If one was to mistakenly put assy. Lube between main bearings and block and behind cap bearings too, then torqued everthing down, would one need to pull and clean everything?

I have never come across that problem, but how did the crank turn when it was
all torqued down? If it were tight and not a smooth precision feel, it might be a
good idea, but if it feels fine, I see no issues with it.

When you take an old engine apart, oil has worked it's way around behind the bearing
shells, and this is really no different, you just don't want a too tight fit on a new engine
because oil has a thickness and needs room to move between the crank shaft and the
bearing surface, being new these clearances are a little extra close.

Did you check the clearance with Plasti-gauge? A good thing to do also

So this is your call, because I can't feel it for myself 

Wild

you kinda have to use pasti-gauge don't you? I would not put together a lower end with out! so if your going to have it apart a bunch of times why not clean it up and have that piece of mind. that's kind of  a important part of the engine and a bitch to have to re-do. 

It may not matter but I am using new std. bearings and my crank was cleaned up by machine shop to spec.

Maybe I am confused on using the plastiguage. I thougjt on a rebuild it wasnt needed. I can mechanic pretty decent but def a novice on rebuilding.

It may not matter but I am using new std. bearings and my crank was cleaned up by machine shop to spec.

Maybe I am confused on using the plastiguage. I thougjt on a rebuild it wasnt needed. I can mechanic pretty decent but def a novice on rebuilding.

"cleaned up" could mean multiple thousandths of a inch. I would not leave it to chance.and there is no telling if the clearances were out of spec from the factory. the crank is the place I would spend the most time with a precision assembly.

this is all assuming you want a quality rebuild that will last a while and not just a "race" motor.

The only way to clean up a journal is to polish it, and that
means removing some metal, Plasti-gauge is a must in my
opinion for an engine being done this way, to ensure the
mains are not too loose, you won't have any issues being
too tight on clearance, so the lube behind the bearing shells
is not an issue, but there might be too much clearance on the
mains and it needs to be checked, all the journals including
rods if they cleaned those too

I appriciate all the advice.  I suppose my inexperience led me to going about this wrong from the get-go.

So in a normal rebuild, one would check these tolerances before the machine shop.  Then they would polish individual journals if needed based on my recordings by comparing them to factory specs.  If one or more was too loose, you would then go oversized bearings and polish all back down as needed.

So in my situation, by dropping the block, crank,  & caps off, after I took them all apart,  there is no way I could have known what correct bearings to order?  The shop told me to order standard on both bearing sets so I am qurious how else they would have known.  I know the block guy had a spec book out when i dropped by one time last week.

Sounds like I will be pulling everything back apart, check/compare with pastiguage, and by some stroke of good luck none are too loose!

No, the machine shop uses a micrometer to measure the journals, and the book tells them
the specific info for your engine, if they told you to get Std bearings, just go with it, if the
crank feels ok, I wouldn't worry about it.

I thought you dropped off parts and did all of the parts ordering yourself without checking
the bearing clearances, but if it's been done for you, go with it, you should be fine, but the
Plasti-gauge is good to use for peace of mind, shops do make mistakes, had one crank that
was too tight, wouldn't turn, shop didn't turn in to the right under size, but a Std journal can't
be too tight, and they would of turned it to a .010 under if it were bad, so I think you are good

Wild

My only 2 Bits is.......

Even though you got every thing back from the machine shop, gun oiled in nice plastic
protective bags........

CLEAN EVERYTHING AGAIN !!!!  EVERY NO0K & CRANNY !!
 Clean out ALL OIL PASSAGES, counter weight balance drill holes, ETC. !!

Grinding Dust, Old petrified Krud from the "Block Boiling Process" will ruin your
NICE NEW REBUILD in the 1st couple of thousand "Break In" Miles !!

Just a word of "EXPERIENCE......

CAPT

Agreed, I assumed you did clean everything before assembly 

I appriciate all the good advice. 

I have a long way to go before this project is drivable! I just hope everything runs smooth when the time comes.  I am charting a lot of new ground with this rebuilt motor, COP, and MS1 setup and there are a lot of possible kinks to be worked out along the way.

Still have my motor on the the engine stand and I was working on the new timing belt today with the oil pan still off.  I went ahead and dropped in the spark plugs and while I was turning the engine over manually, i can hear compression leak from the bottom end.  Just wanna catch something ahead.  I did set the rings 180 apart.  I know the rings haven't been broken in yet but again, I just wanna make sure I dont need to double check something. TIA

Ya, that's pretty much normal, they call it leak down, it will improve as
the engine breaks in, but you will almost always have some leak down
because the rings have end gaps. To really get the best seal you could
use total seal rings, but it's not really necessary

Wild

Thanks.

On a 96 16v, driver side sensor just above oil filter. Assuming this is knock or taps into oil? Looking for a spare port for aftermarket temp guage. Driver side hopefully.

The's where the oil pressure switch goes - for a coolant temperature gauge you want it in the intake manifold as close to the water outet elbow as you can get it.