Commuter rebuild Q's

[9697Galant]

I have a 96 Galant S 5-speed with 225k I picked up for 500 bucks that was burning oil. I really couldn't turn it down as it had a ton of new parts and the body and interior are in great shape. I have a 97 ES auto I drive right now and I got that for FREE and love it. I commute ~110 miles a day for work. I have pulled the engine from the 96 already and am tearing it down. I know it needs rings as it had MAJOR blowby coming from the oil cap and the oil was pretty carbonized and smelly. When I got on the gas it would really blow smoke bad. It used about 1/2qt in 100 miles. I did no compression test , but it wouldn't tell the condition of the oil control rings anyways. My question comes to the crank and rod bearings. Should I even bother replacing the crank bearings? I keep seeing different posts with different opinions about the crank finish, the robust nature of the engine, etc etc. I was going to replace the rod bearings simply because I have to take them off to hone the cylinders anyways. I have rebuilt plenty of Ford V8's (Mustang) but am totally new to these engines. Not replacing thebearings would be hard for me to do personally if I already have it torn down as it seems like cheap insurance. Any advice greatky appreciated. Thanks.

[mko]

Yeah, replace everything when you fully rebuild the engine. Or you could just do a mild rebuild - hone the cylinders, new pistons and rings, new rod and crank bearings, all seals on the block, new head gasket and misc gaskets, new valve seals. There are entire rebuild kits on ebay, they work pretty well. If you go to the dealer, every part is a notch better than the other vendors, but youll be hurting from the prices, and youre gonna have to wait cuz most of the time they wont have every single part.

[Galant306m]

with the amount of miles that are on that engine i would recommend getting a crank kit. They come matched with bearings so there is no guess work involved. You can pick up a crank kit for a 64 for around 250bux.

[9697Galant]

Thanks for the replies. I was more or less looking to just do a quick fresh up, hone, bearings, rings. Are new pistons really required? I have only replaced when the block has been overbored. I was looking at getting parts at partsdinosaur. I would like to spend <$500 so if I could avoid getting another crank that would be great. I guess once I pop off the mains I will see for sure.