1979-1993 & 94 Conv [Subscribe to Daily Digest] |
Members do not see ads below this line. - Help Keep This Site Online - Signup
or how i did mine.. my car is an 8 valve none turbo with no air-con..
one.. drain at least thirds of the coolent.. i pulled the bottom hose to drain mine.. but how u do this dosnt matter really..
two .. for safety reasons disconnect one of the battery terminals..
three.. remove the plugs plus distrubutor cap and leads.. and useing the marks on the crankshaft set the engine to top dead centre.. u can tug on the belts to do this.. with the plugs removed the engine will turn easy..
four.. working from the inlet side of the car.. remove all the bolts that attach things to the head such as the warm up valve and all the inlet manifold bolts.. any electrical sensor connections that plug into the head.. dont disconnect anything u dont have to.. basically leave all the stuff attached to the inlet manifold alone..
five.. give a firm upward tug on the inlet manifold it should break cleanly away from the head.. if the gasket is undamged it can be reused.. it wont come up far cos of all the stuff still attached to it.. then place a block of wood or anything between the manifold and egine block to keep the manifold slightly clear of the head.. all done on this side..
six.. working from the exhaust side of the car remove the front pipe where it attaches to the exhaust manifold.. u might have to go under the car to do this.. leave the manifold attached to the head..
seven.. loosen the power steering pump bolts and remove the power steering belt..
eight.. place a jack under the exhaust side rear of the engine and take the engine weight.. lift the engine slightly but not too much.. the jack goes roughly under where the power steering pump on the engine is..
nine.. remove the two small bolts that go upwards into the head at the timing chain end.. a small ring or open ended spanner should do this.. u cant see these bolts but with the power steering belts out of the way they are easy to get at..
ten.. now this is what the jack under the engine is about..there are two bolts that form part of the rear engine mounting arrangement.. these screw into the head and look like they are part of the bracket that holds the power steering pump in place.. remove these two bolts useing an open ended or ring spanner.. if they bind coming out u have the engine jacked wrongly.. go up or down slightly with the jack untill these bolts come out cleanly.. do it carefuly as it will save a lot of trouble getting the buggers back in..
eleven.. now for the interesting bit.. remove all the allen screws that hold the valve cover to the head.. give the cover a sharp "thump" sideways near its base.. if u are lucky the cover will break cleanly away from the head without wrecking the gasket.. if undamaged the gasket can be left in place and reused.. lift the cover up from the timing chain end and free it from its distributor to camshaft connection.. with the engine top dead centre the dog on the distributor is upright.. check the rotor position and make sure it goes back the way it comes off..
twelve.. now u can see into the "works".. put a small cable-tie thru a hole in the timing chain gear and go round the chain.. this makes sure the chain dooes not come off the gear.. look down into the chain cavity and useing something like a screwdriver handle wedge this down the centre between the two halves of the chain.. this makes sure that the chaing stays in place and dosnt come off the cog on the cranshaft end of things.. i made a foul up of this but it didnt seem to do any harm.. my chain and cog ended up hanging in the breeze but things still stayed in the right place.. still try and do it right..
thirteen.. now trying not to spin or turn the engine u need to remove the three bolts that hold the gear to the camshaft.. there is an art to doing this and the angle u hold your spanner relative to the cog helps.. so does gently thumping the spanner with your hand as opposed to simply trying to turn it.. anyway remove these three bolts and tap the gear of the end of the camshaft..
fourteen.. now to remove the head bolts.. they are bloody tight.. remove them gently and progessively in a similar way u would tighten them up..
fifteen.. now grabbing whatever u can.. the exhaust manifold and camshaft come in handy pull like hell.. things should come apart.. being carefull of the timing chain gear lift the lot off..
what u do now is up to up.. head skimming.. valve grinding can all be done if u feel the need.. all i am concerned about is simple gasket replacement and how to do it.. when i put mine back i used a couple of 1/2 inch wooden dowels about a foot long that screwed into the bolt holes in the block.. this helps with holding the gasket in place and lowering the head into position.. all the rest is a reversal off taking it apart.. there are many options as how to remove a cylinder head and what needs taking apart.. i think my way is the easiest.. working slowly and methodically it should all be off in less than three hours.. i could quite easily do mine again in about one and a half hours having done it once.. allowing for putting it back i could do it all in three hours..
and if u have a high mileage saab and want to take the mileage higher replacing the head gasket purely as a matter of long term maintainance.. ie before it starts to give trouble will save u having to skim the head and all sorts of future problems.. do it before things get really bad and a simple gasket replacement will do the job.. it isnt that hard or expensive a job there are far worse ones.. he he
trog100
posted by 62.254....
, Tue, 7 Jan 2003 18:27:14
No Site Registration is Required to Post - Site Membership is optional (Member Features List), but helps to keep the site online
for all Saabers. If the site helps you, please consider helping the site by becoming a member.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
