Get a leak down test done before you jump the gun on a new motor.  Could be
a valve issue that would be fixed by installing a new head.  Much cheaper
and faster than a full rebuild.  A leak down test would tell the tale.

Ken

On Fri, Jul 10, 2015 at 6:35 PM, Marc Perdue <mcperdue@gmail.com> wrote:

> Not much to say; apparently my Vanagon guys were waiting for me to
> give the go-ahead before tearing into the engine. Communication is
> important.
>
> In any event, there is an unusual noise in cylinder 1 of unknown
> origin. They talked about an engine rebuild. Not prepared to make that
> kind of commitment without knowing the cause of the noise and what it
> would take to fix it.
>
> Being as the engine rebuild option was being put out there, I decided
> to look into some engine replacement/rebuild options. Being as we
> haven't had a good tire thread in at least a day, I thought I'd start
> an engine options thread.
>
> My Vanagon guy, Keith McDonald, says he can do a balanced and
> blueprinted engine rebuild for me for something along the lines of
> $4-5K. I assume he would keep my engine for a core, but don't know. I
> assume this cost is installed, but don't know. What I do know is that
> they did a video of one of his rebuilt engines running on a pallet,
> unrestrained, and not moving around on the pallet. They said they sent
> the video to Shaun (sp?) at Bus Depot and that he was impressed.
>
> I personally have no solid idea of what "balanced and blueprinted"
> means. I'd love to be enlightened on this. I do know that my engine
> definitely would go running off of a pallet if unrestrained.
>
> Bus Depot has a rebuilt engine for under $2K, plus a core charge,
> shipping, etc.
>
> GoWesty has a number of different options, price not including core,
> shipping, etc.:
> 1) 2.2L for about $4.3K
> 2) 2.3L for about $5K
> 3) 2.45L for about $5.7K
>
> I could sign on to Bostig's RG6 build for Winter 2015 with a deposit
> of about $1.7K, total non-installed price circa $6K, not including
> engine.
>
> Subaru conversion for who-knows-how-much.
>
> So, I have no idea how much an install of any of these would cost if I
> was having somebody else do it and I don't have the proper facilities
> and/or time to do it myself. On the surface of it, the Bus Depot
> rebuild looks good just looking at cost. But is it balanced and
> blueprinted? Should I care about that?
>
> I was hoping that the time to install a new engine was a long way off,
> and it may still be. It is kind of frustrating that I'm having this
> kind of issue at 170K miles on the 3rd engine. Now, the quality of the
> 2nd engine rebuild was definitely questionable, but this one is a
> Boston Bob engine with maybe 50-65K miles on it, and I've tried to
> baby it.
>
> Sigh...
> Marc Perdue
>

--
Thanks,
Ken Wilford
John 3:16
www.vanagain.com