sitting engine tips

[russell072009]

i'm looking in to a lincoln continental that needs an engine. i can get them from a yard for 500 all day long for one of those. is there anything i should really do to the salvage engine before i drop it in? i'm concerned about timing chain tensioners, oil pump, rust on cylinder walls, sludge in general stuff like that. the engine in the car runs but has a bad knock so i can use the electronics off the running engine.

[CBT]

Don't most salvage yards offer a short warranty? Or just buy another Linc with a crappy body but still has a decent engine and yank it.

[burt ragio]

Pull the valve covers & oil pan. This alone will give you a good history of how well the motor was maintained. If you want to take it a step further pull the rod end caps check for scoring. You can also pull the plugs & read them for signs of valve problems. You ca also take a light scope insert it through the plug holes to do a visual on cylender walls.

[Chevyguy]

Considering how many of those cars blow the trans and end up in the junker your chances of getting a cherry engine is good.

I would go no further than pulling the oil pan and maybe the valve covers. If it's clean proceed. Taking apart more things only adds more cost and wastes time, you could just rebuild your current engine or buy a new short block if you want perfect.

Do the swap quick enough so you can replace the engine if it's junk.

[russell072009]

Considering how many of those cars blow the trans and end up in the junker

is transmission failure that common with those?

[Chevyguy]

Those FWD transaxles failed enough behind the 24V Duratec or the 3.8 imagine how they liked the 32V 4.6

[Dan04Merc]

Valve cover gaskets and Pan gasket, easy to change when engine is outside of car, not so easy when engine is installed.

Removing the pan also gives you a chance to check the oil pump pickup screen to be sure there are no old timing chain guide parts clogging it.

Might want to have a look at the coolant hose that runs under the intake manifold.

I would also remove the front cover and get a look at the timing components.

Change out the spark plugs too, now is the time to discover any problems, not after the engine is installed.