Finally started my v4 crossflow build!!!

[keefallan]

I have been saying it to you guys for too long now......about getting my motor built for my boat. Yes, I have been busy, but I am out of time, and could've done more as well. Been working on it for the last two weekends. So I will start from last weeks work. Btw, this is the same motor I started in November and started the 115/140 thread. I couldnt find it when I started this today.:rolleyes: Moving frwd.......
485955
Here is everything ready to go. I had previously coated the tops of the pistons, the entire exhaust tract down to the tuner. This was my staging table to grab stuff and go.

485948
Here, I installed my CC reeds onto the lapped cages. As you can see, the screws stick way into the airflow. So I decided to cut them.

485949

The pic speaks for itself. This is how far i cut the factory screws down.

485950
This is the finished cage(s). I had to use my carbide bit to just touch up the areas where the screw was to get a flat area(about 30 seconds per cage). I liked the flush screws.......no chance of air disturbances..........dont know if it mattered, just didnt want to take a chance.

Before I started the real work today, I did install a cage onto my manifold. I have intake stuffers going under the cages as well as factory rubber stuffers going beside the cages. I need to trim the rubber stuffers. They stick up past the face of the intake. I will post a pic later.

Now, it was time for installing the pistons. I dread doing the needles because of my past experiences with them. But I remembered ROCK replying in a thread about a 13mm socket. So, I pulled out my 13mm socket and gave it reading.... .743 and the wrist pin was .748-.749. So, I gave it a shot............night and day difference. The socket extended just enough to grip the retainers on each side of the rod as well, so, all I had to do was push my wrist pin though..:thumbsup:

485951485952485953

In the above pics, you can see the 13mm socket sitting in there. The needle bearings are in there ready to go. As for the jig, I had two of them. One is for standard bore crossflows, and the other is for big bores. I made it exactly the width of the respective piston, and the side wood keeps the pistons in place. There is also a thru bore in the wood for the pin to push thru. With it, you can punch out old wrist pins(if necessary) and install new ones. The one block supports the rod perfectly centered(enough) to hold the rod in place and just push the pin thru. I use and old hitch pin(pictured) to remove old pins and install new ones if necessary(a little leverage...no hammer here). But I may tap on it to remove an old piston:D

485954

This is the finished pistons and new bearings. I also lapped the face of the block on each cylinder bank to ensure a flat face for the gasket and head to bolt to. I washed the block in hot soapy water, and then blew it out with compressed air to dry it out and get it oiled up to stop flash rust. I used ATF to clean the bores even more, and I will wipe them down with two stroke when I install the pistons tomorrow. More pics then.

I have a alot to do..........got to build a mid, so that all I have to do is remove the old motor in its entirety, and install this one. I plan on using the old mid for my xp175 powerhead that needs a home.

[racer]

Pictures make it difficult to see but appears you might not have the oil hole at wrist pin up on all.

[keefallan]

Thanks for the reply Al. And you are right. I just went and checked to see('cause I swore I had them right), and I have 3 and 1. So......I guess I am starting off the morning with swapping a rod over. Thanks for the catch. I might have caught it later, and then again............;)

I appreciate the good eye.

[H2OPERF]

I wouldnt reuse the cirlips

[keefallan]

I started at 8am this morning to move forward on this. Of course the first thing on the list was to swap a rod around....got that out of the way, and then proceeded to just clean things up...........lower bearing, upper bearing..........install new seals and o-rings on both and the start the assembly.486005
This is the deck after lapping. Everything is not shiny bright, but I put a straight edge over everything on both sides. I couldnt fit a .002 feeler gauge under my straightedge. Those ears on the exhaust side of the head are always high. Everytime I lap the deck, those 2 ears always shine up first before the sandpaper touches anything else.

The carbs were rebuilt last weekend and the plastic bowls always need attention. I would love to install the metal bowls, but I have them for my v6 motors..........and I dont have the jets for the metal bowls to install on v4's. So, gotta lap the float bowls......100g, 220 g and then finish up with 320. I usually lose a 32nd or more, but the bowls are dead flat afterwards. A free fix for leaky bowls.

486006
This is the exhaust ports after a general clean-up.....no porting, just removing the "tooth" in the middle thats left from factory drilling. That area is ceramic coated and flows into the filler blocks......see the 115/140 build from November for pics.
486007486009486008

I don t know how many rags you guys go thru, but i go thru them like water when wiping down the bores. I was surprised to see how dirty the towels were this morning when I wiped things down again. The second pic is with all the pistons installed, waiting for the crank. The 3rd is the crank installed, caps torqued down to 30ft/lbs, and waiting to sealed up.

I stopped here because I realized that I needed to find my inspection covers. Its funny how OMC couldnt make up its mind thru the years what to do with recirc lines. They changed them 2 or three times:mad:. So, i realized I cleaned up some early covers and they were wrong for my intake. That meant finding them, cleaning them up(done now) and reading the manual for the hose routing.

So, tomorrow after work........button up the block and maybe get some primer on everything:thumbsup:

[keefallan]

Thanks Joe........good to hear from ya:D

[CUDA]

Pictures make it difficult to see but appears you might not have the oil hole at wrist pin up on all.

Nice catch Al

How is lake Norman?

[racer]

Cuda thanks. Lake Norman is nice but do miss somethings in Florida. How are things?

[CUDA]

Mosquitoes, traffic, Women chasing you around the pool?

I'm looking to retire near where you were, just east, Saint Johns river area

What ever brought you to this coast? got sick of taxes and regulations? ;)

[dagodiver]

Awesome stuff.!!!
I hope to have a running v4 crossflow soon.

Dago

[vintage v4]

On the exhaust tuning side, you may want to find a 1977 megaphone part number 321681. Its a one year only part so may be hard to find but by far the best for performance.
486174

[keefallan]

Yur wanting me to find a unicorn eh?;) I completely agree..........but finding just the tuner.......tough one. If I travelled to wisconsin, I could pick up a complete 77 motor, but its too far, and I dont need another motor. I always have one eye open for one, just havent come across one yet.


Dago diver...............ME TOO!! I almost have it buttoned up. I need to get some stainless bolts from work for the bubbleback cover.....then paint, take some pics and post 'em.

[keefallan]

486403486404
I've been super busy this week. But I was finally able to get it buttoned up and put some color on it. Everyone always go black. I had some red engine paint in the garage.........and I thought, "Perfect". Johnsons have a red and black theme with them thru many of the years, so I am gonna make it red............and, well, you see the results. But before you smack the dislike button:D, its gonna have powder coated water covers and bubble back, black flywheel, and black electronics. So, it should look decent. For those crossflow builders who see a bolt/stud in the wrong place(I'm not showing where), it was just to keep paint out. I will be installing proper hardware when I dress it out.

I would have definitely finished it this weekend. BUUUUUT, There was another side of the picture too......my boat. It needed its spring cleaning. I had to repaint the floor and topside with no slip paint(my crab boat), install bottom paint, wash and compound/wax the hull, and install a new depthfinder. I will post pics of that too.

More to come............

[keefallan]

I need to take another pic of the motor completed with the flywheel and everything on. But I dont have that yet. Today, I finally got around to working on the other part of my motor.......cleaning and painting the parts to put them together. I firmly believe tha the only way to paint an outboard is to take it apart and paint it piece by piece. I understand that thats not always possible, and I have done that before. Its very time consuming to paint pieces apart. But, you get a better paint job and better paint adhesion when you get the opportunity to piece paint. So, thats what happened most of the day today. After I finished sanding the motor cover, my son and I went and prepped/sanded/grinded on the steering head. Its a 1978 unit that works well, but the old units have a ton of casting flash. There was also a previous paint job to get rid of....mostly;). After that we hung every thing on a paint rack err .....I mean a clothes rack that I used for hanging my pieces to paint. The wife didnt mind, so all is well.



487013This is everything hanging after I sprayed it with two coats of white epoxy. For those of you who dont use epoxy primer, I strongly recommend it. Its better than self etch and it sticks well to just about everything......if you properly prep. I had old paint, bare plastic, and bare aluminum to deal with............epoxy was the only way to go.

After I shot the epoxy, I went straight to white base coat.......two coats. Thankfully, with the white primer, color saturation was very fast. It may have taken three coats with gray epoxy or regular 2k primer. After color, I went with SPI universal clear. I shot two coats and I need to sand the cover a little(runs)....I couldnt see because the sun was so bright, and I couldnt get to an angle (reflection) to see the clear going down as I sprayed it. So, I have a tiny bit of wetsanding on the cover to fix that, but other than that, it went down really nice......being sprayed outside in the weather. I am working on getting a dedicated place to spray.....like the past. Right now, I am making lemonade:o. Making the best with what I have available. But I had no wind today(well light wind at times), so, I couldnt have asked for a better day to paint outside.

I will say this, I normally use urethane for outboard stuff. It would have been waaaay easier to accomplish this today. But since, I didnt have to pay for any supplies, I went for it. It was a success. But I will but single stage urethane next time. Its just easier when I dont have a booth available to spray in.

487014487015487016487017487018487019487020This is everything with clear sprayed on. Hopefully tomorrow, I can get the lid wet sanded and put the new decals on so you can see what it will look like as a warmed over 115........CHEERS!:D:D:D

I do want to thank a friend I met thru S/F who gave me the cover for this motor. He is a local Joe who races on the exhibition circuits. So, I wanted to thank him for giving me the cover to be able to get this motor done:thumbsup:.

[LakeFever]

Looks great!

[Scream And Fly]

Fantastic post! Build-ups and restos are always my favorite posts here.

[keefallan]

Well, I finally got it completed. It took way to long and life always has a way of slowing things down. But I finally got this Johnrude out on the water. I will pick things up from where I left off.
489548489550489551
Piecing the parts together was simple. But it was a grab from here and there........The midsection and steering head assembly was from my 78 140, the trim pump and brackets, came from a 150 parts motor(the 140 was missing these parts). The belly pan was from another donor motor because the 140 belly pan was crushed on one side. But as you can see, the previous owner had drilled holes in the belly pan to access the thermostat housing. It was originally out of round, so I grabbed a unibit and made them round, and siliconed rubber grommet/plugs in place. Unfortunately, I forgot to take the picture of the finished product.

489552


The picture is self explanatory.........p-head finally mounted to the midsection............



489553


Here's the motor fully assembled and mounted on my crab boat. I think the red /black/chrome motor colors turned out pretty good. At this point, All I left to do is run it on mufflers to see that it really runs, and set base timing...........then take it to the water and set timing and run some fuel thru it. After running it for awhile, it was running like a turd........bucking and spitting and it was all I could do to get back to the dock. I found a broken hose for a recirc nipple. I took it home and pulled the carbs. We fixed the hose. It was running so bad, I thought the motor was damaged(like I lost a cylinder/burned one). I did a compression check.........the low hole was 135, and the others were 140.........all good. So, I did a spark check, and all the coils jumped a 3/8 gap setting on my tester with a bright spark......all good. I was running l77jc4 plugs with the double oil. I had the hotter plugs in my shop(the ones spec'd for the 90's v4 crossflows), so, I put them in and fired it up. I went back to the water, and it ran perfect after that...........

489554489555

Here's the pics of the motor with decals on the hood. I got them from Garzon studios. They weren't a perfect fit....seemed distorted a little. So, I made them match the best the stickers would allow. But the end result looks really nice, and only those who know how they are supposed to look, will know where the changes are.

489556

So this is my set-up. It is a 1982 Ken Craft that my grandfather bought new. I inherited it in 2010 when he could no longer use the boat......and it was in complete state of disrepair. The floor was mush, and it had so many layers of bottom paint..........I decided to restore it in honor of him. But he never had anything bigger then a 50hp on there. And as one who like to go fast in any boat that I am in, I have put motors all the way up to 235's on here. The back end likes to slide too much with big motors trimmed out. But it really responds well to a v4 trimmed out.

I know its not a scream and flier...........but I make it fly as fast as it should safely go. Over the weekend, with the new motor and 6 people on board, I saw 39 on gps..........which was the fastest I have been with the previous 115/140. So, I know that I will easily break into the low/mid 40's with a light load. I also had changed the prop to a smaller pitch.....a 15". Holeshot was awesome and top end better. All truth be told, I was also looking forward to trolling slower with it.......three birds with one stone. This hull responds well to Ballistic props. I have one for large gearcase and now for the small case.

So, this is the final motor for this boat, it just looks right on it. And I love making things faster. This boat is no exception. But make no mistake, my goal is to find a hydrostream or something like it, and put one of my bigger motors on it. I have a modded 175 sitting and waiting. I also have a 135 Chrysler that would look good on an old wood racer.........and I have the plans(prints) to make one. But since the costs of lumber have gone thru the roof, I dunno about that for now. But if anyone's looking to sell/get rid of a speed hull in need of restoring.......let me know;)

I am a crossflow guy, and will be one till I stop using a boat...........be it a crab boat, a bass boat, or a speed boat.

Thanks for reading.......hope you enjoyed it.

[keefallan]

I want to thank Chaz, FMP, Chris Carson, Bud, and everyone else who helped me get this build done. I am genuinely appreciative of you:D

[mrichartz]

Nice job looks great...

[keefallan]

I have previously stated that I would show pics of the piston that was winged(been using it for 4 years). This motor had compression numbers of 145,145, 160, and 90.........running fine(mostly). Too long to explain the 160 piston, but the 90 piston was 145.....till it puked:p.


489557

This is the old powerhead. I was amazed to see what I saw..............


489558

Brackets I fabbed up to be able to mount coils next to 135 heads. I ran a ground wire from both brackets to a common tapped(spare) hole on the block to ensure good grounding..........never had issues with it.


489560489561489559

Check out where the ring broke in the lower picture. It took out 1/3 or more of the ring. If you heard the sound the motor made when it happened, you would have sworn that the head was toast and so was the piston. But the piston(although it is ruined) is not as bad as I expected. As you can see from the head picture, the head emerges unscathed from the whole ordeal. The cylinder wall (although showing scuffing), has zero marks in it that I can feel with my fingernail. Has anyone ever broke a ring and been so lucky? It does explain why I was able to use it for so long with zero issues.

[mach351]

Very cool

[powerabout]

great look with the polished parts on the painted block
Do you have a shot from behind?

[LakeFever]

Nice job! Glad to see your project completed it’s always a nice sense of relief when they get resolved

[keefallan]

great look with the polished parts on the painted block
Do you have a shot from behind?
I looked though my photos, and no. I thought I had. But I will take one and post it. Its a really good picture because the bubbleback is chrome powdercoated as well.

And LF.........you are right, it was a BIG relief to get it running right. My thoughts were very morbid about it. Bad plugs and a recirc line broken made it seem like it was done.

[Forkin' Crazy]

Sweet!!! Looks like a new one!!! :cool:

[mrichartz]

The picture is self explanatory.........p-head finally mounted to the midsection............

No it's not it makes no sense why did you....just kidding.
Was wondering when your taking it out again and how it does now? So don't forget to update again..:cheers:

[keefallan]

The picture is self explanatory.........p-head finally mounted to the midsection............

No it's not it makes no sense why did you....just kidding.
Was wondering when your taking it out again and how it does now? So don't forget to update again..:cheers:

Made me laugh Mr. R!!! I will update things. If the weather is good this weekend.........i wanna run it with a light load:reddevil::D........just got 4 more gallons to burn....;)