Engine Storage with ATF

[Steven B.]

Years ago an engine builder who runs a large shop told me if engines are not going to be installed or ran for months or even years he installs ATF instead of oil. He dynoed them, tuned, and ran them for about 30 minutes on oil then drained and installled ATF. Is this common? I assume the engines would have to be drained and filled with oil again before initial startup?

When I told another builder about this he told me if the engine had sat for a number of years he would drain the ATF and fill with Marvel Mystery Oil. 'Sound logical?

[Mike E.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

The worst-looking mess of a seized-up engine I have ever seen was put away for about 20 years with Marvel mystery oil in it. It had evaporated, broken down, rusted, seized, flaked, and basically destroyed the motor. There are a lot of "best ideas" out there that aren't!

[Michael W.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

The BEST way of storing an engine is drained dry of all fluids and stored in low humidity (<40%)

[Duke W.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

Geez, another "engine builder" story. What's next?

How about filling a stored engine with concrete?

Duke

[Steven B.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

'Thousands of builders and millions of stories. I got the ATF info from Garry and Hoyt Grimes and the Mystery Oil from Ernie Elliott while living in Georgia.



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Hoyt Grimes Still Going Strong
Georgia dragster pioneer was “first” in many ways

3/8/05

ack in the days when Hoyt Grimes was a hot dragster pilot, there were no phone calls to order a blower drive or pulleys, no company-made intakes, not even a shop-built car. If you wanted to race a dragster, you had to build it yourself. This was no sweat for Hoyt Grimes, a master machinist and lay mechanical engineer since the late 1930s. Today, Grimes, 83, who lives on Lake Lanier, “in Buford (Georgia), up there close to Warren Johnson,” is still at it, machining parts for customers of his son Garry and his “Twister Engines” shop in Alpharetta. Hoyt still puts in seven to eight hours a day, still machining everything from street-stock hemis to big-inch, dual-engine power boats to small-block this-and-thats for local racers.
Hoyt is a man of “firsts” --- first to break 100 mph in Georgia, then 150, then 175, and so on. First to build a competitive hemi-powered dragster in Georgia --- actually a tank/lakester car --- and the first Georgia dragster racer to win big at a national event, the ’59 Winternationals at Daytona, a joint NASCAR/NHRA race. He won all five nights of the race.
Grimes was also the first dragster racer to experience a blow-over. It happened at Bristol on Oct. 9, 1965, at a special race against another now-legendary racer, Bill Mullins of Birmingham, Alabama. That crash and his subsequent recovery ended Grimes’ dragster career, but he went on to more fame, as partner and crew chief for the late “Sneaky Pete” Robinson. Grimes also served as chief on his own son Garry Grimes’ Pro Stocker, who also retired abruptly from racing in the then-new class when he hurt his lower back after a giant wheelstand slammed his Vega hard on a racetrack surface.

Hoyt Grimes is a walking history book on early Southern dragster racing. He actually be gan racing on dirt round-tracks at Lakewood Park in Atlanta in the early 1940s, before he went into the navy as an air-sea rescuer and skipper of a converted PT boat. When he got out after WW II ended, he began drag racing at the 1,000-foot dirt track at Fairburn, Georgia, in 1953. “[The late, great NHRA starter] Buster Couch was some kind of unofficial official there. First car I raced was my street car, a ’40 Ford with a ’49 Cadillac engine,” Grimes said. “To me, it [drag racing] made more sense. Being a mechanic and machinist, I stayed around round-track racing when I was a kid. But there weren’t any rules in round-track racing then, and they tore up so many cars. Nice cars. I worked on a lot of them. I got disgusted with no rules, amateurs using conduit for roll cages and all the crap they were doing, I was sharp enough to understand that that wasn’t the way to go.”
Some time in the early 1950s, he collaborated with some Georgia Tech engineering students on an unfinished dragster, and he finished it up and took the Cadillac engine out of the ’40 Ford coupe and put it into the rail. He drove it until he built another car in 1954.

Copyright 1999-2005, Drag Racing Online and Racing Net Source

[Tom M.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

Geez, another "engine builder" story. What's next?

How about filling a stored engine with concrete?

Duke

Duke ,
thanks for the laugh tonight , I needed one , Who says you don't have a sense of humor , LOL, LOL

Tom

[John D.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

Geez, another "engine builder" story. What's next?

How about filling a stored engine with concrete?

Duke

My Dad always said Portland cement was the strongest.

[Tom M.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

7 Bag mix, 5000 psi, makes a good boat anchor for Duke and is motor when the cam/ lifters break down , from not using the correct oil

[Bill M.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

Here in Michigan, condensation is a much bigger issue than what you put in the crankcase; maybe not in Texas...?

[Duke W.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

The BEST way of storing an engine is drained dry of all fluids and stored in low humidity (<40%)

In all seriousness, if you are assembling an engine that will not be fired for some time use a paint brush to "paint" every internal surface with CJ-4 oil.

If you are going to test fire it for even a few minutes all internal surfaces will end up getting coated.

It's okay to leave the oil in the sump.

As stated, the biggest potental problem is condensing humiditiy.

Duke

[Steven B.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

Here in Michigan, condensation is a much bigger issue than what you put in the crankcase; maybe not in Texas...?

Hi Bill! It depends on where you are in Texas. It is very dry in some parts but along the coast and where I live in the middle of a pine woods on a lake I sometimes turn the dehumidifiers on in the garage. When we first drove the road to look at our house it honestly reminded me of the U. P. of Michigan about 30 miles west of Marquette. It is a little drier than where I lived in far northern Indiana and a few miles north of Atlanta but our windows do have condensation often. I do use silica bags in the Corvettes to hold the humidity down.

[Michael W.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

It's okay to leave the oil in the sump.

As stated, the biggest potental problem is condensing humiditiy.

Duke

My comments come from many years in the aircraft engine business and being personally responsible for a fleet of over 1,000 engines that frequently transit in and out of storage.

Residual oil left in an engine after usage may already contain an unacceptable amount of acid, or the type of oil (synthetics) used may tend to become more acidic during storage by reacting to water absorbed from the atmosphere. I believe that both Mobil and Shell mention this characteristic in their literature.

In any case, since there is no benefit to leaving oil in an engine from a preservation point of view, the SOP is now to drain the engine dry prior to being placed in storage. The drained oil of course can be used in other engines if it is still suitable.

The second point and far more important than residual oil, is ensuring that the ambient humidity be kept as low as possible. 40% relative humidity is an acceptable threshold.

Of course, all this flies in the face of the myths believers who insist on taking their car out of a warm garage in mid winter and letting the engine run in the driveway for 15 minutes.......

[Duke W.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

Residual oil left in an engine after usage may already contain an unacceptable amount of acid, or the type of oil (synthetics) used may tend to become more acidic during storage by reacting to water absorbed from the atmosphere. I believe that both Mobil and Shell mention this characteristic in their literature.

In any case, since there is no benefit to leaving oil in an engine from a preservation point of view, the SOP is now to drain the engine dry prior to being placed in storage.

Are these engines test fired prior to storage? Test firing will coat all internal surfaces with oil, and API certified oils have corrosion inhibitors/acid neutralizers, which remain active.

Aircraft oils are of the "ashless" variety, and have few additives that are found in API oil. It would probably be better practice to test fire small aircraft engines with API oil to get the benefit of the corrosion inhibitor additives during storage.

Vintage car owners can learn a lot from aircraft maintenance practice, including documentation of maintenance and repairs, but use of light aircraft reciprocating engine oil is not a good idea due to its lack of automotive type additive packages.

Duke

[Steven B.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

In all seriousness, if you are assembling an engine that will not be fired for some time use a paint brush to "paint" every internal surface with CJ-4 oil.

If you are going to test fire it for even a few minutes all internal surfaces will end up getting coated.

It's okay to leave the oil in the sump.

As stated, the biggest potental problem is condensing humiditiy.

Duke

Thanks for the tip Duke! I assume the oil will adhere to the surfaces for years and years. Is one weight oil better than another to use when doing this?

Also, I see the Z-Max commercials on TV and on Two Guys Garage. Is this stuff any good or hype?

Thanks!

Steve

[Bill M.]

Re: Engine Storage with ATF

Hi Bill! It depends on where you are in Texas. It is very dry in some parts but along the coast and where I live in the middle of a pine woods on a lake I sometimes turn the dehumidifiers on in the garage. When we first drove the road to look at our house it honestly reminded me of the U. P. of Michigan about 30 miles west of Marquette. It is a little drier than where I lived in far northern Indiana and a few miles north of Atlanta but our windows do have condensation often. I do use silica bags in the Corvettes to hold the humidity down.

Hi Steven:

I mention that because I found water in the oil pan of my '65 one spring: a lot more than a few drops. I don't subscribe to the "change the oil before you store it" because I drive the '65 only a few hundred miles a year. There is no contamination in the oil in the fall, but there might be water in the oil in the spring due to condensation. After installing the new oil in the spring I used to pull the plugs and spin the engine to get oil pressure before firing it; I got too lazy to do that, now I just fire it up. No problems.

That same spring I pulled the intake manifold before starting the engine, and found rivers of rust in the intake ports and puddles of rust on the intake valves.

I eliminated 90% of the condensation problem by heating the attached garage in the spring and the fall. (I judge the level of condensation problem by watching the disc brake rotors.)

Bill