Author Topic: SR4 Rebuild  (Read 14055 times)

Rxe

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 15
    • View Profile
SR4 Rebuild
« on: January 03, 2012, 05:34:22 PM »
New member here, and I've been daft enough to take on a rebuild of a rather waterlogged, but hardly used SR4.   I can see a lot of similarities with the "FR4 Project" that Reg Burns started: I'm not doing this for cost effectiveness, I'm doing it because I like decent engineering and it is a challenge.  If I wanted cost effective, I'd go and get a Yanmar....

The original plan was to have something that would drive a big compressor: 70 CFM so that I can do proper blasting.  So I was looking for a 20 - 25 HP engine that would not be stressed when delivering that power.  An SR3 wasn't quite enough so when and SR4 came up....it seemed sensible.   How hard could it be, it's just an SR3 with an extra cylinder?  Wrong!

So this vast lump of iron arrived on a pallet.  It looked so much bigger "in the metal".   It was advertised as "seized, but no water in the bottom end".   Hmmm.    It was certainly seized. 

All of the ducting and ancillaries came off with a liberal application of WD40 and a small amount of swearing.   The starter motor works, the dynamo generates current when spun in a drill, and the manifolds look at lot better now they are cleaned up and painted.   Cylinder heads next: all in reasonable order, no valve wear at all, in fact no valve marking whatsoever, which suggests this was very low hours.   Water had been getting in through the inlet manifold, so it got progressively worse towards the front of the engine.  All pistons were seized solid, with the bores of 1 and 2 totally rusted up.   No need for subtlety in freeing them up, just the application of a 3 foot long 3/4 drive breaker bar.   Pistons in the bin, bores sent of for a bit of +2 oversize action.   I've now got new oversize pistons, and everything needed to rebuild the top end.

Fuel pumps are OK, no visible corrosion, the racks on three move easily, the last is stuck. 

Down to the crank.   The sump was filled with water and oil (no water in the bottom end ha ha), but the big ends were fine.  A bit scuffed, but fine.   The cam is perfect.  No wear or corrosion.    3/5 mains are also perfect (but the shells are trashed) but the front two have evidence of corrosion.   Not terrible, but can be felt with a fingernail and didn't respond to a bit of polishing.   The people who supplied the replacement big end shells, don't have new mains.    Hmmmm. 

So, some questions, hopefully someone out there will have the answer. 

1) What do I do with the crank?   Getting it machined is no problem, but does anyone know where to get oversize main bearings for an SR4?  Apparently they are different to the SR3/2/1 items.   

2) How do you get the cam out of the block?   And while I'm there, how do you get the oil pump out.  It looks like you press both of them...but before using force I want to be sure. 

3) Does anyone know of a parts book or workshop manual for one of these engines?

I think it would have been easier to stick with the Petter PH1s that I normally fiddle with - a lot cheaper for sure, but it will be very satisfying when it runs.   I can put photos up...not sure of forum etiquette at this stage.




dieselgman

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 3189
    • View Profile
    • Lister Parts
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #1 on: January 03, 2012, 06:34:12 PM »
We have some parts and manuals for SR4... maybe gasket sets, not certain about bearings until I can research further. That engine is not at all common, so may be a bit of a challenge. It sounds to me like you have most of it handled already! Congrats on saving the old jewel!

Contact me directly and maybe we can sort the rest of your needs.

gary@dieselgen.com

dieselgman
ALL Things Lister/Petter - Americas
Lyons Kansas warehousing and rebuild operations

listard-jp2

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 662
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #2 on: January 04, 2012, 04:01:33 PM »
Having mentioned this to an acquittance of mine (a retired Lister Petter service engineer), and him having personally worked on these engines. He is of the opinion that the main bearings will be identical to the SR3 engine apart from needing an additional pair of  intermediate main bearing shells (as the SR4 will be a 5 main bearing crank, verses the SR3 which will be 4 main bearing crank).

I am not surprised that your supplier was not able to source main bearings for you, as they were never available aftermarket due to the small volume of SR4 [and  SL4] engines made by Listers.

However not all is lost as it should be easy to assemble a set of SR4 main bearings from a combination of suitably sized SR3 and SR2 main bearing shells, but it won't be cheap (as your effectively buying an additional set just to get the additional intermediate set of main bearing shells. However you could resell the remains of the SR2 set as a SR1 main bearing set to recover some of your outlay.

Are you UK based?, because if you PM me I can send you a scanned copy of the relevant pages from Associated Engineering (AE) and P Vandervall (PV) catalogues, listing part numbers for each of the  main bearing shells for say a SR3 engine (which you would then extrapolate to get the required bearings for your SR4 engine). Which you could then quote to a suitable motor factor in order to obtain the required bearing set(s). From the same source I could also supply you with the journal diameters for regrinding to an undersize if you need it (as you mention a couple of the journals need more than polishing). Depending upon your journal diameters I may even have some of these main bearing shells myself.

One final point, and to possibly give you some more options to explore, the main bearing journal diameters for the SR engines are the same as the LD, LR, and SL engine range (hence they use the same bearings).

Regards the camshaft, it operates a plunger type oil pump via an eccentric lobe on the camshaft. You need to fully depress the oil pump plunger to be able to fully withdraw the camshaft, this can be awkward as its almost a two person job to accomplish.

The SR4 and SL4 were usually found in a marine propulsion application, or in the case of the SR4 were also used on early moisture extraction units (prior to introduction of the HA4 engine).




dieselgman

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 3189
    • View Profile
    • Lister Parts
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #3 on: January 04, 2012, 04:41:10 PM »
I would also be interested in those AE and Vandervell reference pages. SR main bearings (and all others) are sold singly - not as sets, so no problem doing swaps and recombining them to suit.

dieselgman
ALL Things Lister/Petter - Americas
Lyons Kansas warehousing and rebuild operations

listard-jp2

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 662
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #4 on: January 04, 2012, 08:30:22 PM »
SR main bearings (and all others) are sold singly - not as sets, so no problem doing swaps and recombining them to suit.

From looking at the AE catalogue I have, that is indeed the case for for the ST, TS, and HR range, but not for the SR range, which has to be bought as a set, which is VPM92562LC for the SR3, and is presently available in STD, -0.020", and -0.030" sizes. But also listed (for information purposes only) are the AE pt numbers for the individual main bearing shells.

If you were to buy direct from a Lister Petter dealer then, you would also be correct. As they also make the bearings available in single sets.

Rxe

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 15
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #5 on: January 04, 2012, 11:42:35 PM »
Yes, I am uk based, and I will pm you in a second for the pages.  Thanks very much!

Interesting on the cam.   I am not with the engine right now (work does have a habit of getting in the way), but the oil pump on mine appears to be gear driven by the cam.  I don't recall seeing a plunger, but I will check at the weekend.


dieselgman

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 3189
    • View Profile
    • Lister Parts
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #6 on: January 05, 2012, 12:14:16 AM »
Gear-driven oil pump in the SR4. And, being a Lister dealership, we were not aware of what AE or Vandervell might have done bundling their offerings for Lister products. That is interesting and seems to be a bit of an anomaly as far as these parts are concerned. I hope you are correct about SR3 bearings interchanging with SR4, the Lister part numbering would not support this assumption though!


dieselgman
« Last Edit: January 05, 2012, 12:21:33 AM by dieselgman »
ALL Things Lister/Petter - Americas
Lyons Kansas warehousing and rebuild operations

Rxe

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 15
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #7 on: January 05, 2012, 08:45:50 AM »
An update.   Dieselgman has come up with a parts book and manual ( ;D).

It would appear that the cam is located using a non-obvious dowel pin.   Well, it wasn't obvious to me anyway.    I will investigate over the week end and post a few photos of the extraction.   The oil pump looks like it may be a problem.  The manual says "remove the two set screws and withdraw the pump".   I've removed the set screws, and the pump doesn't want to budge.  It may be more accessible with the big cam gear removed. 


listard-jp2

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 662
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #8 on: January 05, 2012, 08:50:30 AM »
^^ Having not had any dealings with the SR4 engine myself, I am happy to stand corrected on the oil pump situation, after all my information comes 2nd hand from someone who is over 90 years old :)

I am already in contact with the OP, regards the bearing situation, and again you could very well be correct. But working on the premise that the SR4 part numbers being different to the main bearings used on the SR3 engine makes them totally incompatible with the SR4 engine is not 100% confirmation that these parts are not interchangeable, and also the well known vagaries of the Lister part numbering may also have being in play here [I am also encouraged by the fact that OP stated that the big end shells were identical]. Until the OP is able to compare what he has dimensionally to the published AE and Vandervall catalogues we will not know for sure either way.

There could also be reasons for different part numbers, due to slight design differences such as: oil feed hole location, bearing length, bearing material,  locating tag positioning, etc. The important aspects are bearing i/d and o/d. Everthing else can be overcome if your keen enough, after all this engine does not sound like it is going to have a hard life when its put back together again.

I am sure in the fullness of time the OP will let us know, what he finds.

« Last Edit: January 05, 2012, 12:04:32 PM by listard-jp2 »

Rxe

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 15
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #9 on: January 05, 2012, 08:57:35 AM »
I'll get the micrometer out....

Rxe

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 15
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #10 on: January 06, 2012, 02:06:53 PM »
Main bearing journal diameter is 66.65 mm.  Width of the current shells is 37.something mm ( can't remember two numbers at the same time, will have to go and re measure).


listard-jp2

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 662
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #11 on: January 06, 2012, 07:35:54 PM »
I have being doing a bit more research on this today, and now have access to a SR4 manual, the main bearing pt numbers being 204-52340 (upper), 204-52350 (lower), and thrust washers are 204-52330.

Compared with the dimensions that you have quoted, none of the SR3 main bearings will be any good to you.  :embarassed: As the SR4 has 2.625" diameter main bearing journals verses the SR3's 2.250" main bearing journal diameter.

Further more the SR3 main bearings are bushes on either end of the crank, with 1/2 shell bearings for the intermediate main bearings. The SR4 engine has 1/2 shell bearings for every journal, and is both a very different crank to the SR both in terms of main bearing journal diameters and style.

I have looked extensively at both AE and Vandervall bearing catalogues today, and no other aircooled Lister engine shares the same main bearing journal diameters, I am also speculating this would be the same for the thrust washers.

Due to the very specialist nature of this item I think your best option is to contact Sleeman and Hawken in Devon (long time Lister Petter dealer). If they cannot help you the only other option will be to try and find some bearing shells from another application.

I did something similar to this myself some years ago with a Ferguson TEF20  fitted with the Standard vangaurd FE20C engine, and had to fit Landrover big end shells to the connecting rods as the crank had being ground to -0.060" and the Ferguson big end bearing shells were only available to -0.040 undersize at the time. If you are forced to take a similar option let me know and I will have a look though my catalogues, but would additionally need accurate measurements of the bearing housing inside diameters.

Rxe

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Posts: 15
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #12 on: January 09, 2012, 01:53:35 PM »
Hmmm.  Something told me it was unlikely to be that simple.   Thanks for checking it out though.  Digging the veg patch took priority over diesels this w/e, so no progress on the cam either.   I'll see what dieselgman comes up with, then try Sleemans.

dieselgman

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 3189
    • View Profile
    • Lister Parts
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #13 on: January 09, 2012, 02:12:13 PM »
We also use Sleeman & Hawken (among others) for sourcing in the U.K.. It is my understanding that the SR4 main bearings are unique and obsolete. I'm not sure what else can be done in this regard. There may be some of those engines around to salvage though - none that I am aware of in the USA.

dieselgman
ALL Things Lister/Petter - Americas
Lyons Kansas warehousing and rebuild operations

listard-jp2

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 662
    • View Profile
Re: SR4 Rebuild
« Reply #14 on: January 10, 2012, 01:42:41 PM »
It is my understanding that the SR4 main bearings are unique and obsolete.
dieselgman

That is so, in the case of SR4  STD size main bearings, though Sleeman and Hawken do still have -0.020" available, though priced as a pair of shells per journal at £27.66+VAT+delivery (5 sets required per crank) you might like to be sitting down when they take payment from you. :o

Unfortunately thrust washers are no longer available, but you should be able to reuse what you have, being as your engine has not done any serious work.