Removing 340 heads

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markfh

markfh

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It's been a long time since I tried removing heads while the engine is still in the car so please refresh my memory. What's the best way to do this without damaging anything?

Thanks
 
Drain coolent, while coolent is draining, remove dist cap and wires, then remove carb. next pull battery cable, positive. disconect wiring to alt and temp sending. Move wiring out of the way. Remove valve covers. remove alt and brackets. remove top rad hose, and bypass hose. remove heater hose from engine side. move heater hoses out of way. Remove intake. remove rocker shaft from both sides. remove push rods. If you are going to reuse any of the valve train parts, mark them to go back in the same place. remove exhaust manifolds. On the drivers side you wont be able to remove manifold, just remove bolts and lay it out of the way. might have to move it a few times to get to all the head bolts. Removing manifods is the tough part. Remove head bolts and then pull heads. You are going to get lots of coolent flowing when you pull heads. Normal. If car has AC, Im not versed on that, need others advice. Good luck. :burnout:MT
 
Great advice Mopar Tim. I would add to place old towel in valley after pulling intake to protect from dirt, etc. getting in engine. Also, some of the exhaust manifold bolts go into water jacket. So even if you drain the coolant, you may get a trickle when removing those bolts. Nothing to worry about.
 
Two more tips; 1) if you drain the block,both sides, you don't get near the amount of coolant into the cylinders. and 2)usually the heads don't just lift off,but are stuck down pretty hard. I leave two long bolts installed about 4 turns down. I use an iron bar in the coolant ports and pry the head loose, and off the dowels. Then I let it drop back onto the dowels, and remove the two long bolts. Then heave! them outta there.
Instead of prying in the coolant ports, you can pry underneath, going across the chinawall. Or whatever works for you.
 
AJ/FormS said:
Two more tips; 1) if you drain the block,both sides, you don't get near the amount of coolant into the cylinders.
Click to expand...

Or in the pan which might be more important

AJ/FormS said:
Instead of prying in the coolant ports, you can pry underneath, going across the chinawall. Or whatever works for you.
Click to expand...

Preferably using a hard clean 2x4 or rag protected bar
 
To free up cylinder heads, a soft-ish hit with a baby sledge or a heavy but from a rubber mallet. If you need to pry, and that would not surprise me, a pry bar with a thin tip to tap in with a hammer is a easy route for low muscle stress. Tap the pry bar from the front of the engine at the blocks beck and China wall corner.
 
Step 1 is to protect all the sheet metal with old blankets or moving blankets. I have some nice big ones that cover both outside & under the hood.
 
..........................AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnnnddddddddddd.........

O' course this reminds me of an old story

Long about the summer off '66 or '67 and long about the time I took my SECOND set of heads of a SB Chev, somehow I miscounted the head bolts. AAAANNNNDdddddd the last bolt in the back lower corner was submerged in a little puddle of oil.

Yeh. LOL. I pried on it for awhile, then, finally, counted the bolts AGAIN.
 
There's a cast-in boss in the block lifter valley that is great to use a pry bar on to help break the heads loose before removing them. Just leave a couple of bolts in a few threads, then pry them up...
 
Mopar Tim said:
Drain coolent, while coolent is draining, remove dist cap and wires, then remove carb. next pull battery cable, positive. disconect wiring to alt and temp sending. Move wiring out of the way. Remove valve covers. remove alt and brackets. remove top rad hose, and bypass hose. remove heater hose from engine side. move heater hoses out of way. Remove intake. remove rocker shaft from both sides. remove push rods. If you are going to reuse any of the valve train parts, mark them to go back in the same place. remove exhaust manifolds. On the drivers side you wont be able to remove manifold, just remove bolts and lay it out of the way. might have to move it a few times to get to all the head bolts. Removing manifods is the tough part. Remove head bolts and then pull heads. You are going to get lots of coolent flowing when you pull heads. Normal. If car has AC, Im not versed on that, need others advice. Good luck. :burnout:MT
Click to expand...

Okay, got everything off except the exhaust manifolds. There are studs in the head that prevent me from easily moving or removing them at least on the passenger side. I haven't unbolted the drivers side yet.

One thing the exhaust manifold on the passenger side does not have a gasket. Is this a factory thing or did is it that someone that worked on this engine before just not put them in?
 
You will have to remove the exhaust flange from the exhaust pipe. Then you will be able to remove manifold. The gasket is in three parts. All good advice^^^Thanks. :burnout:
MT
 
On my 1970 Duster 340, there was no exhaust manifild gasket on the passenger side. The driver's side had the heat shield/ gasket.
 
Leave the studs in on the ends, it helps when you install them... Chase them with a die to clean up the threads before reassembling...
 
Okay, got the manifold off and down out of the way. A little tug with a long screw driver popped it that extra little bit. Put it back on just to make sure it would go without problems. I left the studs in as you suggested. I agree it will make it easier in reinstalling.

I have a set of gaskets for the exhaust. Any advice on yea or nay on using them?
 
Dont cut, but you should use. I use the fel pro three piece gasket on non header engines. MT
 
Okay finally got back to this. So, I went ahead and tested compression on each cylinder to thinking that maybe I don't have to change the gaskets. Each cylinder tested out at 170 - 175 PSI. I take it that is where they are supposed to be and indicates no leaks requiring replacement. So my next question is would you go ahead and replace the gaskets?

At this point the only oil leaks I have been able to verify was the front and rear of the intake and the valve covers.
 
markfh said:
Okay finally got back to this. So, I went ahead and tested compression on each cylinder to thinking that maybe I don't have to change the gaskets. Each cylinder tested out at 170 - 175 PSI. I take it that is where they are supposed to be and indicates no leaks requiring replacement. So my next question is would you go ahead and replace the gaskets?

At this point the only oil leaks I have been able to verify was the front and rear of the intake and the valve covers.
Click to expand...

So you were thinking head gaskets for an oil leak? Or did I miss something?

If you have a leak, I would start with the valve cover gaskets.
 
Bad Sport said:
So you were thinking head gaskets for an oil leak? Or did I miss something?

If you have a leak, I would start with the valve cover gaskets.
Click to expand...

This car sat for 25 years on jack stands. I've been working on the brakes knowing I have some leakage from the valve covers but after running the engine for the last few weeks severe leaks developed that required some level of disassembly. I couldn't see well enough around the back of the engine to determine if I had a head gasket problem so I was prepared to remove the heads.

Don't want to if I don't have to at this time. Know what I mean?
 
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