engine rebuild help, lots of questions on organization and other stuff Options

[stateofidleness]

hey guys..

so im in the middle of "rebuilding" my engine, and by that i mean replacing all the hoses, stripping the smog equipment, painting/powder coating to make it look nice, and other general maintenance.

what i have a hard time understanding is how you guys keep everything sorted when taking it all apart?? im an ABSOLUTE noob with this stuff and am basically learning as i go from online forums and friends (MUCH MUCH MUCH appreciated btw!)

taking it apart is no problem lol, but im scared that i wont be able to put it back together.. i barely know the names of most of the parts of the engine let alone where the parts "should" be. ive seen some very beautiful engines on here and know what mine could possibly look like if i take the time to do it right. that is what inspires me and keeps me motivated.

WITHOUT spending tons of $$ on taking it to a shop to be "machined" (dont even really know what that means... is it possible for me to have a solid reliable engine "rebuild" without taking it all COMPLETELY apart... basically tin off and stopping... i dont have the knowledge or funds to turn it into a huge powerful engine but i think i can do most myself and have a solid build.

what all would ya'll recommend i do (im a novice, keep that in mind) and side question is how do ya'll keep it all organized?
another side question: if i get all the tin off and decide to powder coat, will the coater straighten the tin for me to? how do ya'll straighten the edges?

thanks for the help in advance!

maybe i should post in the concourse section as well for some pics of stock 2.0L's?

[MrKona]

Regarding your first question, I think the best tool is a digital camera. Dissassemble your parts slowly and take lots of pictures along the way, from all different angles. You can never tell which picture is going to be the one that really helps you down the line.

In addition to that, take the time to label pieces: what they are, what side of the car they were one, hoses should be labeled where they went to.

Also, especially with hoses or wiring, take the time to draw a diagram of all routing before you start dissassembly. As I'm sure you can tell, it's really important to document, document, document, because by the time you are finally ready for reassembly, you won't remember a thing...

Pretend like sombody else is going to be putting the pieces back together.