It always seems that the likelihood of something bad happening to a new engine is somehow proportional to the amount of anxiety one has when building it. We've all been there before and know the sinking feeling in the gut.
Thanks, the cam is coming out tonight. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
What's everyone's opinion of the lifter pics? The all still had a crown at the top. Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
one question?? did you check the clearance on your s****er/windage baffle on the rod bolts ?? , that looks excessive on the distance of the welds , if you can deflect it with your fingers the oil/windage will bend it too , specially if your using heavy weight oils , most of the good s****ers are held in place by the block and pan so they have solid support , clearance should be minimum .030 more if the s****er deflects , but you can open it up farther for bolt clearance by notching it . very carefully run your fingers or use a mirror and check the under edge for any s****ing/polishing of metal . and to measure the clearance make a stip of playdoe about .070 and apply it to the rail and rotate the ***embled crank 2 full rotations and then check the clay with a caliper if it leaves indents
bottom picture fuzzy but I do not like the looks of the center , all the lifters should have a decent crown to them you can check the crown by holding them up to the side of another lifter or put them on a gl*** plate and they should rock easily , if it rocks and stops upright you have one whos face is failing
dang nabit the thing posted before I was done .... if the face is failing pitch the lifter as it case hardened and you wore thru it and it will eat the center out faster that a fat kid at mcdonalds and take a good look at the cam as the wear surface should be along the front or rear edge ,if its more than half way across the cam might be comprimised ,but ussually the lifter takes the brunt till it chews a big hole in it then it eats the cam surface up from not spinning
No clean room can make up for grit petrified inside an oil p***age or a porous spot on the block/head. If the builder misses just one tiny p***age when cleaning the block yer engine is gonna die early.
I never heard or felt interference with the crank s****er when I ***embled the engine. Perhaps the heat expanded to the point of rubbing. I think this is somewhat unlikely as the crank is only 3.25" stroke and this is a universal pan geared for at least 3.5" stroke. Worth checking out though.
I held each lifte up to a light and set a straight edge on top of the face. I could see light at the edges indicating that the lifter still had a crown. Whether that crown has been worn down remains to be seen. Now I'm paranoid to reuse the cam lol!
How can I tell if the hardening has failed? All of the lifter surfaces at smooth. No gouging. Thanks for the advice
Might consider going with a retro-fit roller cam when you regroup. I plan to use one in my 327 build.
I think you're right. I'll see how much the machining costs. All the roller cams seem to have so much lift. I doubt my heads will flow that well to take advantage of it.
I dont want a radical cam either. Duration @.050 will be 214/217 and just under .500 lift. Comp cam behive springs are a direct replacement, and work up to .525 lift. Cam range is idle to 4500, which is all I need to get into trouble. I feel its good piece of mind when breaking in a new engine.
I looked at the pics of the lifters and did not like what I saw sooooooooooo I went in to my garage and pulled out the box of lifters that go with one of my small cams for my Falcon engine, Used with about 5K miles on them. They were polished just like new. Something is very wrong with those lifters
sorry it took long to reply was trying to find a good example in my s**** bin and I have a engine that has 500 miles on it with a short break in done on it that the cam went flat , the lifters should be smooth across the face for the good ones and no pock marks in the center ( thats what I was trying to look for but the examples I have will not photograph the detail because the surface reflects too much light ) you can sometimes feel it as it will have a defined lip/ridge about a 1/4 or 1/3 away across you rub your finger tip across it in several directions , and sometimes you can see the spalling with a magnifying gl*** , but you should be able to see the wear as it will flatten out the surface towards the middle , as for the cam the wear should run a thin line 1/8-1/2" along the edge at the base circle then widens as it approches the top of the lobe ( several of my good cams its goes 3/4-all the way across the lobe face ) then neck back down. the cam face is ground on a taper to spin the lifters so they do not heat up and gall . ( and why you need zddp)
I pulled the cam. There were no signs of the timing chain rubbing on anything. The fuel pump ***embly seemed fine, no broken springs or anything that I could see to be the source of the noise. I can't tell if the cam lobes are good or not. It seems like the wear is straight across the lobe face rather than just the tapered side. Here are pics of the lobes from #8 to #1:
Well I measured my lobes and found variation of about .003" between them. I have no idea if this is to be expected with a cam that has about 6K miles on it. I have to admit I used a plastic michrometer but it was made in Switzerland.
Comp 986s 1.43" diameter 322 spring rate 1.150 coil bind 132# seat 293# open 1.75" installed height. I don't think these are the problem. Check my next post.
I just pulled the heads and found the source of my noise! Apparently my engine enjoys ingesting small bits of metal. Fortunately the piston bore the brunt of it. Zero damage to the heads that I can see. The bores look fine from up top. I hope I didn't bend a valve, but everything looks ok at this point. Could this have been a piston ring? I don't see how a ring could get up top without complete destruction to the ring land. I didn't see any smoking to suggest the ring broke. This ****s but at least I found it and didn't keep going making it worse. I'll report back once I get this to the machine shop. Thanks for everyone's help and support!
I hope nothing fell into the intake that would have caused that. Is that the #8 cylinder that was knocking?
damn. How many cylinders show this? This doesn't look pretty either, along with your bearings still showing issues. Might as well drop the pistons out at this point and continue the forensic investigation. Could you take a picture farther away so we can see all piston tops in one shot? That looks like quite a bit of carbon buildup already for that fresh of an engine. How do the cylinders look? I see you are already 60 over, not too much more meat there if the cylinders got damaged.
I'll take some more pics. I think the carbon was from when I was setting up the outboard carbs on the tri power. One was puking fuel and running rich. Took a lot of fiddling to get it adjusted. I think that may be when the foreign object was introduced. This carbs were off and on so many times.
A bent valve is the least of your troubles. I'd trade a bent valve for the **** you've got there Anyday and twice on Sunday. Bent valves make neat "garage men" - this one holds my gl***es
Perhaps, every experienced mechanic will tell you how important it is to cover any open holes. Now you have a story and know why this is important. Funny thing is IF you saved the world nobody would know and everyone would continue on as usual. When you cover open holes you save the world every time.
It looks like a small machine screw went through the engine. I saw similar marks before when a ****erfly screw came out of a carb.
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