Question on IXK-3 Rebuild in Washington State?

[wesocec]

That makes a lot of sense Hotratz.  If the motor has babbitt bearings on the rods and they are worn bad I can see the knock easy but do you think worn crank bearings will give me a knock as well?  So, plasti-gauging the crank bearings for clearance and maybe being able to adjust them with shims if there is adjustment left and then doing the same to the rods minus the adjustment part I would imagine.  Is there anything specific on the crank or anything else down there I should be looking for?

[hotratz]

Umm, I meant to say the rod journals....on the crank.... So the shims will be between the cap and the bottom of the rod.
It's probably a rod bearing issue but it could also be a wrist pin. I'd pull the pan and grab each of the rod caps and pull/push up and down to see if one or more has noticeable movement. The offending one will be somewhat obvious. Pull the caps and plasti-gauge all four and compare. Once you have the rod caps off you can try to find some movment in it crank or plastigauge it too. More than likely though it's going to be in the reciprocating parts.

[wesocec]

Hotratz, thatnks!  I think the light finally dawns on my marbel head.  This will be my weekend project unless I get pulled into overtime.  That would be the best case senario.  I guess once I found the troubled bearing, I would only need to remove a shim, retorque, plasti-gauge again and continue this process until it meets the specs in my book.  I am guessing when the rodcaps are off I can push/pull on each rod as well to see if there is a wrist pin issue on any of them?  Do you think there would be enough play in a wrist pin that it would be as noticable as the rod bearing should be?

[John Schwiebert]

I did get the PM. Now alot IXK engines when they were rebuilt were bored out to be IXB engines. I would save part of the oil that is in the pan and when you drain it get an oil analysis test done. Me, I would stay with the babbitt bearings. It is farming season here but will try to put some information together for you in the next few days. I would also make a vacuum test of the engine and take a compression test before I reached any conclusions here.

[wesocec]

Thank you John.  I will appreciate any info you come up with and what you have given.  I am starting to think about the same thing, with keeping the babbitt bearings.  I had no idea they were adjustable with shims if they haven't all been taken out already.  This has given new hope before I really even get into this thing.  I am going to add this to the line up before I pull the pan, vacuum test and compression test.  Maybe I will get lucky and find an easy spot on the intake to hook up a vacuum line.

When you do get some time away from the fields I would be interested in the line bore idea you also had and something about IH bearing.  Thanks in advance.

[clueless]

This may be a little late (haven't checked in for awhile).
If memory serves, on these babbitted bearings, after all the factory shims had been removed, to adjust for wear, the next time they needed adjustment, if the people didn't have the money to rebabbitt/replace, they used to file the caps to adjust for more wear. I'm not sure if the filed caps can be rebabbitted, or whether they can, and just add shims to compensate.
More seriously, insert rods might--repeat, might--have once been made available; you'd have to find a Herc master parts book to find out.
Waukesha built a little 4cyl almost universal use engine, the FC, which originally came babbitted; later production was inserted, and rods were made available to convert the babbitted models to inserts; Herc may've done the same. It apparently wasn't done often; the FC is the only engine so noted in my Wauk parts info, altho my parts info doesn't cover many of the older engines.
Good luck.

[wesocec]

Thanks clueless!  I have had some information conveyed to me that the IXB rods with shell bearings will work with the crank.  Sounds like exactly what you are talking about.  I am also maybe now thinking of just rebabbitting the old ones if I need to.

[John Schwiebert]

First of all, this is all speculation on your part. Take a vacuum check, save an oil sample, pull the pan off, look at the crank area and then do a bearing leak dector test. Then pull the engine down and take some good carefull measurments, then ask questions.

[wesocec]

Took off the pan.  #3 rod bearing noticably loose before I pulled the cap.  No shims left.  Crank doesn't look messed up or scratched.

I couldn't find a place to hook up the vaccum guage I have.  It is meant for heating systems anyway.  I have no idea what a bearing leak test is.  The other rods are within spec via plasiguage.  #3 is way out.  Feels like maybe a wrist pin as well on the same.

[John Schwiebert]

Wrist pin? Wrist pin is clamped in the rod with a bolt. Were the pistons cast iron or aluminum? I would have dropped the carburetor, covered it and drilled a 21/64 inch hole in the intake and tapped it for a 1/8 inch pipe thread. Take the vacuum test, replace gauge with a pipe plug. I never mada a leakdown teston an L -head engine, if you reduce the air pressure to about 40-50 psi it should work.

[Oliver_collector]

John will know more then me about doing this and if it's possible, but it's still a suggestion. If the rods need rebabbited it might be possible to bore them and use regular insert type bearings. A lot of guys are doing that around here with old Chevy 6's that had babbited rods. I have never had a Hercules apart and don't know if you can do it with them, but I thought I would throw the option out there. The hardest part would be finding someome with the machinery to do it and maintain the correct center to center length of the rod.
Geoffrey