Pulling the Engine!

The engine pulling took about 12 hours over a weekend. This includes splitting the engine from transmission and putting the engine on the stand, but not engine tear down up to the point it is in the pictures.
There are two common approaches to the E-Type engine pull, Top pulling and bottom. I hadn't ever seen bottom pulling of an engine so I did it the standard way. The engine fits very tightly in the sub frame making it a tedious job. You must take the pulleys and water pump off to clear the front of the sub frame, and the entire car needs to be at least one foot off the ground to allow the transmission to drop enough to get the engine out.
You can see how steep the angle needs to be to get the engine out in this pic. I had a pair of XK lift loops bolted to the head. but only ended up using one and had to move it to the front head bolts to get the right lift pull point. I was surprised at how heavy the XK engine is. I don't have a scale, but would estimate it is about the same as a small block Chevy V8. Give or take 100 pounds.

I'm pretty sure the engine had never been out of this car. It had at least 40 years of crud on it and no evidence of previous pulling on the engine mounting hardware. The later 4.2 Head was installed in the car without doubt. If I had to pull the Engine again I'd probably remove the steering rack first to make a little more front end clearance.

The transmission with rear spring mounting pin clearly visible at the bottom. This car was one of the first to have this arrangement with a spring type shock mount for the transmission. It is listed in several books as the first FHC with this type of mount. Also notice the drain cock for the crank case. This allows quick removal of the antifreeze. Also notice the Speedo cable hanging below. The ninety degree fitting on this easily gets snagged on the transmission tunnel on the way out. I'd remove this first on the next engine pull.

One 63 Jag E-Type less engine. You can see the waiting engine stand in the for ground. There is no turning back from here. The engine pulling process took all day to complete, however I'm sure if I had it to do again it would be quicker. Now that the engine is out the tear down of the front suspension and sub frame will go quickly.

Up up and away, Its been fun having you in there all these years, but its time to go get rebuilt. I'm sure it will be at least a couple years before its back in. I'll strip the engine down later, after all the body work is done. For now it goes on the stand and will be stored away.

Not a bad looking power plant, but its seen better days. It was burning a little oil on startup but had pretty good compression. The engine had about 143K miles on it by the time I got it. Not bad for a late 40s engine design built in 62.

Remember that drain cock I mentioned before. Guess who didn't think about using it. I spilled a about a pint of fluid on the floor. Not a big deal, but could have been avoided. Nothing a couple rags wont fix right up.

Getting the transmission off was a pretty smooth process, just pull the bolts and slide the splined shaft out of the engine. Cutting all the grease off the transmission and engine was a different story, several rags soaked in chemtool gave their all in this process.

Just love this shot of the rear of the engine hanging on the crane. The oil lines are interesting. The Rev counter Generator has already been removed. This is probably wasn't required, but I did it as a precaution. Previous owner had destroyed the original Rev Generator when replacing the head, by not fully threading the connector cap into the end of the Cam. When the allen screws were tightened it pushed the Generator out of the back of the housing. I replaced it before tear down. This type of tach. is known to less than perfectly accurate, but its part of the charm with E-types.

Getting those flywheel bolts out was a bear. Even with a breaker bar and a home made tool to lock the flywheel in place I took all the muscle I had to get them to break free. You can't mount the engine on the stand until the wheel is off.

The Moss Non Syncromesh transmission in all its glory. It will get a full rebuild before going back in the car, it was working fine before it was removed but better safe than sorry. Its another item which will have to wait a year or two before it goes out for rebuild.

Mounting the engine on the stand is easy enough. I used four of the original transmission mounting bolts to do this. Once it is on the stand it will go into a dry cool closet in my garage.

More Tear Down!

Author: Bill McKenna