Great subject and Very, very well videoed. Keep up the great work. I am 76 and as a boy in the 1950's Jaguars wereone of my dream cars along with Asdton Martin.
According to the factory service manual, the letter stamped into the top of the pistons is the factory tolerance of the diameter of each piston measured within a few 10,000ths of an inch. G is in the middle of the range of factory tolerances that told the finishers how much to hone the cylinders when they assembled the engine. When I had to rebuild the head of the E-type I used to own, I had all 6 "G" pistons, perfectly balanced.
Small tip: Life is so much easier if you use two studs to wiggle off the main caps and rod ends. You also prevent possible surface distortion. Keep on the great work!
I did the same thing with a '79 Cadillac 425 engine that had been sitting for about 17 years. I cleaned the pistons up with a broken ring. I also honed the cylinders put new rings on the cleaned up pistons and reassembled the engine with new components and she purrs like a kitten. The letters next to the bores and on the pistons probably denote the bore size so you can get the proper clearance. Love these old cars.
In manufacturing they do not zero out the machines for each engine only at the start of a shift. So as the boring and honing stones wear out the bores get slightly smaller than blue print specification. So they sort the pistons into various ranges as well. When the block is going down the line one guy measures all the bores and will either put a letter of color top of and tot he side of each bore. The next guy down is a bunch of pistons that will have letter or color codes for each size that has the rings and rods already assembled. His job is to drop a piston and rod assembly into each bore based on the size it is marked. Depending on the company you might have 4-8 different size ranges of presorted pistons. This allows you to come close to a precision hand built engine with out taking the time that would take to do. We do not need to do this today because we have less tolerance stacking and less variability from part to part. This is also why you need to try pants on to make sure they fit. When they cut out a patern of say blue jueans they stack up fabric 2-3 feet high and stamp out the pattern. As the fabric cutting/stamping die cuts through the fabric the material on top will be close to the exact same size as the stamping die. The fabric down bellow though spreads out as the die comes down. So the aall of the panels bellow the first couple layers will not match the die they will be larger or small and this is where we get tight legs, relaxed fit, regular etc......
You make a good point. However, even modern production engines still have this. It is common for a new crankshaft to have a variety of bearing shells. If you ever order crank bearings from a Toyota dealer, they will ask for the color code.
the letters on the pistons (G,F etc) are the weight of the piston, jaguar used to balance the rotating assembly, make sure that "F" piston goes back in the same bore or it may vibrate.
I rebuild a 3.8 E type and what made the engine bay pop was all acorn nuts were triple copper plated highly polished and clear coated, cam covers were done in crinkle black with the top ribs brought back to alloy and mirror polished, the metal coolant to flexible pipes were again triple copper plated polished and clear coated rely makes it pop out.
Please stop letting OLD metal drop on the concrete you have given me a heart attack Great set of vids and well done from England... I worked on the Mrk ten and 420 G mrks..... Now retired...
The letters on the pistons relate to slightly different bore sizes when piston were individually sized to bores. Machine accuracy in those days was not as reliable as today. You are correct as a customer I would not be buying this engine which needs a proper overhaul including a rebore and new pistons etc. etc. but if it is just for you OK.
Several things about this engine surprise me 1) The low amounts of counterweights. Yes I know you can build inline six engines with 12 down to 4 counterweights on the crank (I spent 30+ years in a engine plant that built inline 6's). RPM response? Costs? Total engine weight? 2) Full Skirt Pistons. Due to most of the load on the Piston Skirt against the cylinder walls being at right angles to the centerline of the engine this is why engines today are manufactured with Pistons that only ride on the cylinder walls in that area. The sides of the Piston are relieved by the way the Piston is cast. 3) The length of the Piston. That's an awfully lot of extra recipricating mass travelling up and down. Plus with an undersquare engine like the Jag that means peak Piston speeds at redline are going to higher vs a square or oversquare bore and stroke ratio. Of course a larger bore means greater bore center distances which means a longer block and crank.
@@RichardMichaelOwen He's talking about piston knurling. Real old school machine shops can do it. You can get back .002' of wear or so on the skirts. Hell, if you work on old British cars you should OWN a piston knurler. I'm surprised pops doesn't know about it.
@MichaelKingsfordGray Both ways can expand the piston skirt. Piston knurling goes way back. The displaced metal from knurling the skirt expands the dimension of the piston.
@MichaelKingsfordGray Yes, it was kind of a Great Depression thing when people were broke and couldn't afford new pistons. Old timers used to say that it actually helped reduce wear because the knurling marks retained more oil on the piston skirt and the knurling marks were not sharp when the tool was done.
@@scdevon I haven't hear of the knurling process on pistons, but they also used to shot blast them from the inside, which would expand them a little and perhaps re machine them to size after, not sure about the latter bit, maybe they just carefully shot blasted them till the slop was taken out.
When the rope seel leaks oil it means the jag engine is worn out and needs rebuild designed to do that as i have worked on a few old jags and all the end caps go out of shape and crank goes Oval
My dad had a 54 xk120. I got in trouble with it. I snuck it out in the middle of the night and went for a drive. He was waiting when i came back. I was 14 years old and couldn,t control myself.
Any damn' fool can assemble nice, clean, precisely-machined new components. Resuscitating a shapeless mass of corrosion separates the men from the boys. :-)* (Sometimes, just identifying the bits in the lump can be a challenge.)
I would have thrown out the old pistons and thrown in modern forged pistons and longer rods for a better stroke to rod ratio and a lower reciprocating mass
a hone rering n lap valves n it will run great i would regrind the cams at delta cam Washington state never hurts to have a better grind them guys can do it
There is a small hole half way up the connecting rod that sprays oil on the cylinder wall. The manual says to install the rod such that it sprays on the thrust side cylinder wall. Is that the intake side or the exhaust side?
@@RichardMichaelOwen Jag lovers forum discussed con rod orientation briefly way back in 2001. It was mentioned that the thrust side is the exhaust side. Now I am worried about assembling my 66 E-type engine incorrectly. Can you help clear this up? OBTW they mentioned you junk E-type start up in the forum. Thanks again
@@brucehayes4409 Hopefully this helps. If you find a link to that thread I would like to read it: www.quora.com/Which-side-of-the-piston-is-the-major-thrust-side
Why don't you throw the entire cylinder with pistons in a chemical and ultrasonic parts washer, soak in penetrating oil before banging away? Just wondering...
He sorted it all out in a very satisfying few hours and saved £450 ($540) on a new set. Also that old set would was perfectly balanced and sized for that engine.
how many miles this thing done,its still got factory hone marks.never serviced never driven like it should be.typical jag owner too scared to drive it incase it stops,then it cost thousands.
It is impossible to drive pistons out the other way as the casting for the crank journals protrudes into the bore area and would foul the pistons, also if you start pounding on the domed crown of a piston you will most likely punch it straight through the piston top and at best you will certainly deform the ring grooves. The way they did this was absolutely correct the strongest part of a piston is the area surrounding the gudgeon pins which is where you would want to put the load through
Painful watching you taking out those stuck rings. Mixture 50-50 acetone and transmission oil is even better than Hydoseal carb cleaner. seen engines with diesel poured down stuck holes after twenty years outdoors.
They are perfectly reusable. If they are in the tolerance it's not a big deal, that they have slight traces of corrosion. I trust those old pistons more than any modern repops.
Richard, Great video, good news getting the pistons out! Thanks for the mention from your dad about the focus on my camera lol, Cheers Dave.
Great subject and Very, very well videoed. Keep up the great work. I am 76 and as a boy in the 1950's Jaguars wereone of my dream cars along with Asdton Martin.
According to the factory service manual, the letter stamped into the top of the pistons is the factory tolerance of the diameter of each piston measured within a few 10,000ths of an inch. G is in the middle of the range of factory tolerances that told the finishers how much to hone the cylinders when they assembled the engine. When I had to rebuild the head of the E-type I used to own, I had all 6 "G" pistons, perfectly balanced.
You are right, it was diameter size as the block was measured and stamped in a similar fashion.
I appreciate the patience you guys have, most folks are in a super hurry and mistakes are made, good job!
Small tip:
Life is so much easier if you use two studs to wiggle off the main caps and rod ends.
You also prevent possible surface distortion.
Keep on the great work!
Love that tip, thanks!
I did the same thing with a '79 Cadillac 425 engine that had been sitting for about 17 years. I cleaned the pistons up with a broken ring. I also honed the cylinders put new rings on the cleaned up pistons and reassembled the engine with new components and she purrs like a kitten. The letters next to the bores and on the pistons probably denote the bore size so you can get the proper clearance. Love these old cars.
Yeah the piston codes are bore size.
Great video as always! Your Dad is a genius!
Love to hear the words of wisdom from the old dog to the pup
In manufacturing they do not zero out the machines for each engine only at the start of a shift. So as the boring and honing stones wear out the bores get slightly smaller than blue print specification. So they sort the pistons into various ranges as well. When the block is going down the line one guy measures all the bores and will either put a letter of color top of and tot he side of each bore. The next guy down is a bunch of pistons that will have letter or color codes for each size that has the rings and rods already assembled. His job is to drop a piston and rod assembly into each bore based on the size it is marked. Depending on the company you might have 4-8 different size ranges of presorted pistons. This allows you to come close to a precision hand built engine with out taking the time that would take to do. We do not need to do this today because we have less tolerance stacking and less variability from part to part. This is also why you need to try pants on to make sure they fit. When they cut out a patern of say blue jueans they stack up fabric 2-3 feet high and stamp out the pattern. As the fabric cutting/stamping die cuts through the fabric the material on top will be close to the exact same size as the stamping die. The fabric down bellow though spreads out as the die comes down. So the aall of the panels bellow the first couple layers will not match the die they will be larger or small and this is where we get tight legs, relaxed fit, regular etc......
You make a good point. However, even modern production engines still have this. It is common for a new crankshaft to have a variety of bearing shells. If you ever order crank bearings from a Toyota dealer, they will ask for the color code.
So great that you are willing to post the work on this engine. Thank you. Great job. I like this much better than any TV junk.
Great thanks for the encouraging comments. Will have this one running soon!@
the letters on the pistons (G,F etc) are the weight of the piston, jaguar used to balance the rotating assembly, make sure that "F" piston goes back in the same bore or it may vibrate.
The bores are similarly marked too
I rebuild a 3.8 E type and what made the engine bay pop was all acorn nuts were triple copper plated highly polished and clear coated, cam covers were done in crinkle black with the top ribs brought back to alloy and mirror polished, the metal coolant to flexible pipes were again triple copper plated polished and clear coated
rely makes it pop out.
Awesome job Sir Richard, man you got the style with that e type engine
Please stop letting OLD metal drop on the concrete you have given me a heart attack Great set of vids and well done from England... I worked on the Mrk ten and 420 G mrks..... Now retired...
The letters on the pistons relate to slightly different bore sizes when piston were individually sized to bores. Machine accuracy in those days was not as reliable as today.
You are correct as a customer I would not be buying this engine which needs a proper overhaul including a rebore and new pistons etc. etc. but if it is just for you OK.
Several things about this engine surprise me
1) The low amounts of counterweights. Yes I know you can build inline six engines with 12 down to 4 counterweights on the crank (I spent 30+ years in a engine plant that built inline 6's). RPM response? Costs? Total engine weight?
2) Full Skirt Pistons. Due to most of the load on the Piston Skirt against the cylinder walls being at right angles to the centerline of the engine this is why engines today are manufactured with Pistons that only ride on the cylinder walls in that area. The sides of the Piston are relieved by the way the Piston is cast.
3) The length of the Piston. That's an awfully lot of extra recipricating mass travelling up and down. Plus with an undersquare engine like the Jag that means peak Piston speeds at redline are going to higher vs a square or oversquare bore and stroke ratio. Of course a larger bore means greater bore center distances which means a longer block and crank.
That engine was designed during WW2!!!
My god, that engine at the beginning is beautiful.
I love that old bore gauge.
Dam that jag engine finished is nice as hell 🙀
Nice to see British spec triple carbs - full power!!!
I like to fill the engine with diesel and soaking before stripping down. Gets it all loose and breaks the rust up
Really enjoying this 👍🏻🇬🇧
When I overhauled my 3.8 40 years ago I couldn't afford new pistons so I had them expanded. Still running strong today.
Never heard of expanding pistons before. Congrats on 40 years of E-Type ownership, that is wonderful.
@@RichardMichaelOwen He's talking about piston knurling. Real old school machine shops can do it. You can get back .002' of wear or so on the skirts. Hell, if you work on old British cars you should OWN a piston knurler. I'm surprised pops doesn't know about it.
@MichaelKingsfordGray Both ways can expand the piston skirt. Piston knurling goes way back. The displaced metal from knurling the skirt expands the dimension of the piston.
@MichaelKingsfordGray Yes, it was kind of a Great Depression thing when people were broke and couldn't afford new pistons. Old timers used to say that it actually helped reduce wear because the knurling marks retained more oil on the piston skirt and the knurling marks were not sharp when the tool was done.
@@scdevon I haven't hear of the knurling process on pistons, but they also used to shot blast them from the inside, which would expand them a little and perhaps re machine them to size after, not sure about the latter bit, maybe they just carefully shot blasted them till the slop was taken out.
When the rope seel leaks oil it means the jag engine is worn out and needs rebuild designed to do that as i have worked on a few old jags and all the end caps go out of shape and crank goes Oval
wow Mastery ! excellent ! thanks for sharing !
Good work though guys, soon to be a lost art
Great result. That's what really matters, I think.
love the impact block you made with the curve to match the connecting rod. A true engineer
Pop’s is Top’s! If it was me, I would order new pistons/rings, clips, wrist pins and bearings.
Dad is right about the cylinder walls..just do a light hone to them and they'll be fine
id be going to the speed shop with the piston size,gudgeon pin depth,get modern pistons,rings,,theres another 50 hp..
Elbow grease wins the day!
Carbon remover a better way to clean pistons . Works wonders on 2 strokes so would help not cause any damage to pistons .
My dad had a 54 xk120. I got in trouble with it. I snuck it out in the middle of the night and went for a drive. He was waiting when i came back. I was 14 years old and couldn,t control myself.
epic first drive!
Seems pretty obvious this engine was operated with a blown head gasket for some period of time.
Any damn' fool can assemble nice, clean, precisely-machined new components. Resuscitating a shapeless mass of corrosion separates the men from the boys. :-)* (Sometimes, just identifying the bits in the lump can be a challenge.)
I like that bore measuring tool. Who makes it?
I would have thrown out the old pistons and thrown in modern forged pistons and longer rods for a better stroke to rod ratio and a lower reciprocating mass
Have you ever tried Desial to soak pistons it works quite well :-)
a hone rering n lap valves n it will run great i would regrind the cams at delta cam Washington state never hurts to have a better grind them guys can do it
great vids is there a part 4
soon!
Nice work, I subbed.
When I pulled my pistols I soaked them in carb clean for two days.
There is a small hole half way up the connecting rod that sprays oil on the cylinder wall. The manual says to install the rod such that it sprays on the thrust side cylinder wall. Is that the intake side or the exhaust side?
@@RichardMichaelOwen Jag lovers forum discussed con rod orientation briefly way back in 2001. It was mentioned that the thrust side is the exhaust side. Now I am worried about assembling my 66 E-type engine incorrectly. Can you help clear this up?
OBTW they mentioned you junk E-type start up in the forum. Thanks again
@@brucehayes4409 Hopefully this helps. If you find a link to that thread I would like to read it: www.quora.com/Which-side-of-the-piston-is-the-major-thrust-side
I even left out the rope seal and relied on the reverse threads with no leakage
nice engine, i notice there is no ridge on top.
Boil that block. Get new liners, pistons, rods, rings,bearings,wrist pins .
Then it wouldn't be junk :)
That's what I thought....I wondered what the hell he is doing
Why don't you throw the entire cylinder with pistons in a chemical and ultrasonic parts washer, soak in penetrating oil before banging away? Just wondering...
I'd have tossed those pistons, that's more aggro than it's worth.
He sorted it all out in a very satisfying few hours and saved £450 ($540) on a new set. Also that old set would was perfectly balanced and sized for that engine.
"Jag - you - Ah" :)
Agreed!@
We'll get there eventually. Shop life Video # 3,000, you'll say Jag-you-ah , and watch your ratings go through the ROOF !!! :) :) :)
Here in Clare we'd say Jag-you-ARR.
@@dessullivan1725 Arr ! :)
@@pauloconnor7951 😁😁
why wouldn't you have just sent the piston out the bottom?? it obviously had buildup going out the top and most likely the ridge on the top from ware
Didn't really have a preference, there was so much corrosion, do you think it would have made a difference?
after the fact not really but as you were doing it I was expecting it to gouge the walls worse
this block is built like a brick house you should think about boosting it you will get a lot of views
I have put pistons in dip carb cleaner before
I wouldn't let a set of new rings and pistons go down those grungy holes 2 & 3.
Yeah, this is a bit of a junk build.
Soak stuck pistons and frozen cylinders with brake fluid. 🙂👌🏻
Thanks
how many miles this thing done,its still got factory hone marks.never serviced never driven like it should be.typical jag owner too scared to drive it incase it stops,then it cost thousands.
ahhhh ? I would drive all the pistons out the complete opposite way - cylinder walls have no tapper
It is impossible to drive pistons out the other way as the casting for the crank journals protrudes into the bore area and would foul the pistons, also if you start pounding on the domed crown of a piston you will most likely punch it straight through the piston top and at best you will certainly deform the ring grooves. The way they did this was absolutely correct the strongest part of a piston is the area surrounding the gudgeon pins which is where you would want to put the load through
@@davidtaylor8244 oh.
Careful with that radio playing in the background. Copyright hounds will be on your trail.
Why not just use an electric wire wheel.
Wire wheel grinding is too harsh for me, I only use it on bolt threads
I would vapor blast all engine parts
We did vapor on the oil pan, timing cover and bell housing
FUN !!!!!! :) :)
Those pistons look horrible, even after cleaning.
I agree!
Painful watching you taking out those stuck rings.
Mixture 50-50 acetone and transmission oil is even better than Hydoseal carb cleaner.
seen engines with diesel poured down stuck holes after twenty years outdoors.
Those pistons are junk. New ones are a must.
I'd replace the liners too.
They are junk!
They are perfectly reusable. If they are in the tolerance it's not a big deal, that they have slight traces of corrosion. I trust those old pistons more than any modern repops.
Use 2 bolts and rock the main caps off Not a screw driver !!!
those pistons are not clean
Good enough for me, this is a junk motor
remarkable lack of wear.
Knocked the pistons out in the wrong direction!