Cleaning & Painting engine parts

Although I'm not cleaning and painting the engine to a perfect level, I do want it nice and clean to work with. So next I've started cleaning and painting brackets and shields.

So first I'm giving them a hot water and abrasive clean. Once dry I've then attacked them with sandpaper to loosen up the surface rush where needed. I then again wash them and let them dry.

I bought some Simoniz high temp Paint. I have a matt Black and Silver as I'm trying to keep the stock look. Its important to do thin coats and more of them, rather than a few thick ones.

Once these were done I placed them in the oven to help them cure a bit, they wont of fully cured, but with the weather like it is currently I wanted to make sure I'd got some of the chemicals at least gone from within the paint as they'll be no heat on it for quite a while and it hardens the paint a bit this way. A picture below of some pieces so far;

Gearbox Cleaning

I'm not going to flood the blog with post after post of the cleaning process but just each big step that I do. So this post is about what I've learnt doing the gearbox.

Remove the solid dirt on the engine / gearbox - I used a product called Gunk and some wire wool and a tooth brush and let it sit for 15 - 20mins. Then wiped off what I could. Dont worry if its not perfect you are just removing the majority of what you need to, the dirt staining gets done later.

Wire Brush - I tried varying wire brush methods so I'm just noting the one that worked for me. I used a wire brush set that goes into a drill. The link below is the one I have actually used.

http://www.screwfix.com/p/drill-carbon-steel-wire-brush-set-3pc/13734

Now it cleans up the metal amazingly and removes the last bits of dirt. Now the down side is if your not careful it can scratch relatively deep and of course it is actually scratching the surfaces to remove the dirt. To get it back smooth and more shiny you could use a mop to polish it.

I wont be doing this I just want it clean and will clear laquer it to protect it for the future.

Tip - By pushing the wire brush over the top of the nuts gets rid of any slight rust on them and they look like new on the gearbox as shown in the pic below. To get like the below I have spent around 6hrs cleaning that bit so far....many more hours to go and still a a little bit in some of the areas ive done.

Engine Work

I'm looking to keep the engine stock (for now) but in good health. There are many revisions of the MR2 engine and depending on the revision will depend on how much power can be had from it due to the sensors / head on the engine. To get to 300BHP on a Rev 1 / Rev 2 is quite hard. rev3+ is a bit easier

Rev1 / Rev 2 are limited. They are firstly limited by the head gasket, which cant take as much PSI. This is easily resolved by using a Rev3 metal headgasket which can take 1.2Bar +, The next limiting factors are the head sensors and ECU... I wont be doing this at this stage.

So by having a metal headgasket I will be able to up the boost in the short term. Also I have had the valves lapped to get a good seal.

Below is a pic of the valves lapped, the head has not been cleaned yet hence is messy, the engine is not in too bad of shape for its age. We also found one of the gaskets by the turbo was blown out but all gaskets are being replaced.

So next was to decide what to do with the block and gearbox and how to tackle it, I really don't want to be taking it fully apart, but will take bits off as I clean those areas so its easy for me to place back. Below is a pic just after I started as I forgot to take a pic before;

After 2.5hrs cleaning the gearbox area it was looking more respectable, although still needs a lot of cleaning! Many hours are going to be spent cleaning this engine I can tell. Ill update with how I get on with it and the best and worse products!