#8 bearing movement

[Walt Fricke]

A friend says he can elicit a little fore and aft movement on the #8 bearing of his 3.2 engine.

He knows which way to turn a wrench, has no reason to believe this engine has been apart, and is chasing an oil leak in the area. He is replacing the crank pulley seal, and the IS plate gasket. But he thinks there is evidence of leakage around the #8/case joint.

Seems unlikely a 3.2 case was line bored (using standard #8 on a bored mag case was cause of another guy's mystery leak). Between the locating dowel inside and the clamping of the case halves, I would not expect any movement would be possible on this lightly stressed bearing.

He's going to run a bead of JB weld around the bearing snout to see if that does any good, because no ideas short of a teardown come to mind.

Other ideas on how this movement could happen? Seen this before?

Walt

[Walt Fricke]

Nobody has seen this?

Attempts to put a band aid on this will doubtless look like the RTV disasters Henry pictured, but without any possibility of stuff getting inside the engine.

Walt

[304065]

He's accidentally put the dowel pin through the oil gallery in the bearing instead of the locating hole? Only thing I can think of.

[Walt Fricke]

Thanks, John

I thought of that too (this guy bought the car, so its faults are not his though the problems are). One of the things I pay close attention to when closing the case.

But he says he can't twist it. I have always figured that, like other bearings, there is enough clamping force on it to keep it from moving, dowel or not. But I've not experimented to see what mistakes produce what symptoms.

I also thought that if you got the pin in the big cut-out no oil would enter. I will continue to act as if that is always true, but maybe the oil cut-out is such that it can, if one is lucky, cover the pin and the case oil hole? Or the engine can run for quite a while with the rods being oiled only from the flywheel end?

I wonder if blocking the case oiling hole by misinstallation of the #8 would increase the effective pressure of the oil (I'm thinking of a finger over the end of a water hose), thus making it more likely to force its way by the orange O ring.

Wierd issue.

Walt

[Mr9146]

The #8 main is a pressure leak; no amount of epoxy will fit it if it's leaking from there ... oil finds a way. If it's leaking from the #8 main it is not going to be a "minor" leak.

I offer no solution...sorry.

[Henry Schmidt]

I have seen the case .015" oversided during standard inspection for assembly.
With that much clearance the bearing will move.

[Walt Fricke]

My friend found that one of the adjacent 8mm case studs had a nut loose. Tightening it, he felt, reduced the movement. He added JB Weld or the like, and is crossing his fingers. So far, so good.

Walt