Originally Posted by
comongoose
the noise was definitely coming from the LIM, but I also heard a little bit of mysterious crackling noise as well from who knows where. This was all during the compression stroke. I do have L67 intake and heads on the L26 block. I could get the leak-down tester from harbor freight for 35 bucks but I m not sure how to use it, where do you put the compressed air? Also just so you know I also had torqued the heads down in the wrong pattern, I accidently used the smaller v6 motor pattern. I don't know if this has anything to do with it or how specific the pattern is. I noticed on the top swap write up sticky they have a slightly different pattern that what is seen on autozone's repair manual write up as well. I might have also not have cleaned the block as well as I should. A buddy and I stood there for almost 2 hours scrapping it with a razor blade and got all the gasket off but the black underlay wouldn't come off. Maybe that is part of the problem. When I wanted to take the baked off gasket on my TB I used 1200 grit wet sand paper, is this safe on the block and heads as well? Should I look into a shop that will clean the bottom of my heads?
Now that I am no longer in a rush for this car, I think I might add some light performance as well. I was looking at getting modded 1.9 rocker arms and maybe springs. If I get larger valves from WBS can I lap them to the heads? Also will these do any performance for me if they are not ported? The valves look pretty haggard so I was thinking maybes new valves would be a good idea? I want to get this all right in one shot since its getting kind of expensive having to keep buying 60 gaskets.
