The car was sold to me with 302 ci engine in it. At the time of purchase I did not pay too much attention to the condition it had. Actually, I did not care because I took the attitude that it will have to be rebuilt anyway. As it may take a while to rebuild the engine I decide to start tearing it down in order to verify it's condition. Should the block be usable I might as well rebuild it. If it would appear to be useless, I would have plenty of time to decide what kind of motor I will start looking for.
This engine sat years untouched so apparently it was stuck. I tried to rotate the crankshaft but had to give up to avoid breaking it unnecessarily. Not knowing if was seized by failure or were the piston rings just stuck, I drained the fluids and oil and poured diesel oil in. All the nuts and bolts were soaked with WD-40 and left it there for a couple of weeks. Every now and then I rotated the stand to help oil find it's way. Weeks of soaking, no change. So, with careful moves I started the disassembling the parts. I will not go into details but one by one parts found their way to the shelf.
With the heads removed next thing was to remove the pistons. As the engine is seized and you can not rotate it, you just have to remove what you can access. Then try to turn crankshaft and proceed to the next one. A couple of pistons came out nicely and a couple of more with slightly helped by a wooden punch. Lifters could not be removed upwards so the camshaft was removed so that the engine was upside down and by rotating the camshaft they we lifted. Finally when all rotating parts were removed I was able to push lifters out downwards.
Finally we have almost a bare block left. Luckily there was no marks of scratching the cylinders during the removal of the pistons. The block was then scraped clean of remaining gaskets and oil and water plugs and given a thorough wash. The main bearings had copper tone telling the engine has suffered from heat and lack of oil.
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| These oil galley plugs were left for the machinist to remove |
I collected the casting and manufacturing information of the engine. It is funny to notice that the engine was manufactured very soon after the heads and block had been cast.
| Block | 302 (C8OE-6015-A) | 8B3 | 3rd February 1968 | |
| Heads | 302-2V (C80E) | 8A31 | 31st January 1968 | |
| Engine Tag | 302 C 68 1 | 302 cid, Cleveland, 1968 , USA | ||
| 8-B 279-J | 1968, February, 2-barrel carburetor | |||
| VIN Stamp | 8A172278 | VIN 8A**172278 | ||
| Manufacture date | 8B7F | 7th February 1968 |
Everything in the engine seemed like it has never been opened. All the bearing had FoMoCo stamping and no over/undersize marks could be seen. A quick check on the cylinders showed that this block is standard 4" bore. I packed the block with main caps and delivered to the machinist for more thorough check. Based on his diagnosis I'll make up my mind what kind of engine this will turn into.
As the C80E heads are not known for their contribution to the power production they most likely will be replaced by aftermarket aluminium. And knowing that reconditioning of the original rotating assembly will cost more and produce less power than a stroker kit, they'll most likely stay in the shelf.
