I can't believe I had never heard of this, but I have read scotch brite usage can ruin an engine in only a few miles. I used a combination of a scraper, a wire wheel on a drill, and a scotch pad by hand to clean the head surfaces, intake surfaces, block, and somewhat the tops of the pistons. Used a vacuum cleaner to remove all of the debris I could see.I'm feeling pretty down after coming across a few articles linking scotch brite to engine failure. Should I not even bother reassembling and just have the engine rebuilt at this point? Is there also any way to clean out debris that may have gotten down between the piston and the cylinder wall or should I not worry about that? Any honest advice would be appreciated. Not feeling very confident about reassembling at this point. I have the oil pan off as well if that makes any difference.

 

Search results.

Differences of opinion, but I would recommend you read post #19 very thoroughly. And the subsequent posts by the author of #19.

https://www.camaroz28.com/forums/lt1...-205941/page2/

 

So it sounds like basically I'm out of luck as far as being able to reassemble without having an engine failure

 

Why?

Yes, I remember when GM issued that statement before that people used those surfacing pads all the time. It doesn't mean "if you use it it will fail," but that if you get enough of that abrasive in the system it _might_ fail.

Unless you've been looking for an excuse to rebuild it, go through a few cycles of vacuum/blow out everything exposed, maybe even wipe down with solvent in there somewhere, or take some tape and stick it to all the surfaces if they're not oily right now, slap it back together, dump some cheap oil in it, start it, run it for a short time period, drain and change the oil. Run it again for say 500miles, change the oil again.* Then say a little prayer/cross your fingers/whatever works for you and send it. In 100k miles you'll forget about it.





* you can take this step as far as you're comfortable with, some will wipe it out, slap it together and not worry about it, I've seen others take and pressure wash the open parts with all the drain plugs out, then flush it with Kero/WD40/mineral spirits, oil... for me personally it would depend on how expensive the parts are in the engine. Something I _really_ cared about I'd do what I originally listed, and maybe add fushing it with a mixture of Kero or mineral spirits and a little ATF.

FWIW, I was recently in a similar position, the neighbor's idiot lawn service ran one of their mowers through the middle of my yard and blew a bunch of debris in my engine with a cylinder head and intake off of it. I went and yelled at the idiot (he sent his kid over with a leaf blower to "blow it off," to which I apologized to the kid, sent him away and told his father that he's an idiot), cleaned it off with some towels/vacuum, blew it out with an air hose and put it back together...