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2006 Crusader 6.0 with a seized block!

DoneRampin

New member
Hello all,

I'm new to this forum and to the Crusader engines. My wife and I purchased a cabin cruiser with twin 6.0s a couple of months ago. Of course we did everything we were supposed to do and had the boat and engines inspected. The port side engine had been rebuilt back in 2015 but was barely used (only had about 20 hours on it). This recent rebuild should have been a red flag, but I got a false sense of security from a good survey.

A couple weekends ago we had the boat on plane and the port engine shut down abruptly. After stumbling back to port I tried to start the motor but found that it was seized pretty good. I pulled the plugs and found that the #6 plug had been smashed in.

The heads have since been pulled and revealed catastrophic engine damage. The #6 piston is in pieces and lodged in the crankshaft. The cylinder walls are scored pretty bad.

In looking for a replacement long block, I've found that they are very difficult to come by. Standard marine rebuilders for the most part haven't heard of this engine, and the one place that has wants 6,900 + 2,500 core!

I've determined that this engine is built on a GM LQ4 engine block and have started looking at auto rebuilders for a reman long block.

My question to the forum is: what do you think about using an automotive reman long block for this application? Other than a possibly different cam shaft, water pump, and oil pan, does anybody know of other parts that Crusader swapped from the standard GM block?

Any advice would be appreciated! I want to make sure we have a reliable replacement, but can't afford the 16k+ that a complete engine from Crusader would run.

thanks in advance!!
-Dave
 
Since the cost of the build, the exhaust and all the parts will come close to 75% of the cost of the new complete drop in. I would find the money for the Crusader complete engine.
 
Since the cost of the build, the exhaust and all the parts will come close to 75% of the cost of the new complete drop in. I would find the money for the Crusader complete engine.

Thanks Chris, I really appreciate that you took the time to read this and to give advice.

Would you mind explaining what parts you are referring to? When I removed the exhaust the manifolds looked almost perfect (this is all FWC in the exhaust) and the risers as well. New risers are only about $200 each.

Are there other parts that will need to be changed that I'm not aware of? I don't want to be 'penny wise and pound foolish'.
 
Hello all!

I'm extremely happy to announce that our boat is back on the water. I was able to source a well reman'd long block and found a great local boatyard that was able to assist with pulling the old block and dropping in the new one. So far, we've got about 8 hours on the new engine and the boat is running better than ever.

If anybody out there is ever in the same position I was in, I've started a blog to chronicle my experience with getting Done Rampin' back on the water. Hopefully this will help to pass on some hard-earned knowledge to someone else who needs it - http://crusaderblue.com
 
Dave, short of low oil pressure and/or over-heating, Marine Load Detonation is the gasoline Marine Engine's worst enemy!

If by chance you re-used the precious ignition system, and/or the previous FI system, you may want to verify that these components were NOT the cause of the initial failure.
You certainly DO NOT want a re-peat of the prior failure due to these components!

I have seen and have heard of this occurring before....... It is not pretty!



.
 
Dave, short of low oil pressure and/or over-heating, Marine Load Detonation is the gasoline Marine Engine's worst enemy!

If by chance you re-used the precious ignition system, and/or the previous FI system, you may want to verify that these components were NOT the cause of the initial failure.
You certainly DO NOT want a re-peat of the prior failure due to these components!

I have seen and have heard of this occurring before....... It is not pretty!

Hey Ricardo, thanks for taking the time to reply!

I really appreciate you pointing out that detonation should be a concern, as it isn't something that I was thinking about. Should I be able to hear if detonation were occuring?

Except for the spark plugs and wires, I did reuse the fuel and ignition systems. While the parts were out I checked for any part that looked worn out. I also thoroughly cleaned the intake manifolds and bench-tested the fuel injectors. Most of the sensors, including the knock sensors looked to be in pretty good shape. This engine does not include a distributor, rather it has one coil pack per cylinder (which were all reused).

This engine does have two knock sensors in the lifter valley, and should be able to adjust the timing in any knocking is detected. I'll run the scan tool this weekend to see if there is any evidence of any recent detonation saved in the scan codes. The engines seem to be running great based simply on sound and performance.

Since you mentioned overheating, prior to the rebuild I did have an issue where the engine temperature would increase to about 190 - 200 degree when on plane. I don't know if this is hot enough to have caused this kind of damage.

David
http://crusaderblue.com
 
BTW, I came across a thread from this site back in 2014 where you were helping someone. He had experienced piston damage as a result of detonation, here is the link:

http://www.marineengine.com/boat-fo...e-Power-5-7-liter-engine-pistion-hole-at-edge

There is some good information in that thread about proper piston design. Unfortunately, I can't do much with this information now as the engine has already been replaced, but I'll play close attention to the engine to make sure there are no detonation issues.

David
http://crusaderblue.com
 
David, if I may!!!!

Hey Ricardo, thanks for taking the time to reply!

I really appreciate you pointing out that detonation should be a concern, as it isn't something that I was thinking about. Should I be able to hear if detonation were occuring?
The two phenomena known as Pre-ignition and Detonation are each very different from one another.
Pre-ignition can be very audible.... but Detonation can be inaudible in the Marine Cruiser environment.




Except for the spark plugs and wires, I did reuse the fuel and ignition systems. While the parts were out I checked for any part that looked worn out. I also thoroughly cleaned the intake manifolds and bench-tested the fuel injectors. Most of the sensors, including the knock sensors looked to be in pretty good shape. This engine does not include a distributor, rather it has one coil pack per cylinder (which were all reused).
This engine uses a crankshaft position sensor to talk to the ECM of which triggers each cylinder's ignition coil.
The oil pump is driven at the front of the crankshaft..... so there is no cam gear nor distributor gear at the rear area.

This engine does have two knock sensors in the lifter valley, and should be able to adjust the timing in any knocking is detected. I'll run the scan tool this weekend to see if there is any evidence of any recent detonation saved in the scan codes. The engines seem to be running great based simply on sound and performance.

Since you mentioned overheating, prior to the rebuild I did have an issue where the engine temperature would increase to about 190 - 200 degree when on plane. I don't know if this is hot enough to have caused this kind of damage.
Detonation promotes heat..... and heat promotes further Detonation.


David
http://crusaderblue.com

BTW, I came across a thread from this site back in 2014 where you were helping someone. He had experienced piston damage as a result of detonation, here is the link:

http://www.marineengine.com/boat-fo...e-Power-5-7-liter-engine-pistion-hole-at-edge

There is some good information in that thread about proper piston design. Unfortunately, I can't do much with this information now as the engine has already been replaced, but I'll play close attention to the engine to make sure there are no detonation issues.
The GM 6.0L is quite different from the earlier SBC 6.2L or 6.3L.
If you were to look at the combustion chamber of each, you'll see that they are very different. The early SBC chamber is of a wedge shape design, and should NOT have a Full Dished piston underneath it. The later 6.0L chamber is quite different.

David
http://crusaderblue.com
 
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