Cost to Rebuild a 259 V-8 These Days

[studepickups]

hope you will not do this

Great thread. Given this information I guess as soon as the snow clears off I should load up that collection of Studebaker V-8s that have taking up space in my shop and drop 'em off at the local scrapyard, as there is no way that I'll ever be able to justify dumping 20+ k into rebuilding them. Just keeping the Cadillac, Mopar, and Chevy engines, which are rebuildable within my budget.
Who'da ever thought. I can build me a Studillac for less than the cost of rebuilding the original 259.

Jessie: There are other ways of keeping the cost down. Often I remanufacture engines for people but not to the extent of a complete. Usually a long block and the person uses their own water pump, carburetor, fuel pump, distributor and so on. If you are more curious read an article I wrote for Turning Wheels, July 2014. Name of the article is "why does it cost so much to rebuild a Studebaker engine?"

[Jeffry Cassel]

Much of the expense is the Machine Shop. It is like walking into the Chevvy dealer and asking if you need a new car!!!! Of course you do!! Parts are more 'cause they built a zillion Chevs and and Fords and a handfull of Studebakers. If you have any aptitude it is not difficult to do a ring and valve job. You need a table saw; carefully clean the head and lay it on the saw table. You can check for any wobble at all and use a fuller gauge to probe between head and machined surface of the saw table. You need a decent micrometer. Practice with it. Cranks are often reusable with out machining. I've had good cranks trashed by shops. You need to have the cam bearings installed by a mechanic with the proper tool ( don't try to scrimp by not replacing them) One of the biggest things is getting those darned galleries clean If the shop cleans your block they won't be clean enough. I use a shotgun cleaning rod. I have a friend who is a retired tractor mechanic and he has a valve ginding machine. Be sure you don't grind exh. valve too thin; they'll burn out. Keep it clean! Cannot over stress going slow and Plastigage. Doubl e check everything. Blocks can often be reused. Check bore with a new comp ring squared up with a piston. measure gap with a feeler gage. Install piston without rings to check wear ( with feeler gage) You'll need a ridge cutter and a ring compressor to install pistons. Don't forget to hone cylinders-the rings might not seat. Lube pistons with ATF. Use K_W Copper Coat on headgaskets -be generous with it. Follow shop manual exactly. Retorque. Unless you live right near the end of the world you will be able to find an SDC member to help. Join AACA ; you should be able to make a gearhead friend or two amonst these nice folks. It gets more expensive to fix old cars with every passing year; we should be helping each othe out as much as possible.

[TWChamp]

In addition to what Jeffry said, I have a framing square that I use to check heads. When I worked at the auto machine shop, I set my framing square against the head bar, and found it was perfect, so I set the square aside and only use it for checking heads and blocks and manifolds for flatness.

[Lynn]

I certainly would not try a freshen up with the block still in the car. When I was in high school, a friend and I "rebuilt" a ford 390 in a 67 Mustang without pulling the motor. Rings and rod bearings. Took the heads to a machine shop for a valve job. Nothing was cleaned. Engine ran well enough, but he sold it shortly thereafter. Definitely not the solution if you plan to keep the car. As others have said, not every block needs decked. Not every set of heads need skimmed. However, on ANY engine I want to be perfect for many years of trouble free service, I have the block decked and the heads trued. I have checked many used SBC blocks for square, and only found one that was dead on.

[Jessie J.]

To read some of these posts Studebaker did such a lousy job of machining their V-8 that it was a pure miracle that any of these engines stayed together even long enough to make it to the dealerships, much less instill owner satisfaction, and brand loyalty for decades and hundreds of thousands of miles of use.
Personally I tend to doubt that Studebaker's factory machining was significantly worse than that of any other competitively priced make.
Certainly meticulous and time consuming precision 'blueprinting' benefits any 1950s engine. But it is NOT a requirement for attaining "factory new" performance, and a level of satisfaction commensurate with the original owner experience.
In my case, it is quite inconceivable that I'll ever put more than a few thousand miles a year on my Studebaker's. I wouldn't want to, because of the frequency of required maintenance, and that I employ disposable brand Xs to beat to death as daily drivers.
My Daytona with its R-3 headers and Don Simmons 2 1/4" stainless 'straight through' exhaust gives a very satisfying rumble while cruising about, and pedal down pins us to the seat up to any legal speed. Not competing in the Pure Stock Muscle Car Drags, a 'stock' stock, as originally factory assembled engine, serves plenty well enough for me, as it has for the last 50+ years.
The 169 in my M-5 still runs and hasn't been apart once since 1954, no need. (actually it wasn't "apart" even then, just sheared the shaft on the oil pump ...which I still have.)

[JoeHall]

To read some of these posts Studebaker did such a lousy job of machining their V-8 that it was a pure miracle that any of these engines stayed together even long enough to make it to the dealerships, much less instill owner satisfaction, and brand loyalty for decades and hundreds of thousands of miles of use.
Personally I tend to doubt that Studebaker's factory machining was significantly worse than that of any other competitively priced make.
Certainly meticulous and time consuming precision 'blueprinting' benefits any 1950s engine. But it is NOT a requirement for attaining "factory new" performance, and a level of satisfaction commensurate with the original owner experience.
In my case, it is quite inconceivable that I'll ever put more than a few thousand miles a year on my Studebaker's. I wouldn't want to, because of the frequency of required maintenance, and that I employ disposable brand Xs to beat to death as daily drivers.
My Daytona with its R-3 headers and Don Simmons 2 1/4" stainless 'straight through' exhaust gives a very satisfying rumble while cruising about, and pedal down pins us to the seat up to any legal speed. Not competing in the Pure Stock Muscle Car Drags, a 'stock' stock, as originally factory assembled engine, serves plenty well enough for me, as it has for the last 50+ years.
The 169 in my M-5 still runs and hasn't been apart once since 1954, no need. (actually it wasn't "apart" even then, just sheared the shaft on the oil pump ...which I still have.)

The block and heads are just chunks of iron. So I'd think, after trillions of RPM, and hundreds of thousands of heat cycles, they may contort a bit. So, since technology is available, and does not cost that much, it just seems a good idea to check the block deck and heads for straightness, upon rebuild. Unless the motor is in a trailer queen, or other vehicle not likely to ever see another 5,000 miles in its lifetime.

[Michael J Hawk]

Much easier if you remove the engine. No need to be leaning over the fenders and trying to avoid head injury imo. I'm doing. a 289 right now that was running good but developed a knock which turned out to be a failed rod bearing. Has over 100k. Doesn't appear it was ever disassembled before. I have the heads and crank at the machine shop right now. The valves and seats were really hammered and the valve guides were a bit loose. Studebaker International has the best prices on parts except for gaskets. Had the thin head gaskets which didn't come with Felpro set. My cylinder walls were still good with very little wear or taper so I plan to hone and re-ring. Biggest surprise was how plugged up all the water passages were. It's no wonder it ran hot. I expect it had too much stop leak or something added. Agree with others about not short changing the job. You really won't know until it's torn down and inspected

[PackardV8]

Biggest surprise was how plugged up all the water passages were. It's no wonder it ran hot. I expect it had too much stop leak or something added. Agree with others about not short changing the job. You really won't know until it's torn down and inspected

Agree; it typically takes a full day to clean the typical 100Kmi+ Studebaker engine. First it has to be cleaned enough to disassemble, then disassemble, remove all the core and threaded plugs, clean the mud out of the water jackets and oil sludge out of the heads, block, rockers, cam bearings knocked out. The parts have to be clean enough to go into the pressure washer (don't want a bucket full of mud and grease going in the tank), then inspect all the parts to determine what can be reused and what must be replaced or remachined.

Has over 100k. . . . My cylinder walls were still good with very little wear or taper so I plan to hone and re-ring.

Congrats on being able to save the $500+ for boring and new pistons. That is very unusual and someone must have been diligent about air filter and oil changes. The Shop Manual says no more than .005" taper and we've never seen a 100Kmi+ Studebaker V8 have less than that.

FWIW, we're building an R2 and the owner told us the bore had no ridge and wanted to reuse what he thought were original pistons. What we found was at some time in the past the ridge had been reamed out and new pistons and rings installed; the bore actually has .012" taper. Eyes are OK for a quick inspection, but the Sunnen dial bore gauge doesn't guesstimate.

We could save the low-miles R2 repop STD pistons, but finding a block to put them in with less than .005" taper would be the difficulty. Back in the CASO days, we'd have knurled the skirts, hit the bores with a hand hone and driven it another 10 -20,000 miles. That build would have been down on power, smoked and used a little oil, but would have run fine by the standards of the bad old days and certainly preferable to parking a Stude for lack of funds for a full remanufacture.

jack vines

[Hawklover]

Back in 1995 I had the engine in my Avanti completely re-built (engine out of car).....cost me $3,000.00........have had zero issues with about 30k miles since the re-build. Have no idea what that same job would run in 2018?

[Deaf Mute]

Remember the day (1960 era) when you could get the valves ground on your 232 for $16.00? It was $1 a hole back then..... and a gallon of blue DuLuxe enamel was $10.00. I was making 50 cents an hour bagging groceries and 55 cents an hour in the body shop.
Now I am living on Social Security & a gallon of reducer cost me over $30 last week.

[1951Champion]

It's not an exact comparison, but I just finished paying for a rebuild of a 1955 Champion Straight 6 engine -- for my 1951 Champion (shot a rod through the block last summer.) The "new" engine had lots of issues -- rusted and broken valves, etc. It had been rebuilt once before. The process of stripping everything to bare metal and then building it back up again cost $7,000. But now she purrs and works beautifully. So yes, it can be very expensive. But I'm hopeful that this engine lasts a very long time. Cheers to Vern Ediger in Kansas for finding the engine, and to my mechanic and his team for the soup-to-nuts rebuild.

[swvalcon]

Deaf Mute so what your saying is your still making .50 cent per hour but paying three times as much for everything.

[Alan]

Deaf Mute, I can feel your pain. I was making $.85 an hour, working at a Signal Oil station in 1960 and you can not live on Social Security, just exist.

[spokejr]

Well, I just ran the numbers on rebuilding the 289 that I just installed in my Avanti.

The machine work that I sublet came to just shy of $1,100. This included decking the block to square it up, boring and honing, milling heads both for the deck (.040") and intake face, installing guides and hardened exhaust valve seats, grining crankshaft and balancing. If I dropped the balancing and squaring the deck I would only save $250.

Parts came to just over $1,800.

The one part that I have no dollar value for is my time; cleaning parts, putting it together, porting heads etc.