Perkins Phaser 180 or 6v53?

hmm hydroflouric, nasty stuff... Didn't know it was available over the counter anywhere. Will look into it though - I assume try it sparingly first. So is a chemical method a safer bet to start than heat? Or are you assuming heat won't work?

On the pin retainer tool - what sort of radius is the proper tool?

It gets worse. I dug out a material data safety sheet on the stuff I use and in addition to the hydroflouric acid, it's got muriatic acid in it, as well as some pretty aggressive detergent. All the usual precautions are advised: no kids around, face shield and rubber gloves, plenty of fresh water available, and DON'T heat it. It says it's used on non-ferrous metals, but I've had good luck with cleaning steel (does a good job on files, cleans the crap out and sharpens the file) and cast iron, takes all the rust, caked oil and grease and paint. Should be available from any trailer parts supply house.

You might want to try Swishy's suggestion about the oven cleaner. I've used it to soften cooked on crud on an engine exterior prior to the hot pressure wash and it did a pretty good job. If the rings are stuck due to cooked oil, it may work. And it's cheap.

I don't know that heat won't work since I've never tried it. I was trying to turn out an engine that was as close to new as I could get it and stay within the customer's budget. Cylinder kits were cheap compared to the time involved in cleaning, not to mention the no worries factor that comes with new parts. Your emphasis is different - there's no rush, you're not going to work the truck daily, and if something goes bad, what the hell, you aren't far from home and it was worth a try. It's your engine and your call.

If you decide to use your torch, be really careful when you get the flame near the piston because the flame temperature is a lot hotter than the melting point of aluminum.

Another thing I ran across in one of my old books was a pencilled note from long ago that refers to soaking the pistons in a 50/50 solution of kerosene and ATF. I may have actually done this, but I don't remember it. And it was in a Cummins manual, come to think of it.

I like Blackduck59's idea (reply 58) for the retainer installation tool. If you've got a random orbital sander with medium paper and the proper diameter stock, just sand it to fit the concavity of the old retainer before you pop it out. Or turn it down in a lathe with a ball shaper, it you've got that. Hey, you could probably fab it out of a piece of soft pine.The main thing is, use something rugged enough to bottom and set the retainer and soft enough to avoid kinking it. I think the special Detroit tool was made of steel, although I've never seen one. Most of those special tools were thin on the ground when I was doing engines regularly. We mostly built our own as we needed them and saved 'em for the next job.

If any of this stuff works, I'm sure you'll let us know.

Everyone need something to believe in, and I believe I'm going to have another beer.

Cheers,

Mark

YEP,
Hydroflouric Acid

One of the most dangerous acids known to man, unless you REALLY know what you

are doing, its a good idea to keep away from it.

Does all sorts of strange things , even penetrating the flesh and attacking the bone.

A weak solution was sold as RUSTYBAND for removing rust stains off clothing

but no longer sold. It is still possible to buy the acid(up to a few years ago)

We used to use an 8% solution to clean gold but, now I prefer to keep away from it .
................Billy...............

If your going to use hydrofluoric acid, be so much more careful. Even though it is a weak acid, it has the ability to dissolve body fat, which means it will soak into your skin and eat you up from the inside, not to mention you not feeling a thing while it happens. Its one of the few compounds on earth that will dissolve glass, so it deserves a lot more respect.

I'd be tempted to break the piston rings out. Give the piston a boil in a deep fryer to heat it up, and use a centre punch on a ring to break it and give you a starting point. If it doesn't break the ring, you might have to drill a hole though it. Get yourself a little bubby punch just smaller than the ring groove, round the sides off the tip so it won't scratch anything and chip the ring from the groove. A good seal pick should take care of any multi-segment rings.

Doubt you can buy straight Hydroflouric, it is pretty tightly controlled.
Water will not work if you splash it on yourself, sodium glutamate is used to neutralize it.
It has killed people before.
It is also released from Silicone products when burnt so caution is the order of the day when working around late model vehicles that have had fire.

yeah hydroflouric is out of my comfort zone for sure, will try everything else first. Well I'm a bit impatient and haven't been able to go to town yet but had a bit of a go at the rings. Used a bit of DD's methods and a bit of my own - heat the up a little with oxy and used a combo of centre punch, pin punch and reground screw driver to get all the rings out! Of one piston of course... However I thought I should make a dedicated thread as this has gone off course and don't want to pollute a GM thread with the perkins title

here it is - www.hcvc.com.au/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1439790632/0#0