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As I have dug into my A4 pretty much as deeply as it is possible to dig, I have discovered a couple things that the Moyer Manual overlooks, which would be nice to have covered in there.
Overall, it does a pretty darn good job of walking you step-by-step through the total tear-down process, in sequence.
But it never tells you how to remove the accessory drive. There is one sentence, in association with removing the rear cover over the reversing drive, which says, "If the two bolts that hold the accessory drive on are still in, remove them now."
I couldn't tell at first if that means you can then pull the drive off, or what. It's not totally obvious from looking at it how it comes off. And the manual doesn't say how or when to remove the drive. As it turns out, you just pull it off and the whole thing comes off in your hand. There's nothing about taking it apart either - how to pull the shaft out of the casting. I managed that as well, though, mainly because I've taken apart a bunch of machinery in my lifetime, so I figured it out.
Anyhow, so now I'm trying to decide whether to replace the oil seal or bearing in that accessory drive housing. I figure it makes sense to replace the seal; the bearing seems to be fine.
Next thing was that the manual never tells you when or how to remove the oil screen. In the following section, about putting it back together, it tells you when and how to re-install it, but that of course assumes you've already taken it off.
Again, no biggie; I figured out to just carefully unscrew it.
There's also nothing about disassembling the starter motor, which I did so that I can clean and paint it. So I'm totally off the map there.
I also found nothing that would aid figuring out my question about a the exhaust flange bolt holes.
Finally, and this is a small, but potentially significant, point: the nuts that hold on the crank main bearing caps and all the connecting rod caps have little slots cut in them. I noticed when taking mine apart that nearly all of them had those slots oriented away from the object being secured. So those slots pointed towards the open end of the stud or bolt, rather than pressing against the rod caps.
BUT one rod cap had them on the other way - the slots were bearing against the rod cap.
I assume that since all of the other ones were assembled in the other orientation (i.e., away from the rod cap) that this one had been assembled incorrectly. And this occurred at the factory! Because I'm pretty confident this engine has never been opened up since it was installed in 1983.
It would be nice if the manual had at least a little sidebar about the proper orientation for those slotted nuts. I plan on putting them all back in with the slots pointing away from the caps, because that's the way all but one of the caps were assembled.
It's actually very nice having a manual to follow for once - pretty much all the machinery I've disassembled and reassembled has been antique woodworking machinery, and I have to figure it all out as I go, take good notes and photos and remember how it all goes back together. But the potential for mistakes being very costly is much lower when disassembling an old bandsaw than with this engine.
Overall, it does a pretty darn good job of walking you step-by-step through the total tear-down process, in sequence.
But it never tells you how to remove the accessory drive. There is one sentence, in association with removing the rear cover over the reversing drive, which says, "If the two bolts that hold the accessory drive on are still in, remove them now."
I couldn't tell at first if that means you can then pull the drive off, or what. It's not totally obvious from looking at it how it comes off. And the manual doesn't say how or when to remove the drive. As it turns out, you just pull it off and the whole thing comes off in your hand. There's nothing about taking it apart either - how to pull the shaft out of the casting. I managed that as well, though, mainly because I've taken apart a bunch of machinery in my lifetime, so I figured it out.
Anyhow, so now I'm trying to decide whether to replace the oil seal or bearing in that accessory drive housing. I figure it makes sense to replace the seal; the bearing seems to be fine.
Next thing was that the manual never tells you when or how to remove the oil screen. In the following section, about putting it back together, it tells you when and how to re-install it, but that of course assumes you've already taken it off.
Again, no biggie; I figured out to just carefully unscrew it.
There's also nothing about disassembling the starter motor, which I did so that I can clean and paint it. So I'm totally off the map there.
I also found nothing that would aid figuring out my question about a the exhaust flange bolt holes.
Finally, and this is a small, but potentially significant, point: the nuts that hold on the crank main bearing caps and all the connecting rod caps have little slots cut in them. I noticed when taking mine apart that nearly all of them had those slots oriented away from the object being secured. So those slots pointed towards the open end of the stud or bolt, rather than pressing against the rod caps.
BUT one rod cap had them on the other way - the slots were bearing against the rod cap.
I assume that since all of the other ones were assembled in the other orientation (i.e., away from the rod cap) that this one had been assembled incorrectly. And this occurred at the factory! Because I'm pretty confident this engine has never been opened up since it was installed in 1983.
It would be nice if the manual had at least a little sidebar about the proper orientation for those slotted nuts. I plan on putting them all back in with the slots pointing away from the caps, because that's the way all but one of the caps were assembled.
It's actually very nice having a manual to follow for once - pretty much all the machinery I've disassembled and reassembled has been antique woodworking machinery, and I have to figure it all out as I go, take good notes and photos and remember how it all goes back together. But the potential for mistakes being very costly is much lower when disassembling an old bandsaw than with this engine.
) including each and every not and bolt that is assembled in the rebuild.
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