Crack Sleeve Stacey 2009 Dodge Caliber SRT-4

The Story

Bought the car in May of 2021 from someone that had no idea how to even maintain a vehicle let alone a higher-performance one. Had to drive 5 hours away to even see the car, made the deal and left with the car got 45 minutes away from the PO place car starts overheating, so I pull over shut the car down and pop the hood. The rad cap was venting so I knew something wasn\'t right thought the head gasket. Go to try to start the car huge puff of white and not a chance it will start. So call the nearest town with a tow truck and get it towed there. Oh, and it\'s already 11 pm and we still have a 4-hour drive home. Got back home late late, then had to get a truck and trailer to go pick the car up on the weekend. Got that shorted out was on the road at 3 am got there, then got the car hooked up on the trailer and was back on the way home by 9 am. So made good time, and had the \"new\" car in my shop by 1 pm that day. Had the head off by dinner time and found 4 cracked sleeves... Hence her name. Now the rebuild... Don\'t ever try to source an SRT-4 block for a caliber. You will get some pretty insane prices thrown at you. I went the N/A route after I did some research, AKA facebook group and met some amazing people that walked me through it. So got a N/A block OEM Forged rods and pistons and crank, bolted her all back together after waiting for a month for parts and had it running by June 20th, 2021. Haven\'t looked back since the car has been an absolute beast. The best part about the car being down for a month meant I was able to paint correct the whole car needed a 7-stage correction and paint the front bumper. Then Ceramic/Graphene coated the whole thing. Painted the OEM wheels added a splash of red to the SRT and eyes to the ram heads.