1975 2002 FSP: Rebuilding a rebuilt engine.

[jr02518]

The motor is being completed by Adrian van de Water at his shop, Specialized Mercedes Service in Riverside, California.

www.specializedmercedes.com

Adrian and his staff are "motor heads" that work on the very nicest cars that live in Southern California. The I.E. , or "909" might be looked down on by some from the "O.C." but the quality of work executed by this shop is first rate.

The saga that is my rebuild took an unexpected turn when Morgan Trotter posted, on the FAQ, a "rebuilt" short block that had been taking up space in his garage for some time. The story, yes they all seem to come with one, was that a previous owner spent a serious amount of cash, years ago, having a head rebuilt and the bottom end massaged. The E-12 head had been sold and "fresh" bottom end became a fixture in Morgan's garage.

As a point of disclosure I knew about this, yes for at least three years, but I was never in a position to do anything about it.

How and why I ended up spending the time, energy and money to build an E-12 head and then put it on a 121 flat top piston bottom end would require more energy than I care to spend. I will admit that it could be a low cost combo that might survive a low pressure turbo but, not any time soon.

Adrian's phone call after his initial tear-down was the classic "good news, bad news" conversation. Yes the crank shaft was balanced, the rods rebuilt/balanced and the bearings were new. The pistons were, used, and in fact reusable, then he started with "but".

This is the tipping point that might have stalled the completion of the motor years ago, if not the previous owner would not have enjoyed the results of his large quantities of dollars spent on his motor. Adrian had me come to the shop and turn the crank still in the block but with out the rods and pistons. And as the saying goes, the rest of the story goes like this. I was able to get it to turn, but I had no idea what I was "feeling" to make it happen.

Working with Adrian and paying for his expertise will/has saved more grief and money down the road than I care to think about. The "feeling" that I would not have picked up on was the "effort" required to get the crank to turn. The block need to be line honed.

John Edwards also re-honed the block to work with the piston rings that Adrian ordered "over sized" and then "sized" to the bores. I have in the past put things together and as long as they did not provide any glaring problems I lived with the results. I am looking forward to getting the "new" car together and driving in events. I had some level of success driving a low compression motor, having 9ish to one could be that much more fun!

Morgan, having driven my old car and beat me at it's last BMW Club Auto Cross in San Diego, will get to drive the new car. I need his input....

David Barrish