Hot Rods Quality control in today's world

Had to laugh this afternoon... setting up valve train on a 383 sbc I'm doing. brand new Edelbrock heads..Had 15 3/8' rocker studs and one 7/16' stud

 

Yeah quality control is a thing of the past.

 

That actually was (a form of) quality control, otherwise they would have left that stripped out 3/8" threaded hole for the buyer to discover.
I built a hot 355 in the mid 70's, one ball end insert in a set of GM pushrods never got drilled completely through, makes for blue parts.

 

It's better than that Denny. The head is tapped 7/16 for all the studs... They actually installed a stud in one hole that was 7/16 on both sides

 

Sounds like they got a big block rocker stud mixed in.

 

It's just a heavy duty style stud for solid roller set up's etc. Bought many set of these , never had a miss match

 

Also had another issue...same engine , same company. There is no way the valve covers would have ever seated with that big overhang. I'm pretty sure the CNC missed a step. All fixed now.

 

Not auto related, but Mrs has, lately been using more than a try to get appliances that work.
Makes me think of a Beatles song. "Yesterday"

 

This is just what we have to expect nowadays I suppose. I really like cool NOS stuff

 

Have you check the blower mount surface yet?

 

Yes it was all good.

 

That shot reminded me that I had to adjust one of the guideplates on the Edelbrock heads on my 350.

 

Car off topic but the car my wife inherited from har father when he and is 13 years old with 100,000km/60,000 miles. Timing chain apparently jumped a tooth and grenaded the head with a crack and five of the eight roller rockers gone! Supposed to be a reliable 2.2 Chevy engine!

Found a used engine wth 20.000 less kms but not cheap. Trying to find a good replacement vehicle for her would probably lead to same BS. The flathead six in my ‘42 Fargo is still running!!!

 

While quality control and assurance is most definitely worse today, the "past" wasn't all perfect either. As a student doing a "work-study" program in the parts department at a local Chevy dealer in the late 60's, I ran across a few cases of AC spark plugs that were without (any) threads.

 

Yeah, stuff slips thru. Good on you for catching it.
I assume you are talking about the end of the heads and the lack of area for the valve cover to fit down over it, but the intake was going to hold it up even worse.
E kind of annoyed me back in the 90s. Was building my dad a 289 with E carb, intake and throttle bracket. Throttle and trans linkage did NOT want to play. Called them to ask what I needed to get things to work. They said it had to be made by us. That's fine if you are building a hot rod and mixing and matching parts. It's not if it's a buy this setup and bolt it on deal. Had to go to the junkyard and scavenge some popular Ford parts and get creative with hand tools. Again, this was in the catalog as bolt-on for the application and we were under a time crunch. I appreciate they try to keep things in the US and have continued to stay in business while most others have folded. But stuff like this should have been caught and if sold at all, been a heavily discounted 'second'.

 

Yep we machined the sides of the intake.... no way valve covers were going to fit.

 

The fact that 15/16 of the parts fit up was checked comes in at 94%. Most QC does sampling of lots, which does not really apply here. Parts get mixed up all the time, even in a QC controlled stock room.

 

I've been in assembly, although certainly not at that level. You get used to to even the feel of stuff. Even if your mind isn't focused and you didn't lay out the parts for visual, the weight and balance would be off. I really doubt this is automated, and just grabbing and threading the stud in, your fingers will note the different width of the top of the stud.