Hey there, I discovered this forum while looking for tips on fixing up my truck. It's a 1992 f150 4.9 staight 6 with the 3 speed tranny. I bought this truck 3 or 4 years ago for $200 and figured if I couldn't fix it, it was worth that much in scrap metal. It has pretty much sat in the same spot since I bought it and now I want to get it going. I don't have a lot of experience working on vehicles, but I'm mechanically inclined, how some tools, and can follow a how to pretty well, so it seems I'm about as qualified as a lot of people out there that call themselves mechanics; )
I started checking things out a few days ago and this is where I'm at:
I pulled the plugs and used a little homemade blend of super lubes on top of the cylinders. Replaced plugs while I had them out. Cleaned up the area as best as I could, lubed and talked real nice to every pully and moving part I could think of, and finally, hooked up a wrench to the shaft to see if I could get her to turn. With a little resistance, but no grinding, she rotated. Now I knew I was in business, or at least had a shot.
Next, I was told that the truck had a coolant leak when I got it, but they couldn't figure out where it was coming from. So I took to flushing the radiator to clean it out and look for leaks. Right away, water started pouring out of a freeze plug on the side of the engine block. I didn't want to take the engine out, since that seems a bit higher of a skill level than I have, so I removed the passenger tire, the plastic moulding around the wheel well, and moved all of the components out of my way until I could reach the plugs. There are six of then next to each other, so I did them all while I had everything open. It wasn't easy at all, but it was simple enough.
Now back to flushing and I see water coming out of the fire wall to the cabin. Fortunately, I have the heater core that is right behind the glove box, so I didn't have to take out the whole dash, and it only took an hour or two. No Leak now, except for where I put the tee from the flush kit.
After that, I dropped the tranny pan and drain the fluid. It looked really good and clean in there, so I was very pleased.
After replacing the battery, and draining all the old gas, I decided it was time to fire her up. A few clicks all of the starter later, I discovered a bad battery cable. Once that was fixed, she started up smooth and everything was great outside of the expected cloud of smoke from the exhaust. I let it warm up and got all the fluids correct.
Having worked on it for two days and
Putting a few hundred dollars into it, I was feeling pretty good about the truck running so well, though I hadn't even driven it.
This morning I decided it take her for a test ride and check the brakes. While I was warming her up, I noticed the temp gauge was in the red, so I shut her off. I popped the hood and radiator fluid was bubbling out of the overflow tank in addition to smoke coming off of the engine. I don't see any oil in the coolant or vice versa, but I'm pretty sure that means that I hey to learn how to change a head gasket. If anyone knows something else that it might be, or knows of any good tutorials, I'm very open to suggestion.
P.s. thanks to everyone that is a party of this, I may be new here, but I've already gotten a lot of great info.