No proof of life

So, I've got my PI^HT^Hroject Jeep CJ5A F-134 wheel unjammed, tranny in neutral, clutch bunggied on, up on jack stands...
Time to try to make the engine move for the first time (for me).
I engage the stater. Click. Nothing. Again. Click. Hum. Nothing. Well, warm positive cable. Yank some wires.

I try to turn the crank by hand (what size is that BTW? 36mm is loose and clearly wrong).
Clockwise, I bend the cheater bar (gotta love a craftsman 18in flex handle).
Counterclockwise, the nut comes off.
Zero movement on the crank.

Here are the hints I've been able to glean:

Pull the plugs.
Pull the starter.
Try again.

Try some (kerosene? WD40? Penetrating oil?) in the cylinders and let it soak.
Try again.

Put odd bits back on to make it roll, pop it into third (maybe take the brakes out of squirt gun mode first).

And the final option... teach the kids how to tear down an engine.
Which is why I got it, but I was hoping to make it move first.

I'm feeling kind of like I did when I found a liquefied cam bearing in the oil of my Beetle (I've noticed a few former air cooled guys around here... Hi Guys!). My Parent's kitchen table still bears the marks of that rebuild...

Any hints from the forum?

Thanks.
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CJ5A? Pile of Parts? Who can tell.

 

Some have put Marvel Mystery oil in the cylinders with success. They'll probably chime in or do a search.

I resorted to a 2x2 and BFH to the top of a piston. I think the nut is 1-3/8" (btw)

 

I had this exact same problem with my jeep a few weeks ago... I got my engine unseized with a liberal application of seafoam deep creep down all the plug holes. Let it sit a few days and spray in a bit more daily after work, then crank it over clockwise, /very/ slowly using a 4' pipe extension on the breaker bar. You'll be able to exert a massive amount of torque with this kind of extension, so you need to be careful not to over do it before the penetrating oil has soaked in fully. Otherwise you'll quickly shatter one of the stuck rings and have a world of new problems. Once I had my engine turning again, I rotated it half a turn, and sprayed in more penetrating oil and left it to soak again. This makes sure you get all the cylinders fully lubricated to help prevent damage from things scraping any more than absolutely necessary. After another day of sitting, I turned the engine over by hand another 5 or 6 times. The first few turns it sounded like the little engine-elves were in there rubbing sand paper together, but the awful noises cleared up so I decided to finally let the starter have at it. I kept the plugs out the entire time to help clear out all the deep creep and reduce as much drag as possible, and cranked it until the oil pressure light went off to make sure that I was getting plenty of oil to the top of the engine.

I may have just gotten really lucky with mine, but this worked pretty well for me. I've still got plenty of compression, and after a carb rebuild the engine is up and running like it was never seized in the first place.

Edit:
Also, I should point out, this isn't exactly my method for unsticking an engine. I did a LOT of reading what other people had tried. I probably put 12 hours of research into doing this because I /really/ didn't want to do a rebuild yet. The only trick I didn't use was to braze tire air valves onto old spark plugs and pressurize the cylinders to 2 or 3psi to force the seafoam down. That trick is apparently pretty common with people trying to un-seize tractor engines, but it just seemed a bit overkill for my taste.

But seriously, seafoam deep creep.... the can even says right on it that its good for freeing seized engines, and they're not BSing about that. It worked far better than I expected.

Final edit:
I know the 4' extension seems a tad excessive... But I started out with a 2' pipe and it didn't make a lick of difference. 4' was my next step up... I have an 8' too, but I only use that one for axle nuts. You should probably wear safety glasses if you're going to try this. It's a Craftsman breaker bar, if it explodes they'll replace it no questions asked... But your eyes don't really get that same return policy.

 

Happened to me. Good call.

 

Plugs out, snake oil in (Marvel, if I had it to do over, would probably have used high dollar penetrating oil).Starter out (the which looks nice, as does the exposed part of the flywheel).No movement on the nut on the crank with a couple of feet of cheater. I'm going to let it soak some more, until I see evidence of snake oil in the engine oil... should be easy to spot.Thanks for all the hints guys. All I need now is a retail outfit that stocks a 1-3/8 in socket.P.S....The 36mm might be an air cooled hint, but the 13mm combination wrenches stashed everywhere are a dead giveaway.

 

Yanno, I won't ever call Marvel Mystery Oil "Snake Oil", it has done some great things IMHO, from Big Block Pontiac and Fords, all the way down to 1.3L euro 4-bangers....... It *might* not break your motor loose, but its been good to me.

 

When I got my jeep from the pefious owner, it had sat for 15 years. It only had 5000 miles on the odometer. The engine was seized. The prior owner had poured a gallon and a half of WD-40 into the cylinders to no avail. It came with 4 funnels in the spark plug bores. I chose to pull the head and found that the WD-40 had done an excellent job of disolving the carbon and the cylinder bores were not rusty. After seeing this, I chose to pull the engine and challenge the cylinders one at a time. I put the engine on the stand and turned it upside down. I loosened the main bearing caps and the rod bearing caps that I could access I was able to get about 1/16" free play.

I then wrapped a log chain around the bottom of the engine stand and around the motor to form a circle.

I went to my woodpile and found a maple log the size of the piston and cut of a 2" slice to put atop of the piston. I placed a hydraulic bottle jack between the bottom of the jack stand and the top (now facing the floor) of the piston using the maple block to distribute the force of the piston. I was able to pop two pistons lose very easily, one was a little harder, and on the fourth, one of the rings snapped. This worked very well, I was able to control the force and once I broke a cylinder lose, I loosened the cap and drove the piston towards the top of the engine to reduce the strain on the remaining pistons.

Under normal conditions, while one piston is going down, another piston is rising. So while one piston is being freed by pushing down, the opposing piston is being forced upwards against the wall of rust. Clean the walls the best you can before you start.

This worked very well for me.

Rod and main bearings were fine, I just had to put in new rings to replace the one broken ring.

 

I had heard enough good things about Marvel to give it a go.
I find the number of miracles attributed to it in marketing to be a bit of a turn-off, though.

Being in stock at wally world was another bonus (Deep Creep... out of stock).

It may be the tinted bottle, but I feel like I'm pouring ATF into the engine.

 

After you soak the cylinders, I would install the starter and try to bump the engine over that way. I have seen people beak or strip the crank bolts trying to turn stuck engines with a breaker bar. I have also read that you get far more torque from the starter motor than you can possibly get from trying to turn the crank bolt. I don't know how true that is though.

 

I learned from my Dad, working on Model T's. He taught me to fill the water jacket with hot water when making the the big push to free an engine.

 

Stuck engine... UNSTUCK!

After a month+ of having the cylinders full of Marvel and occasionally applying some pressure, yesterday I was rewarded with a small spurt of red goop in the face.
A little more pressure and a lot more flying red oil and the thing came unstuck.

It now turns freely except for a slightly rough spot, probably where there is some junk still stuck to the cylinder wall.
I'm going to keep working it with lubrication until that smooths out a bit, change the oil, and see if I can get the engine to make some noise.

Thanks for all the help!

 

Funny story.

After the project was put on hold (job change) and manually rotating it every now and then... its stuck again as I'm here ready to start up on it again.
Used sea-foam on the cylinders every day for 5 days and then ... stripped 2 crank nuts trying to turn it.
Yeah Bob.

Maybe MMO is on sale again... not in the market for a tear down just now.