engine stuck now I see why

[studelover]

Pulled the heads off my hawk today and discovered why the motor would not turn. There is one cly that the mystery oil did not even sip past. I hit the pistons with a sluge hammer and they still would not budge.The heads are clean and the block looks ok, there was rust in the water passages. If your motor is stuck it will have to be disassembled to get it to work correctly I was dreaming.

Studebakers forever!

[John Kirchhoff]

Yep, those home remedies are ok for a "stuck" engine, but not a "seized" engine of which I'm sure you'll agree. One question, that front right piston appears to have some funny looking indentations in it. Did you put them in there pounding on it, is that just an optical illusion or are those actually indentations that were there before you started on it? On my 232 I had to remove the crankshaft because I had a seized piston on each side. I couldn't drive one out because the other wouldn't let the crank rotate enough to get the journal out of the way of the first.

[S2DSteve]

You never know. The 289 in the convertible was stuck when I got it. To make a long story short, it turned out the "builder" had installed undersized(oversized?)main bearing inserts. When they were torqed down, it just locked the crankshaft in place. Fortunatly, I didn't try to pound out the pistons before checking the bearings!

[studelover]

when I first saw those indentatons I thought maybe something fell into the cly I did not hit any of these pistons.The walls are ultra smooth, the heads are not burnt up looking.It's my guess that these cars became old and folks stopped driving them, then they let someone drive the car and they had a mishap, no harm done they park the car and time goes by before you know it it's 20 years. We cut into this car and found all kinds of stuff.
stainless steel bolts on the exhaust manifolds go figure!
Studebakers forever!

[Transtar60]

Stainless steel exhaust bolts are stock on many years of Stude V8s,
mainly it seems late 50's V8s like in my 3E38 and 4E28.

3E38
4E2
4E28
5E13
7E7
8E7
8E12
8E28
4E2
59 Lark
etc

[John Kirchhoff]

The way that piston looks, it makes me wonder if that cylinder experienced a severe case of detonation at some time. The intake manifold could have been leaking on that cylinder, leaning out the mixture enough to cause the problem.