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Thread: m62B44 engine rebuilding

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    m62B44 engine rebuilding

    The about time for a new thread about rebuilding the 4.4 family of engines. While I'm aware that it is cheaper to replace a damaged engine with another used one, this is about building a higher performance and bigger cubic inch performance motor. I have reviewed all of bimmerforums and seen no mention of engine building. The entire issue comes down to the aluminium bores and honing I have gone through the internet and read everything written about it, talked to machine shops, and pondered the pitfalls endless. The theory of why the factory can and the aftermarket cannot is going to be discovered. I have access to a machine shop with all the trick honing materials, but all the rehones performed had uncontrolled oil consumption upon completion. The basic theory is alusil blocks are like a slab of concrete. Boring leaves a finish that has a mix of silica particles that are uncut, half cut and most of the way cut and ready to fall out. Just like you see in cut concrete aggregate. By rehoning an existing bore you are removing more soft aluminium, exposing more silica, leaving an area with no ring contact. That leads to oil consumption problems. A fresh bore allows you to control the under cut of the aluminium silica surface. Using a microscope to determine the amount of undercut and trial and some error I'm sure. The cost of buying bmw engine parts means that if the bore and hone could be accomplished, comparable deck height pistons could be used, with less expensive ring packs, and bores up to 94mm. Then it's on to the bottom end to increase cubes, improve rod strength,etc. The end goal is heavy boost. But a strong n/a bmw motor is a sweet sound. I have accumulated a few cores to start on and it's a shame they are all still useable. So am I the only whacko out there, or is there other interested engine builders out there. And better yet does anyone have experience to share. I am boring a block shortly and have pistons picked but am finalizing rod choice.

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    Subscribed for this open heart surgery.
    Last edited by gmak; 04-25-2016 at 08:57 AM.
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    Same here. In for some new discoveries. The magic is in the final hone with some special steps. Good luck.
    98 540i 6, 525 whp, 120 mph 1/4, V3 Si S/C'er @16 psi, W/A I/C, Water/Meth, Supersprint Headers, HJS Cats, 3" Custom Exhaust, UUC Twin Disc, Wavetrac LSD, GC Coil Overs, Monoball TA, AEM FP, Aeromotive FPR, AEM Failsafe AFR/Boost, Style 65's w/275's, M5 Steering Box, Eibach Sways, M3 Shifter, Evans Coolant, 85 Deg Stat, PWM Fan, 10" Subs, B.A. speakers, Grom Aux/BT, Still Rolling as my DD!

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    You haven't mentioned where you looked, but I stumbled across a Sunstrand site last week discussing the problems honing aluminum cylinders/sleeves and the specialized kits they've developed. I vaguely recall BMW being mentioned but I'm blank on whether it was Alusil or Nikasil, or both, or something else.

    Thought it might be worth mentioning so you could check them out. Good luck.
    Regards
    RDL

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    Very cool. In for info.


    Wouldn't iron sleeving the cylinders solve this problem?

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    Iron sleeves would be a great solution. Early on that was the plan but shops warned of block breakage from the accumulated stresses of pressing in the final sleeves. Next step would be cutting out all the bore liners and fitting wet sleeves, but the cost eliminated that plan. Also the there is the slight advantage of the aluminium bores heat transfer on detonation. This brings us to the second part of the build, how much HP will we get from a performance build. Hot Rod magazine had 2 interesting articles in one magazine?!!! 4/15 issue had an engine builders challenge, and an article about assembly of an offy Indy motor. The offy just shows the aspects that look similar to a m62. The other had an interesting way of rating all the different motors. Hp+ tq divide by cubic in. This puts a stock 4.4 with a score of 2 but how much more power can you get. The next step up is the 4.6 which is basically a cam improvement makes 340+350 divide by 280=2.46. S62 comes in at 2.66. Magazine Dyno challenge for heavily modified engines had scores of 2.5-3.0. The biggest limiting factor is air flow. The heads can only support so much cubic inch without modifying them. So my intent with on the first build is to max out the bore, bump compression, and use the 4.6 cams. Headwork will be limited to bowl work, and minor blending in the port. I believe that hp could exceed 350 but I don't want to over promise. Anyone with spare time who loves computer time and wants to download a desktop Dyno could punch in numbers from a non vanos 4.4 to see how close the program is. Then we could alter the specs to see where gains are.

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    New problem. Aren't there always more when you deviate from stock. I wanted to get rid of the cracked powder metal rods, but the pin diameter of the chosen piston won't allow a Honda rod to be rebushed to size. Pardon me for jumping from metric and decimal but we're making mechanical soup here. The stock 4.4 rod is basically 5.7 in so that means small block Chevy. And they're cheap and have don't have t.t.y. rod bolts. But the rod journal is bigger, so finally a use for all those n62 motors laying around. The crank! Same main, nearly 2.1 rod journal. Quick grind to 2" and you can use the extra material to set piston deck height for compression.

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    I wanted to do this when I had my motto half torn down to do the chain guides and a few other things. I'm non Vanos, but wanted to send the heads to be built. I had a lot of mixed responses on the heads. Some said they're very restrictive, others said they were about as good as one can get, some said they couldn't really opens them up more. So I'm curious to see what you can do with this motor as opposed to just LS swapping to get the power. I love the way the BMW V8 sounds and would like to keep it, but I also wonder about what the reliability and maintenance is going to be like if it's highly modified. I'm interested for sure to see what you can come up with.

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    Regarding the crackedcapsinteredpowdermetalforgedblahblah stock rods, I'm not sure why you want to get rid of them unless you are going to a turbo or nitrous setup that will make a lot of torque down low. My experience with similar rods from another make is that they are good for at least 80 ft/lbs per rod, absent excessive detonation. If you are dead set on replacing them with something stronger, there are 4340 H-beam rods available for the M62/M60 at around $600/set. They appear to be similar or the same as Eagles.

    About the cylinder change of bore dimension, it seems like there is no shortage of shops setup with the Sunnen brand felt honing blocks and alusil specific paste for the final honing step, but so far I have had the same no luck as you have had finding a shop that is really setup for the boring operation to get the basic size established properly prior to the final honing/etching/reveal step. That seems to be the tricky spot so far in my asking around.

    There is another tricky aspect of it all though, and that is obtaining non-factory pistons that have a coating on them that is compatible with the alusil cylinder walls. Wiseco says they can do it, and CP is supposed to make some, but I have yet to find anyone who can verify the validity of these claims over a reasonable service life. For me this is a very important aspect to the whole discussion, because even if a guy is okay with keeping the stock bore size, he still might like some forged pistons with a different dish or dome for a compression ratio adjustment...

    Anyway, subscribed for more info you may dig up OP!

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    I'm posting this from my smart phone, so I apologize for the lack of paragraphs. I enter them but they never survive. I have been buried in m62's as I am preparing one for my d.d to swap in. In addition, one for S/C mock up, one for spare and the 4.6. The build is for the eventual failure of the first. The goal is to build a strong engine, cheap. All the trick bmw parts cost a lot of money, $600 rods, $600 pistons, maybe with rings, but I think they are an extra 300. And still you have a rod bearing that on a s62 is prone for wear at just 400hp. And bolts. And I feel like buying stock in the rod and head bolt company after all the bolts I've purchased lately. My build uses a dodge/ jeep 4.7 piston with a 93 mm bore and same compression height. Plus they come with Teflon skirts and up to .020 over or 93.5 mm. And are $300 with rings. Bigger wrist pin go with the Chevrolet rods, with ARP bolts that can be retorqued, also $300. You do have to switch cranks and rebalance, which costs, but a stronger engine is worth it. I'm targeting 12-15 psi of boost so the first refreshed one should last through the tuning stage. Also there is the risk of the bored one not seating the rings, or smoking, or? So initial cost matters. So in to the great unknown. Test block and first block are heading in for (after hours) machining as soon as time is coordinated.

  11. #11
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    There are many of us pushing close to 500 HP or more using all stock internals.
    With different pistons you may not have valve piston contact if you use the 4.6 cams.
    The intake valves (using OE pistons w/4.6 cams) only have 0.3mm of static clearance.
    Probably much less as it heats up, or contact, at speed.
    Good luck with your build.

    Mel (forgot his screen name) had a 4.4 bored out, the rings didn't seal.

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    Quote Originally Posted by wagons ho View Post
    My build uses a dodge/ jeep 4.7 piston with a 93 mm bore and same compression height. Plus they come with Teflon skirts and up to .020 over or 93.5 mm. And are $300 with rings. Bigger wrist pin go with the Chevrolet rods, with ARP bolts that can be retorqued, also $300. You do have to switch cranks. . .
    So you are going with an overbore from the initial stage, huh? Brave!

    What are the details of the rod lengths and big end diameters comparing the factory ones to the Chevy ones you're going to use? I'm guessing the Chevy ones have a slightly smaller big end diameter so you can just have the bimmer crank rod journals ground down a bit and re-polished? If not that or an exact diameter fit, I can't see this being a viable alternative. Enlarging crank journals is a hassle and expensive.

    Another little item is the width of the big ends, the factory rods struck me as quite narrow, with a narrower bearing width than I'm used to seeing in american engines. I always kind of assumed that was part of the reason that the x62s seem to beat up their rod bearings a bit...

    This is super interesting stuff, thanks for sharing!!

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    Yeah, this is interesting and ambitious stuff here. Boldly going where no one has gone before....
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    After taking a few rough measurements from an M62 rod, and a quick googling, I see that the Chevy 5.7" rods do look to be pretty close to working for big end (looks like need to grind the rod journals down a little as I suspected from what you said), and length. My inaccurate measuring puts the center to center length of the M62 rod at 5.625" which supports Pauter's probably accurate number of 5.63".

    But that means that you have a bit of extra rod length there on the Chevy rod that will need to be accounted for somehow. I would guess that adjusted piston pin height would be the simplest way, unless you can make adjustments with head gasket thickness and deck height. What do you have in mind?

    So far I don't have any big end width dimensions for Chevy rods, but my digital calipers showed about .820" width for the M62 rod big end.

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    I thought the rod bearing issues were just s62?

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    This is a thread i really needed !!

    I've supercharged my 540tu with a jag blower and it was working great, then when on a dyno session getting the fueling perfect it had a let go moment no detonation or valve issues though, it looks to have been a broken ring or the piston skirt giving way.

    I've just been quoted around £1240 to reline the cylinders with iron sleeves and a search for pistons lead me here so i'm expecting to pay around £4000 to rebuild the motor strong.

    I would welcome anyone's thoughts regarding this or anything that i may have missed.
    Attached Images Attached Images

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    Depending on how you want to approach things, one low-cost option would be to get yourself another stock bottom end to put in the car, and before you put it in gap the rings out wider. A lot of the LS engine guys do that as pretty much their only prep of junkyard engines and they make crazy power with them.

    The additional heat of combustion with forced induction makes the rings expand extra, and when the ends butt together they tear apart the piston.

    Does your thumb nail catch on that mark in the cylinder bore? If not (or not "too bad"), you might get away with just replacing that piston and rings, and gapping out all of your rings before you reassemble it.

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    Quote Originally Posted by tptrsn View Post
    Depending on how you want to approach things, one low-cost option would be to get yourself another stock bottom end to put in the car, and before you put it in gap the rings out wider. A lot of the LS engine guys do that as pretty much their only prep of junkyard engines and they make crazy power with them.

    The additional heat of combustion with forced induction makes the rings expand extra, and when the ends butt together they tear apart the piston.

    Does your thumb nail catch on that mark in the cylinder bore? If not (or not "too bad"), you might get away with just replacing that piston and rings, and gapping out all of your rings before you reassemble it.
    This is the kind of info that i was looking for thanks.

    I can catch my nail on it and i have a local engine builder who wants to look as he says he might be able to save it.

    Its a bit of a gamble using these old blocks and i cant find one available for sale thats any good if this cant be fixed.
    But i do want to get it back up with the blower, its become a love of boost lol.

  19. #19
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    I know I'll probably catch a lot of flack on here for saying this, but I learned in my old days racing karts that not everything with cylinder walls has to be perfect to make great power. I learned from the Lunatis of Lunati Cams and Cranks that I used to race with that often engines ran fastest after we would stick a piston in the bore, and repair it in the pits with acid and sand paper. No joke, they would really come alive then.

    My reason for telling you this is because if I were in your shoes and not able to easily find a replacement block or engine, I'd probably be taking some 600 or 800 grit sand paper to that cylinder wall and see if I could smooth it out. If I could get that part smoothed reasonably well, then I'd either hone it out myself using whatever fabric wrapped hone setup I could throw together along with the appropriate alusil honing paste (to push back the aluminum substrate and "freshen" the silicon structure), or I'd take it to a handy engine shop that had the proper felt honing blocks and the proper honing paste, and let them do the job. I have a local sprint car engine shop near me that is perfect for this kind of thing.

    If you trust your local guy, I'd let him take a crack at it! Then open up your ring gaps nice and wide before you re-assemble, and go make power! :-)

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    This is what we needed. Pile on in with any and all info, as no one has said that "x" will work. Regarding valve clearance, .3 mil is only .012 thousands so that is tighter than I would opt for. But you say people have? The valve notches on 4.6 and 4.4 pistons (vanos)are the same size and depth. I have noticed various positive piston deck heights on all these engines as though the factory didn't have perfect control over it. The late 4.4 crank has nearly 2.1 rod journals and the late rods only need a .020 hone on the pin bushing to fit the jeep piston.pin of .946. I was opting for the chev rod for service reasons down the road or you could swap in the late crank and rods. Yes I know, now we could go with the 4.8 crank but I still haven't had a successful bore and hone yet. Plus the heads are going to stall out with too many cubes. I'm having a head flow tested with .350 and .410 lift to see what the starting point is. Anyone know what the s62 cam lift is? As soon as I break down and load commie Photoshop I could post pictures. Or wait till post count is high enough. Miss anything?

    - - - Updated - - -

    I have all these motors apart if there is any specific info that needs measuring and posting.

    - - - Updated - - -

    It's not photoshop, photobucket, they want complete access to everything on your computer, files, contacts,email, photos that your not posting to the cloud, etc.

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    Quote Originally Posted by wagons ho View Post
    The late 4.4 crank has nearly 2.1 rod journals and the late rods only need a .020 hone on the pin bushing to fit the jeep piston.pin of .946.
    That rod journal size is a BIG difference from the M62 rod I have sitting here, and I didn't think they changed the rods throughout the M60/M62 run. Are you sure about it?

    Also, when you refer to the pin and rod in this excerpt, is that the 5.7" chevy rod? Did you happen to measure the big end width on those?

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    I was referring to the n62 4.4 as the late 4.4. Yes the Chevrolet rod big end will have to be shaved for width. Look for pics of n62 internals. I haven't ruled out using crank and rods. That has the wrist pin that could be honed to the.946. Offset grinding of the crank (back down to2")could get the few thousands of deck height adjustments if you use the Chevrolet rod.

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    Quote Originally Posted by tptrsn View Post
    I know I'll probably catch a lot of flack on here for saying this, but I learned in my old days racing karts that not everything with cylinder walls has to be perfect to make great power. I learned from the Lunatis of Lunati Cams and Cranks that I used to race with that often engines ran fastest after we would stick a piston in the bore, and repair it in the pits with acid and sand paper. No joke, they would really come alive then.

    My reason for telling you this is because if I were in your shoes and not able to easily find a replacement block or engine, I'd probably be taking some 600 or 800 grit sand paper to that cylinder wall and see if I could smooth it out. If I could get that part smoothed reasonably well, then I'd either hone it out myself using whatever fabric wrapped hone setup I could throw together along with the appropriate alusil honing paste (to push back the aluminum substrate and "freshen" the silicon structure), or I'd take it to a handy engine shop that had the proper felt honing blocks and the proper honing paste, and let them do the job. I have a local sprint car engine shop near me that is perfect for this kind of thing.

    If you trust your local guy, I'd let him take a crack at it! Then open up your ring gaps nice and wide before you re-assemble, and go make power! :-)
    Thanks!!

    So with that in mind how wide should i gap the rings ? looking at the piston i have out and the one remaining good ring that's on it, if i put that ring in the bore there is next to no gap, i measured it with feelers and its 10 thou.
    I hope to have the block out this weekend as i have a full 2 days off work, then i'll get it to the specialist.

  24. #24
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    The question mark for me in this regard is: How does the Alusil block expand relative to a cast iron block?

    Normally for a cast iron block with a bore this size I would personally be shooting for at least about .024-.026" for the top ring, and a couple of thousandths more than that for the second ring. The oil ring shouldn't really heat up too much or cause a problem, so it can be tighter, like maybe around 10 thousandths.... These numbers are on the wide side, but I've found that there is little lost from a bit too much gap, and there is a LOT to be lost from not enough gap.

    Still, I'm not sure how this relates to the alusil block... I expect we can get some decent information from race engine builds with Nikasil bores. They should have basically the same expansion characteristics I think, but I believe it's a more prevalent setup. . . Anyone else care to chime in on this topic?

  25. #25
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    I would be thinking more about the pistons than just the thermal expansion of the cylinder walls on our alusil blocks. What pistons are going in to this build, op?



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