My fresh built aluminum headed 440 has been sitting on an engine stand in my garage for about 2 months, and it could be a couple more before Im ready to put it in the car. Besides the assembly lube and grease used during the build, no other lubricant has been added during this time. I have not rotated it either. All the open ports and holes have been taped up. It's getting cold and wet here in the great Northwest, and I'm getting worried about corrosion inside the block. Should I be turning the engine over periodically by hand? Should I be spraying some kind of oil or lubricant inside the combustion chambers? Any other precautions I should be taking?

Some fogging oil, or WD-40 in the cylinders (spray through the sparkplug holes) will help keep the cylinders from rusting.

If its going to set very long at all, pulling the valve covers and loosening the rocker arm shafts to relieve tension from the valve springs is also a good idea.

If it has no oil in it, it might not hurt to turn it upside down and fog the oil pan, and lower end with fogging oil too.

Rotating it every once in a while will help it from sticking.

http://www.amazon.com/STA-BIL-22001-Fogging-Oil-av/dp/B000H7CKAY

put it in a garbage bag..

I'd put several qts of Bradd Penn break in oil in the pan & preoil with the 5/16" hex. The inside hidden machined & unmachined passages/area can rust as well. I'm overkill & drown everything in sight & not in sight with oil. . You have alot of time & $$$$ invested in this. Rust is terrible

we use this (the stretch wrap) for very important items

http://www.mcmaster.com/#corrosion-inhibiting-wrap/=oz4d1r

start by liberally coating with a long term storage oil (something that is heavy and leaves a film), and then finish wrap it with this

You can get some really good piece of mind if you do it right, but you will need to spend a little

btw the stretch wrap is great for milling and lathe tools as well

I've always liberally applied WD-40 to the rotating internals, squirted some Marvel into the spark plug holes, and covered with a trash bag. I never disconnected anything.

I had a 406 SBC engine stored OUTSIDE (though covered), for 4+ years using this procedure and after bringing it in, I was able to turn it over by hand.

Now 10 years after I had it built, someday, I'll have something to use that engine in....

Try 21 years in a garage on a stand. Still turns by hand I do it once a year or two

My solution was to bring it into my house. I used a 2 wheeler to bring in the block and crank(no pistons or rods) in as one piece. Then set it on a oil pan and the aluminum heads got set on top when they got bought and then it's a good place to store a intake manifold.

I had this motor/short block in the spare bedroom for 21 years, got dusty but didn't rust.

The block and heads have been in my 74 challenger since 2007 and runs excellent.
This is the spot it sat for 21 years.




I have 3 other assembled motors in storage right now, I just keep motor oil in the cylinders and turn the motor over by hand once a year. They are fine that way, don't skimp on the motor oil in each spark plug hole.

WD40 Water Displacement formula # 40 is not a rust preventative, it will evaporate Use a rust prevenative product to help reduce and prevent rust on machined surfaces

I wouldn't advise cranking the motor over. You will wipe off the cam lube. I like the idea of turning the motor upside down and coating the bottom side of the motor. Then fog the cylinders and ports. Bag it up and get some dessicate as mentioned it should last a long time....

This reminds me of how to do it in a freezing cold garage and was done here locally back around 1976-77.

I knew a guy who had a hemi challenger that was all tubbed up and more and for a period of time he kept the entire motor disassembled in a tub of oil completely submerged.

At the time it looked like waste oil as it was all black and you couldn't see the parts but they were in there.

Seems like a guaranteed way to prevent any rust?

Oh yea this also reminds me of the time I went to see a racing engine for sale that was soaking in oil dissembled. I was pissed and left without waiting for him to get each one out the oil and cleaned so I could inspect. I could already tell at that point I didn't want to deal with the bozo.

If it's for sale have it ready for inspection.

I was hesitant to turn the crank for this reason (cam lube.) I ordered some fogging oil and will hit the cylinders and lower end, and the heads. But wont a plastic bag create condensation and trap moisture?? Like when people put their cars under tarps to protect them from the weather and it ends up trapping moisture, creating mildew/mold and accelerating rust.

That's why dessicate was recommended... Put it in the bag to absorb the moisture...

I always thought that was the "purpose" of cam lube, for installation/rotation manually prior to first start-up. The lube dissolves in the oil pretty much immediately once it starts pumping, and everybody pre-lubes nowadays with a new engine build.

When we rebuilt V12 top ends, we were instructed NOT to use cam/moly lube, but instead, pre-lube with fresh oil and a bottle of zinc additive for our break-in oil for 3-5 minutes (because the big 3/EPA reduced the amount of it in modern oil), or used some diesel oil, in our case Shell Rotella. I published a blurb about it in one of the Jaguar rags many, many years ago.

I will start using some sort of "fogging oil" now, though, as recommended by a couple of others!