I've decided to attempt to rebuild my engine, I'm wondering if there's anything I should do besides take off the main e-shaft bolt before I pull the engine out? And does anyone have any advice on how to get the damn thing off without air tools?

 

You dont need air tools. Just a breaker bar and a bfh.

 

I tried that, the car moves.

 

you dont have good enough brakes then...

Many times even my 600ft-lb impact wont remove the front bolt. In these cases, here is what I do(engine out of the car).

Take a flat bar about 1/4" thick and 24" long, and lay it on the flyweel (installed on engine). Take a spare 14mm head bolt thats pretty long and put it onto one of the bellhousing boltholes. Turn the flywheel (the direction the bolt will want to turn up front when loosening) until the bar hits the bolt in the bellhousing patter. Take the pressureplate and lay it over the bar, and put a few bolts in place to hold the PP and the bar to the flywheel. Use the pins on the flywheel to hold the bar in place. Now, you need a big ratchet and about 6 foot of breaker bar to get even the toughest bolt loose. Applying heat with a small torch will help as well (the propane ones from walmart are fine, but take about 10 minutes to heat it up).

 

To remove the bolt and the engine is still in, get a long 19mm socket and a breaker bar and lay the breaker bar against the drivers frame rail.

Crank for just a second once or twice. It will loosen right up.

If this is your first or one of your first times taking out a motor:

Go get a disposable or digital camera and take a picture of every single thing you unplug or unbolt. When you re-assemble it will be 1000 times easier if you have pictures to referance too.

 

Sounds good to me, thats pretty clever. I've been labeling everything except the things I've done a couple times before. When I got my first look at the rat's nest I went and got the digital camera. Thanks for the advice guys.