A method and apparatus for engine piston installation in which robots are used for the entire engine piston installation process. A first robot (900) equipped with a stuffing gripper and force control picks up a piston with a connection rod, detects the piston ring presence, squeeze the rings, find the engine cylinder bore, and stuffs the piston into the cylinder bore. A second robot (100) can be used to load and unload the engine block (102), hold the block and position it to the location, and indexes the crankshaft into the proper orientation for each cylinder bore. A set of tools either fixed on a stationary station or on a third robot (300) is used to guide the piston connecting rod, transport and place on the connecting rod cap, and fasten the cap onto the connecting rod. The piston connecting rod guiding process may be omitted in piston stuffing for some types of engines.