at some point been equipped with turbo powerplants. Well I pulled the engine and trans yesterday and found #3 piston had a nice hole in it. The front cam seal had come out of the head and he ran it with no oil. Today while splitting the locked up short block from the transmission and trying to unbolt the converter from the flexplate I noticed when I turned the flexplate the pistons didn't move Guessing it has a two piece crank. Anyway here are some progress pics thus far:
Damn that lil bugger is clean! That #3 piston is one of those to help lower the compression, lol. Make sure you get us pics of the 2 piece crank when you tear it down This is a thread I am gonna keep an eye on, I like these type of builds.
Yeah the crank will be interesting to see. I'm doing the swap at the dealership where I work so I was trying to get the hard stuff out of the way so I can bring it home and finish it up. My Horizon was a solid mid 13's car without even trying. I'm hoping this will get there as well. I want to find a console to put my 5 speed stuff in it later down the road, but still keep the bench seat.
Again Chrysler turbo'd a bunch of them but I wasn't able to find one close. I found a low mile beautiful one in Pa. I like it because it has six seat belts and I have six people in my family, lol.
I was confused when I pulled the drain plug because oil and coolant came out as a swirl, not a milkshake. Now I know why. Can't wait to see where the crank broke.
Ah, piece of cake while you got the engine lift warmed up and the wrenches all greasy. Drop both in and do the refining later. Sounds like a fun project. Too bad they didn't pay Enginering wages for mechanics. I would've twisted more wrenches than sliderules. More fun.
I carbureted a 5.9 Magnum. 727 transmission 8" converter 8 3/4 with a 4.30 gear. The truck is my DD so with all of that it won't be highway friendly which is where the wagon came in.