Hydrolocked engine opened up, damage/options?

[Squishymonster2]

I posted 2 or 3 months ago about hydrolocking my '94 Sport (with 118k miles) while trying to drive through a ditch :P I finally got over my depression and motivational issues and pulled the engine over a couple of Saturdays.

I was told of course the problem is very hard to diagnose with the engine in the vehicle but I had 3 mechanics suggest a possible bad crankshaft bearing.

When the damage happened, after getting the engine started again, there was a loud mechanical knocking sound from the back end of the engine, using a mechanics stethoscope(?) I determined that the sound was the loudest from the oil pan, rather than the heads, etc.

Now the engine is on an engine stand, I pulled the oil pan off and started turning the crank. Without taking more off, I can see that the cylinder in the back left has a bent connecting rod.

On the bottom of the same cylinder's piston, there is a spot where it looks like the metal was hammered/scraped away. The big balancer weight looking thing on the crank shaft would smash into the bottom of the cylinder and I'm going to say that's where the knocking sound was coming from. The bottom of the cylinder has POSSIBLY 1 milimeter (I think less) of metal tore out of it, and the crankshaft is basically just rubbed by the looks of it.

My plan is to remove the crankshaft, connecting rods, bearings, and pistons, and have them measured/inspected by a mechanic to see what must be replaced.

I'd prefer to inspect the block myself for visual defects, if possible, rather than hauling it to someone. Is this a smart idea? Can I for example just look for rubbed away hash marks on the inside of the cylinder walls to know if a cylinder needs to be machined?

Is it at all possible that valves/pushrods have been damaged? It seems impossible for the piston to connect with them in any way considering the piston stroke basicaly got shorter, not longer, by the bent connecting rod. I'd hope the valves could withstand the water pressure if it can withstand the combustion, and only a timing chain is connecting the crank to the push rods (more or less )

By the way, I'm no mechanic. I've done what I've done so far using Haynes manual. I figured the engine is already dead so I'm not going to break it trying to fix it myself, and the truck is dead without the engine so... I'm trying it myself. I'm fairly interested in this sort of thing, and am priming myself for engine work on a '48 CJ-2A that I'm rebuilding. I know that there are tons of torque specifications and measurement tolerances that I need to pay attention to when reassembling but I'm hoping I'm going to do it right.

With all of that being said, I'm considering running the truck for probably another 40k miles at least... maybe. I'd prefer to keep my engine if the parts are not more than the cost of a junkyard engine ($500). How hard would it be to do a minimal rebuild/tune-up and what should I replace in order to get better performance, operation, and life out of this engine while still making sure it's not tore apart for a month?

There are at least 2 or 3 leaky seals that I should fix, and I also need to inspect the slave cylinder/throwout bearing because I've had the standard difficulty shifting since 90k miles... argh. Holy crap it's going to be SO nice to get rid of this problem... I've learned to shift with it and almost "shift around" the problem by quickly flying into another gear, and back to the gear I want, etc, and when I drive a normal manual vehicle, it almost seems strange lol

[boominXplorer]

The money you will spend (gaskets, assem lube, buying of tools if you dont already have some and most of all the parts) will end up being more than just a JY motor. I would get a JY motor and put that in and use the block you have out already as a lernign experiance. NOW if you have an aftermarket insight like putting in a cam and boring it out or anythign like that then you can just ude the motor you have now, If you plan on staying pretty stock go with the JY one