A complete engine rebuild can take weeks or months—even years—at the hands of highly skilled mechanics.
Don't have that kind of time? (Who does?) Here's a 5-minute compressed video melee of a complete rebuild that took the Hagerty team 10 months and eleventy billion hours to complete. It's the second-installment in our new favorite series: "Skilled mechanics doing great things, getting hands dirty"
The engine is a Chrysler Firepower V-8, the automaker's version of the now-famous first-generation Hemi. From start to finish, the exhaustive video covers many of the nuts, bolts, shafts, valves, and rods that came out of the engine during the rebuild—and then they all go back in.
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We get to see the cleaning, polishing, and greasing as the team rebuilds the engine, along with some handy welds for the car's new custom headers and exhausts. Interestingly, the wedge V-8 gets a fairly unique intake manifold—along with three sparkling new carburetors—that's worth a look.
At about the 4.0-minute mark the video manages to instill a sense of confidence for some backyard mechanics thinking, "I could probably fit in a rebuild after lunch, but before dinner."
I won't spoil the ending, but you should know this before watching the video all the way: You cannot rebuild an engine in five minutes.
