<VV> VV Sleeping Lakewood

[Chris]

Start using synthetic oil... Ain't cheap but every engine I've used it on had black oil in a very short time. After 4-5 oil changes the oil stayed clean. Still better than tearing the engine apart. 

Chris

-----Original Message-----
From: Tony Underwood <tonyu at roava.net>
Sent: Apr 5, 2005 4:06 PM
To: virtualvairs at skiblack.com
Subject: <VV> VV  Sleeping Lakewood  



The weather finally stopped raining, snowing, freezing, blowing gale force 
winds, and allowed me to actually assault the recently acquired Roman Red 
Lakewood that had been sitting since 1969-70.


After rebuilding the carbs, replacing spark plugs (an adventure in itself 
since they appear to be the original spark plugs so you can imagine how 
stuck they were) the plug wires, and the entire distributor since half of 
it didn't work, the engine finally started and ran smoothly.   It quieted 
down after running a few minutes... and actually sounds pretty good.


The inside of the engine is a mess.    When I pulled the distributor out, 
it was caked up with grey sludge... don't know what the previous owner was 
using for oil back in the '60s, but it must have been rotgut crap to leave 
this sort of plaque behind.   The crankcase won't be keeping *this* load of 
Advance Store engine oil for very long...  it's gonna need changing after a 
couple hours worth of running to see if I can flush some of this crud out 
along with it.    Rislone is gonna be my buddy for the next couple of oil 
changes for this engine... I can't leave this stuff inside it.   I'd hate 
to see what else is caked inside everything.


I don't wanna have to pull this engine apart to clean it out.   Anybody 
know of anything that works well to flush out this sort of crud besides the 
usual kerosene soak or running 5 gallons of lacquer thinner through it a 
dozen times?   Any sort of engine crud buster that works well, maybe an 
engine flush that actually does something except paper some manufacturer's 
pockets?


This crud looks like it had lead in it...

I knew somebody who "knew somebody" who said they once cleaned up an engine 
crankcase by running the engine with a couple of gallons of kerosene in the 
crankcase for a minute or two, cut with a couple of quarts of engine 
oil.    The kero was above the level of the crankshaft throws, which 
blasted kerosene all around the inside of the crankcase with a vengeance 
and "cleaned it up pretty  good".


I do not wanna try this with an all original Lakewood engine with 58,000 
miles on it.    But I'd like to clean it up inside without having to tear 
it apart.   I have too much stuff apart already.


I'm tempted to give it a cheap lacquer thinner soak... 5 gallons poured 
through it a few times etc.   Let it soak  overnight... and hope it doesn't 
melt every gasket and seal in the engine...?     Or maybe I should stick 
with Rislone...?


So:   Anybody have any preferences for a GOOD engine crankcase flush that 
actually works?   It's been a while since I saw an engine with crud like 
this.



tony..     

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