Volfro,

Well, it looks like you have your self all primed up to let this project snowball on you. If that's what you want, go for it. You could end up with a very well rebuilt engine as a result.

However, I haven't seen any indication in your posts that you have evaluated what you have now. Once you pull the head, you have lost much of what is required to evaluate what you have. There is evaluation that is done before you start taking things off, and evaluation that is done during and after disassembly. You need to do them in the proper order unless you decide from the get go that you want to do a full rebuild.

On these boards, it is hard to assess what someone else knows without seeing a lot of their posts. I've not seen many of your posts because I was active a few years ago, but only recently bought another Volvo and became active here again. Now it's like I'm new to the board. In other words, you may have rebuilt many more engines than I have, and I wouldn't know it. So, if it seems like I'm talking down to you, please forgive me.

I get the sense that you are thinking, "as long as I have the head off, I might as well replace the rings". If you can get a head that is ready to go, as you have indicated you might, swapping that out can be done in an evening after work. Replacing rings and bearings is a whole different kettle of fish.

At this point, I don’t' see that you have done anything to assess the rings you have in the engine now. If they are working well with the amount of cylinder wear you have, they may be fine for quite some time. New rings may not like your old cylinder walls, and at your mileage, measuring may indicate boring and oversized pistons are needed. Who knows what you will find in the bottom end. It could be lots of work and big money. If that’s the way you want to go, you can have a good engine in the end, but don’t count on this being an “as long as the head is off” kind of job.

It could be that putting another head on it, or having yours reworked, is not enough to fix it. But, doing the head is so little work compared to rebuilding the engine that I think it might be worth the risk of wasting a head gasket set and a few hours to find out before you tear down the whole engine.

And again I will say, don't take the head off before you assess everything you can while the head is still on.

Charley