WTB Diesel Maxima Crank

[Matthew Abate]

Yeah, can't make it work. Would be at least $1500 by the time I got it home.


From what I can tell that is not recoup able from selling the rest of the parts.

There was also one in Arkansas that I missed out on by about a day for $700.

Right now my best option looks like importing one. Investigating having a friend pick one up from an engine that's going for $100 overseas.

[Matthew Abate]

I just found a guy in MD with four LD28s, $750 each. Anyone want to go grab them and pull the best crank for me?


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[Zed Head]

Deeeewwwwwddd....are you really sure you want to follow this path?  The cost/benefit ratio is huge.  You really don't get a whole lot for the cost of that extra stroke.  You'd probably get more benefit from paying to have a head ported by a guy who knows his stuff.  Seems like it's wroth considering if the crank is cheap but paying big dollars for it doesn't add up.  Your money though.

[Matthew Abate]

I am not sure I want to follow this path.

When I started looking into it I had space to store an LD28 and time to eBay the excess parts. Since then my dad went out and bought a turbo engine (I'll admit it was a good deal) that we didn't need and filled that space.

I also missed out on all the cheaper ones I found in the beginning of my investigation. The NOS leads I had turned out to not be real, getting one from New Zealand is possible, but more of a pain and time suck than I am willing to put into it, and then I just realized yesterday that you have to grind the inside of the block if you don't bore to 88mm, which isn't ideal.

But, I also know people like to do this, so if someone wants these four engines and wants to pass a crank my way I'll make it happen. The New Zealand angle is interesting because I found 6 LD28s for sale right now for an average price of $300. They seem to be swimming in them over there. My friends who fly back and forth regularly were up to the challenge for getting them to the states, but in the end I think the price per crank would have been too close to the potential resale price to make it worth doing, and in order to get costs down you would really have to get a bunch of them. Bringing one over is easier but basically $800 for an unseen part.

In the end I'll probably forego it unless I can get one sub $400, but it was an interesting exercise to go through.

Edited July 21, 2016 by Matthew Abate

[wheee!]

The parts whore in me would love to have one of these cranks, just to have the opportunity to build a stroker one day. Blocks are easy to find and picking up an LD crank would be kinda cool... plus I already have an extra L28 to build.... But, alas, Canada does not have a lot of diesel cranks available and import/exchange fees kill most deals instantly. It's bad enough the beating we are taking against the US Dollar these days!!

[Matthew Abate]

Zed Head, to your point, I just read this on another thread, which devolves into a flame war pretty quickly, by the way:

On October 5, 2010 at 1:33 PM, jmortensen said:

 

If I may get on my high horse for a second, there is no way in hell that a stroker crank alone is going to net you a 50% increase in torque when you're comparing an L28 and an L31. Now if you have a really big cam in the L28 and you put a small cam in the L31 and play with cam timing, etc, I could buy that. But for engines built similarly, no way.

 

I think the math on the stroker is the best way to estimate what you're going to get. It's not always that simple though.

 

Running the exact same setup before and after, Tom got 0 hp and 10 lb/ft of torque. My guess is that there is more to be had there and he'll probably end up with about 12% more power and torque, you can stay tuned to the thread to find out.

 

http://forums.hybridz.org/index.php/topic/94521-hbzers-guess-my-31-rwhp/

 

Mark's original stroker put out a whopping 137 hp and 157 lb/ft of torque:

 

http://forums.hybridz.org/index.php/topic/38495-31-stroker-horsepower-rating/

 

And in its latest iteration it puts out 267 hp and 250 lb/ft to the wheels through 40mm carbs:

 

http://forums.hybridz.org/index.php/topic/24798-na-31lhead-camshaft-questions-no-shortcuts-max/page__st__140

 

As you can see, a stroker isn't a guarantee of anything, and I think a similarly built non stroker will put out very similar numbers when measured by hp/liter. IMO if you're looking for a fast car, build the non-stroker. There comes a point at which it is cheaper to go with the stroker than it is to keep going on the non stroker to increase hp, but I don't think most people get there. When you do get there, consider that I bought a 315 hp V8 motor with 320 something lb/ft of torque for $1100 with 30K miles on it. It looks brand new inside. When you get down to it there are far less expensive ways to get power than by building a NA L series.

 

In autocross, having the stroker puts you into XP if I'm not mistaken. That's a pretty tough class to compete in if you want to be really competitive.

 

Edited July 21, 2016 by Matthew Abate

[Zed Head]

I've seen those types of discussions, that's why I brought it up.  Just wanted to be sure you knew what you were getting in to.  Each simple extra operation required to get the crank in and working right adds a few more dollars to the overall cost.  Then when it blows up you have to do it all over again.

[Matthew Abate]

The things that aren't immediately obvious when you read the top results when researching this mod are the vibration, the internal mods to the block, and the impact on the fuel system.

I knew they would be hard to find or expensive, although after eight days I found a pretty wide variety of sources that just require some work to lock them down. They aren't as rare as the $2,000 eBay listing up right now would suggest.

I knew that I would need custom pistons, but my build requires them anyway so that particular aspect is not impacting my budget.

I did not consider the internal grinding requirement, which makes me uneasy, the fact that I would probably HAVE to run triple mikunis or at least make some serious mods to the SU system, and I didn't think about the increased vibration, which sounds like it makes the car a lot lest fun to drive and causes dampeners to fail.

No thanks.


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[siteunseen]

When I read Blue would sale his I figured there was a downside.

[madkaw]

From what I've read this is not a half assed adventure to build a stroker. I've decided to follow the Rebello path instead of going my own. He supplies the parts and preps the crankshaft and block and I put it together . He knows the proven combo. 

Yiu might consider spending a few more bucks and just buy his kit. You spend 1500 for a used diesel crank or spend 2500 and have all the parts to put a short block stroker together- the good sh!t - that's regrinding your L28 crankshaft

Edited July 23, 2016 by madkaw

[Matthew Abate]

I talked to him about it and netted out on stock crank, 240 rods, custom pistons, because ultimately I would rather drive at the top end of that than have too much after all the other factors are taken into account.

Could I build a stroker with a diesel crank and figure out all kinds of solutions to the various issues? Sure, but I want to be on the road in a year and that sounds like a great way to get lost in an engine build forever.

Could I put in a Rebello kit? Sure, but it necessitates a lot of things that I would rather not do. Namely taking lots of metal away from lots of pieces. I know it's price. Effective, but that doesn't fit my build style. I'll probably go through him for other things, though.

[madkaw]

Taking metal out where not needed to give better options - if you are referring to journals . 

I like doing things myself- and I thought the short block would be a no brainier - but I've changed my mind . Rebello has done all the hard work of science for me, but I can save on my labor to put everything together. 

Not sure what you are saying in first paragraph