New pistons Petter PJ2, block after short time engine running. Clearance?

[mike90045]

What is the availability of BioDiesel and using it to avoid the Tax ?

[Rob PetterPJ2]

Hi you all

Amsterdam just doesn't want any engine that smokes. No hybrids either! Not even two engines (electric for city use, fuel for out going trips) That's what they'd announced, earlier. Actually they want to get rid of all the private boats, so you should always hire one for a canal trip. Everything commercial. They do gooders seem to envision a Disney Park. Indeed, Amsterdam would not be Amsterdam anymore! If there's anything I like, it is taking pictures of all the crazy boats. Nowhere as colorful a collection as here!

Electric cars can load the batteries at the border of town, where diesel generators standing next to the loading units, produce the electricity...
Biodiesel is already standard. And then we have to put a drop of extreme poison in it to kill the bio, to not let it stuff the pipes...

I've tried to separate from my boat earlier, but it's also my darling, that I love and sometimes hate. It's also my floating garden house, in front of my place, and a guest room for two. Hard to decide. But getting the engine to start by hand, which is now too difficult, is where I'd love to get.

The valves are really OK. To turn flywheel with valves closed is a hard job. I need two feet at the flywheel to get it over the compression.
I'll investigate the costs of a proper renovation. And be happy to use all you guys knowledge.

Johndoh
why you think the barrels need a new bore? To keep the barrel walls perfectly straight, maybe?

[guest23837]

I thought you fitted over-size pistons and rings? 5 or 10 thou is a lot of metal to hone off if the pistons are oversize.

[ajaffa1]

Hey Rob, when I read your earlier posts I assumed that a re-bore was what you had done. The way this works is: you measure the wear in the bore. Oversize pistons generally come in increments of +.010 inches. If the wear is less than .010 inch you re-bore to allow for a +.010 piston. The cylinder is then honed to provide a key for the new piston rings and very small groves/indents for the oil to sit in to lubricate the new piston rings.

If what your engineers have done is to hone a cylinder out without a re-bore and then try to fit an over sized piston they should be shot for criminal incompetence.

Very sorry to hear the Dutch government have joined in with the all pervasive green stupidity. Could you find a mooring outside of Amsterdam, so you can continue you passion without being robbed by the taxman?

Bob

[Rob PetterPJ2]

I thought you fitted over-size pistons and rings? 5 or 10 thou is a lot of metal to hone off if the pistons are oversize.

What about 20 thou... as +020 are the new pistons. But it was that engine specalists plan to do it like that, and they carried it out, so they said. If you look back in the posts, there are all the details about this.

[Rob PetterPJ2]

It's a HUGE amount to do with a hone. And..... you would NEVER be able to keep the barrels straight and true with an engine hone no matter if you set it up in a drill press or whatever. They would be wide in the middle and narrow at the ends guaranteed.  Definitely needs to be done on the proper machine by an expert.

They talked about honing  and I think, indeed, the barrels aren perfectly straight, because that one piston that does seem a fraction larger (or deformed), when I push it through the barrels, the resistance is not equal everywhere.

And sure, that's exactly what I thought about honing. They way it's described, "never have the stones go out of the barrel" means everything away fro the ends of the barrel will be touched by the stones more than the ends.

So, Glort, I should go there and...

[Rob PetterPJ2]

I wait for the manual t be delivered, look at the advised clearance, then check it with the one OK piston, and then see.

[sirpedrosa]

Hi Rob

How things are going with your JP2?

BR
VP

[Rob PetterPJ2]

I've sent the engine workshop who bought the pistons and did the honing the info from the manual, about the exact measurements for the cylinder for a +020 piston and asked if they'd want to take a look into it all being right, and do another measuring, when I'd bring the stuff over. I also asked where they'd bought the new pistons because I wasn't all that happy with them being different from the originals at various points and that I considered doing some shopping again. I didn't mention any blame. Just the things as they are: I have these questions.

10 days later, still no response.

I got very busy with other stuff, though.
The plan, now, is to contact the two resellers of Lister Petter parts and see if they have pistons that look more, like the originals, preferably, identical!

I have ONE question, that I do not find the answer to in the manual: what the clearance should be between the piston skirt and the barrel!

Cheers
Rob

[Rob PetterPJ2]

I understand I may find the exact measures of the barrel and that of a piston, and then deduct and find the clearance.

[sirpedrosa]

Hi Rob

see may thread (reply 131 >>): http://listerengine.com/smf/index.php?topic=8320.msg97563#new, and pay attention to 38AC's notes.

BR
Pedrosa

[sirpedrosa]

Hi Rob

No news, good news, or not so?

BR
VP

[sirpedrosa]

Hi Rob

How things are going with your JP2? Any improvement?

BR
VP

[Rob PetterPJ2]

Hi guys,

I'm sorry I didn't reply to your questions for an update, but just recently I picked up the project again, and I think I have some good news. Jee, 120 days have past...

When Jim Perkins, from the UK, had sent me a copy of the Petter PJ2 manual, he had somehow overlooked that many pages were missing. Something I first noticed when I couldn't find certain info in it.
Anyway, he has then sent me a complete copy.
But I just kept measuring and measuring the cylinders and the pistons and tried to find out, to what degree the cylinders needed to be bored or honed again, in a friends garage, but I kept being insecure about it. The manual didn't and doesn't mention the ideal piston clearance, or margin it should stay within, anywhere! It just kept me puzzled too much.
First when the cold of the winter left us, it became tempting again to occupy myself with this boat engine. SO, I had to decide what to do.

Now, the good news is, that, with a friend, Jack, who had worked in a garage, and knew more about repairing engines than I, I took the stuff back to the engine revision workplace and simply asked them: "Can you just look at it, measure the cylinders and pistons again, and see what could have gone wrong and what can be done to get it fixed?"
And the guy of the shop, Mike, did measurements right away. He saw there were slight differences in the cylinders they had honed 4 months ago. He did accept the possibility that the pistons they had bought for me were maybe not such good quality as I acknowledged that I had screwed up by not knowing I had to adapt the piston ring gap myself according to a manual that I then didn't yet have.
They were very busy but they would see what they could do. This Mike called me a week later and said they fixed the stuff as good as possible. The cylinders were honed 0,02 mm more (about 0,008" is that?) and the damage on the pistons was polished away a bit. Not ideal, but buying all new stuff again was not the option I'd go for.
There was no bill attached.

So, I went back to the boat with the engine sitting in it, and was then thinking about that slightly bent connecting rod... I was advized to not keep that one there. I apparently thought it would have been quite a job to get the rod out, but I could reach the two bolts from the already open side of the engine and it took me just about 20 minutes to get it out.
My friend Jack said it could be bent back by a professional. I took it to the same engine revision shop, but Mike said it can't be bent back. On internet I also saw it's 'not done'. It would be stupid. OK, new problem...
I called a spare part supplier in The Netherlands. They didn't have it.
Then I tried Jim Perkins, this evening. Sent him an email, and, YES, he has the connecting rod and a new bearing and he has already shipped it to me!

So, I hope soon to have put the engine back together. I don't know how long the not so good pistons will do the job. I think of selling the boat, or move it out of Amsterdam, because, again, the city wants to raise the tax and thinks of doubling it! The past years the city said they raised the taxes (x5!!!) because 'fossil' fuel engines are bad for the climate. Now they want to raise the taxes because they need the money to maintain the canals and the bridges!

[buickanddeere]

As previously stated by numerous others, probably too right on the ring gap.
 As for your skill using the English Language? Superior to the majority of persons born speaking English as their native tongue .