Motor that has been sitting 15 years

73dartneedswork said

I found out last week that my 318 had a bad piston. Instead of rebuilding the motor, I took a chance and bought a used motor off of Craigslist. It’s a rebuilt 318 with about 5,000 miles on it. The problem is the motor has been sitting for about 15 years.
The motor came out of a truck so I have to change the motor mounts, water pump, timing cover, oil pan and oil pick up tube.
Any recommendations (besides a rebuild) on what I can do to get the best chance of success from this motor despite it sitting so long?

Thanks,
Kris

Click to expand...

If it turns over freely, pull all the plugs & squirt some trans fluid in each cylinder, not much, but some, try & squirt it towards the back wall so it gets around most of the cylinder, then make sure the ignition is good to go & use fresh fuel & fire it up, the lifters might be noisey for a bit but should quit down, i'm assumeing you'll be installing fresh oil, if so (prime it), we started up a 383 after sitting 22 yrs. & it ran good, i myself fired up a 440 after sitting about 13 yrs. & all was good.