GM 3.4L LIM Gasket replacement...

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I was talking about how do the fuel injector o-rings look that came out of the manifold.
We'll also need pictures under the valve covers, underside of LIM, etc. areas. Are you planning on doing a lot of cleanup work or just slapping it back together?
 
I believe this to have been done before. The sides of the LI where it contacts the block has enough RTV spread along it to do about 3 or 4 whole engines. The bolts also came out oily with no loctite or anything on them. I did find one short bolt, the one closest to the thermostat, crusty with dried up Dex. I believe that is where the leak is..
 
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Yeah, it has. The gaskets are date coded for August, 2006. Its a 2001 engine so I suppose sometime late 06 early 07 it was done.
The ones I pulled are plastic with embedded rubber seals all along the edges. The new FelPro gaskets are metal and have a rubber coating at all the sealing areas.
 
Van_G.jpg
 
Seeing that this job was done in 2006 makes me a bit nervous. I do not see what was the problem with the engine. I hope you do not end up with similar symptoms after you get it back together again. That is what happened to me and it ended up being a bad head gasket so I got to do it ALL over again a few months later, plus more.

If you would have removed the alternator and bracket first you would have been able to move the power steering pump lines enough to lift it up and move it out of your way. (I think you may have to also remove the fuel rail first now that I think about it)
 
Makes me nervous too. But I had already comitted by the time I found out, so this is what is getting done. The situation with the bolts gives me hope it might have just loosened up enough for it to leak..
 
It doesn't make me nervous, nor does it surprise me. The problem is that the previous repair was made with the poorly designed original-style gaskets. Can't say why, but repairs made with the oem-style gaskets often don't last long. And FWIW, a leak at the sort bolt nearest the thermostat is typical.

I expect that this should be a more permanent repair since you'll be using the redesigned Fel-pro gaskets and putting locktite on the bolts. The Wife's car has about 4 yeas/40,000 miles on those MS98003T gaskets (198,000 total). No problems so far.
 
That looks a lot better under there than my car did. These new gaskets will fix the problem as onion said.

Let us know how the oil pump drive R&R goes.

Do you plan on removing the lifter guide & lifters to see how they look? It's just two bolts & right there. Of course, I don't know your time schedule.
 
Oil pump drive R&R went without issue. Well I dropped the holder back behind the engine and it didnt come out. I went fishing and managed to push it out the bottom.
I already have it partially together.
I have to have it rolling and back in service by 3am Saturday.
 
Had a pain with those two evil bolts on the LI. The crows foot I bought was a piece of garbage and was too big, resulting in more slippage than torque beng applied. Ended up guesstimating with my hand on those two.
 
Went hot at 2:48am. Looks good so far. Making alot of smoke, from [censored] I spilled on the exhaust, antisieze on the O2 sensor, and interestingly, the spark plug boots. I am guessing its some sort of mold release agent burning off.
 
Originally Posted By: Onmo'Eegusee
Went hot at 2:48am. Looks good so far. Making alot of smoke, from [censored] I spilled on the exhaust, antisieze on the O2 sensor, and interestingly, the spark plug boots. I am guessing its some sort of mold release agent burning off.


Looking at your posting times, you must be a night owl. I've found that's the best times to avoid interuptions from everybody.
Hopefully you don't need auto parts at those times, unless you've got a 24/7 parts store.
 
Originally Posted By: benjamming
Did you manually turn it over to ensure that the intake & exhaust pushrods were in the correct order before going hot?

No.
Yes, I am a night owl. I work 12pm to 9pm, which really isn't that late but that's why I started at 10pm Wednesday night as I have Thursday and Friday off.
 
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[censored] it. I have to go back into it somewhat. The VC gasket on the back bottom side skipped out on me and is not where it should be. Its leaking copious amounts of oil. Im thinking I can remove the alternator, coil packs and gain enough room to loosen it and fix the gasket.
 
Got it pulled apart again. I have the alternator stuffed down the side of the engine because I could not get it out. lol.
I tried to finagle it in place to fix it, but I would get one area good and I would end up with a different area screwed over. I just pulled it completely out and put some dots of RTV all along the groove it sits in to kind of glue it in.
 
Make sure you check the thermostat bypass pipe where it is inserted into the LIM for leaks. If it's leaking, you can see dried coolant around the junction, and everywhere South. The last one I did still had the LIM intact, but was leaking (a bit) from the loose bolts, and massively from the pipe/LIM junction.

Hang in there. I think I had to reinstall the alternator 3 or 4 times to get it right. Forgot about the hidden bolt until everything was back together and I had one extra. On the bright side, I can change out a serpentine belt in about 4 minutes now.
 
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