bringing engine back to life problems

[jeffreybandel]

Hello,

My name is Jeff Bandel and I live in Radford, VA.  My father lives in Charlotte, NC and has a 1964 230sl that has been sitting for 20+years.  We have been working on it and got it running but it smoked a lot (from the exhaust).  We started breaking it down and we found some pieces in the oil pan.  They appear to be aluminum or pot metal.  I will attach some pictures.  He wants to take the head off but I said wait.  Anyone have an idea what it could be?

[Cees Klumper]

Welcome Jeff. That does not look good! Did the engine have oil pressure when it ran?

[Benz Dr.]

I don't think it's bearing material so it could be parts of a broken piston.

[ejboyd5]

Does one of your spark plugs appear markedly different from the others?  If so, you may be able to narrow down the area of inquiry and a bore scope inserted into that cylinder may pinpoint the problem.  With the oil pan removed does a visual inspection of the piston skirts reveal any damage? In any event, pieces of that size usually denote a serious failure.  If it were mine I would not run the engine any more but would proceed to an immediate tear down.

[twistedtree]

How is the compression?  Valve clearances?  If you have a blown piston or valve, I would expect ti to show up in one or both of those checks.

Chunks like that in the oil can't be good.

[georgem]

If its running (did it have oil pressure?) it could be from the bottom edge of a piston or the oil pump. Either way its a bit academic as pulling it apart is your only option IMHO

[Benz Dr.]

Those look like broken piston skirt parts to me. I don't think an oil pump would make pieces like that. What happens when you place a magnet against the broken parts?

[Shvegel]

I am with Dan that they appear to be piston skirt parts or even more worrisome piston crown parts.  I get a feeling it wasn't running too smoothly?  When I tried to start my 25 year idle car the pistons were so frozen into the cylinders I had to smash them to get them out.  Something in the metallurgy of the pistons makes them corrode.   Chunks like that in the pan mean something bad happened in there because there are no extra pieces in there that you can just disregard.  Regardless of where the parts are from the engine needs to come apart.

Keep in mind that the "Original Engine- Numbers matching" Premium from the US muscle car market has now drifted into European cars so do whatever you can to save the original engine block.  Not running it again would be a good start.  You might want to read the section in the Technical manual about the "Data Card" and how to obtain one so you can verify that you have the original engine in the car. 

[Shvegel]

Here is a good shot of the inside of the crankcase.  As you can see the only aluminum in there is piston and the not pictured oil pump.

[Benz Dr.]

I am with Dan that they appear to be piston skirt parts or even more worrisome piston crown parts.  I get a feeling it wasn't running too smoothly?  When I tried to start my 25 year idle car the pistons were so frozen into the cylinders I had to smash them to get them out.  Something in the metallurgy of the pistons makes them corrode.   Chunks like that in the pan mean something bad happened in there because there are no extra pieces in there that you can just disregard.  Regardless of where the parts are from the engine needs to come apart.

Keep in mind that the "Original Engine- Numbers matching" Premium from the US muscle car market has now drifted into European cars so do whatever you can to save the original engine block.  Not running it again would be a good start.  You might want to read the section in the Technical manual about the "Data Card" and how to obtain one so you can verify that you have the original engine in the car.

I'm not sure about 113's in this case. I don't see bids going higher for matching numbers and believe me, we can make numbers match if needed. 

[stickandrudderman]

As others have said, the cause is academic at this point; you need to strip the engine, not just take the head off.