Technical anyone using a stud girdle with Corvette valve covers?

George
I have new early style AFR 23 degree heads on my alum. engine and "291" heads (same as 461's) on my 327 right next to each other on stands and can get valve cover rail dims' if needed.

 

Could you just get by with 7/16 studs?

 

Well, yes, you could "get by" in that it probably wont break, but the studs will deflect in the area of .003-.005 at full lift and the rocker moving back towards the valley .005 at peak lift will cost you in the area of .030/.040 net lift measured at the retainer. Some probably wouldn't care, but that flat doesn't work for me. When you get into big rollers, its a different ball game, I guess probably lots of guys have never checked this stuff and never know, so they ***ume its all good, but you know what they say about ***uming.

 

I do understand the flex in the studs and I understand now that the "get by" is not going to work for you(I should have known better).
I myself am on the hunt for a stud girdle but the valve covers are not my problem.
If you shop for stud girdle I would go with the 2 peace rather than the u bolts style because they have problems with the nuts stripping out.

 

Just my own thoughts,#1 is I've found for a hotrod under 2000lbs,the V8 in it feels very very close to the same,no matter how much up we blow $$$$$ souping it up p***ed the HP it had stock={why,well there is just no way for HP to make tire bit better!,an at that point its all smoke}. Now #2 is soup up has for me always been $ I have vs love to have ! As for V-covers,I do love the look of Vett's,but for space an cost with stud bracing= something like this is good;http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/...ll-finned-and-gaskets-and-mini-studs.1053097/ I don't know this guy, but that looks fair to me.

 

Right on! That is what I have on my 406, .630 roller cam. Nothing has broken , very tough.

 

I am planning on a two-bar, but I know a couple guys that like the u-bolt style, they say its easier to set the valves, leave the u-bolt tight, loosen the set-screw in the poly-loc, THEN loosen one nut on the u-bolt, set the valve, tighten the u-bolt, THEN tighten the poly-loc last, they say it doesn't tend to change the lash as much when you tighten the girdle as it does with a multi-bar girdle. I kinda know what they mean, I have used the multi-bar style on BBC's, and they can sometimes change the lash setting when you tighten the girdle back up, you have to double check the lash. Never loosen the whole girdle all at once, just loosen the bolts on the cylinder you are setting.
I used to just loosen the cross-bolts on the girdle a tiny bit, so the poly-loc stayed tight in the girdle, but you really have to rap the wrench firmly to move the lash even a little. But if you use that method, the stud doesn't move as much when you tighten the girdle back up, and the lash tends to not move as much. The nice thing about the girdle is the lash hardly ever changes. They really work good and really help make the whole valvetrain a lot more rigid. I have even seen guys break a stud with a girdle, and not know it until the next time they check the valve lash, the girdle will hold everything in place, even with a broken stud!

 

Yep! It aint the girdle that gets in the way, tis the height of the nuts as there are a few different legnths. This setup clears the tallest nuts and twin bar girdles with zero grinding. I have been running this set up for years.... I thought about welding the spacers to the covers and making my own tall Vette covers.... I don't have the machine or the know how...... but now that I think about it.... it needs both gaskets to be tall enough so.....

 

Crower Stainless backset rockers, 1.65/ 1.6 double bar girdle,and I added some extra head ****.... these heads willsupport 655hp on a 14-1 383 sbc!!!!

 

Mine are Speier Racing Heads.... NOT AFR!!! I had one of the first sets of AFR 195s Eliminator Series heads and the air speed was to fast around the short turn and the quit pullin at 6300.... These Speier Heads SPANK the AFRs!!!!!!

 

Chad has a good rep. 195's are WAAAAY too small for your combo of course they would be too fast around the short side, you shoulda had 210s minimum! Isnt your engine around 380 inches? Hell , I am putting 195's on the 355 ci, 6800 rpm street motor in my truck! How big are the Speier heads you are running, they look like around 220?

 

Tis a pumpgas 383, 165 lbs crankin comp. made 545/ 500 with the AFRs and lil ole Bullet .588 lift. These heads startout at 215 I think....

 

yes, the 195s are too small for a high rpm 383, they are about 1.9 sq. in. at the pushrod pinch. They are ideal for a 355 at around 6500-6800 peak power. I use Pipemax, it gives a lot more detail, but heres a quick and dirty calculator that will get you in the ballpark if you don't want to pony up for Pipemax.
http://www.wallaceracing.com/chokepoint-rpm.php
This is how I do my cam selection, I start with the ci and minimum CSA I am working with, calculate the rpm from that, then select the intake duration that will peak at that rpm and adjust the LSA to put maximum area under the curve. Of course, this totally flies in the face of the standard HAMB method, which seems to ***ign a numerical value based on what Uncle Louie ran, multiplied by how cool it sounds at drive-in speed.

 

Didn't Crane make a cam they call The King of the Drive-In?

 

A little more food for thought, courtesy of Mr. Speiers...

 

Saturday Night Special, they were actually pretty decent for what they were.

 

I thought they went bigger than it.
It was the biggest hydraulic they had....it has been some time.

 

Normally I wouldn't talk like this on here anymore, but its MY thread, so if anyone doesn't like it, they can...well you get the idea...

 

They had mechanicals in the Saturday Night Special line too, back in the late seventies, I knew a guy that had the 244/252/106 in a 355/t350 combo in a '66 Beaumont with 4.56s behind it, that thing ran pretty damned good!

 

No problem here.
I just wanted to muck it up with babble.....and learn.

 

Late 70s sounds about right.
I was running a manley in my 331.

 

no problem at all, theres a few guys that get pissy on here when you talk about CSA and stuff. I have most of them on "ignore" anyway.

 

the Crower steel rockers are NICE, they have a really big trunion, I really like them. They are like the old Norris ones, top shelf stuff. You cant make an aluminum rocker with that big a trunion, the material isn't strong enough, if you make them thin enough around the bottom to clear the spring, they will break. Lotsa $$ though. Nice set-up.

 

I went through that clearing the rockers for a sprint engine and told them it wouldn't work...and it didn't.

 

It looks like Redline has 1.55 springs there. I am using a set of old Crane aluminum rockers, which, as far as aluminum goes are pretty damned good IMO, but I am going to try to squeak by with a 1.43 spring so I don't have to notch the rockers.

 

The Cranes are good and have been beating it up for a long time.
The new stuff is nice but the cost for a shoestring budget makes it hard.
I have an engine that I started back in 86 or 87 that is not done yet.

 

Thanks! I am familiar with the Wallace Calculators they are outstanding!!!!! I have just purchased Pipemax and am not a computer guy... I have figured out the new headers I am going to build with it tho.... I ( top secret Falcon so dont tell....) am building a new V2.50PF headed/T&D shaftrockers, Jones Cams .715 lift roller, SHP blocked 414 with Callies Magnum crank and Callies XD rods. Jones says 630 h.p. I'm shootin fer loooooow 10s..... on pumpgas....

 

Its addicting isn't it? Like heroin, tolerance builds and you need more...and more... Careful, you'll take an eye out...

 

I went to back the valves off one winter and discovered 4 broken polylocks as I had evidently overtighened them..... The valve setting was good and nothing had moved!!!!! LUCKY!!!!!