HELP with SBC rocker / pushrod problem

I bet you could find a good used head and RR your old one cheaper than the machine work for the screw in studs and have it fixed in a few hours. Unless you have hours of porting and polishing done to that head, just get a different one. How many millions of heads are running around the country without screw in studs? If you are racing...then that's a different story of course.

 

Make sure the intake bolts are not too long or they can hit the push rods on some of the cylinders causing the push rod to bind!

 

x2.

 

Hmmm. never ran into this as I have always used oe bolts. Good point though. IIRC the originals are 1 5/8" long. Dennis D

 

That's what I said on his other post about this subject.

Hey 36DodgeRam, make sure you check those intake bolts out before you put this back together or you may be right back where you started.

Humor me... Sure looks like NEW intake bolts there. Look at where that intake bolt p***es through right above the bent pushrod on the exhaust valve. Shine a light down that pushrod hole and make sure you don't see any threads sticking through. If that rod was bent by the bolt, that cyl would **** a full intake charge, close the valve and light it off. KABOOM, backfire and pulled intake stud. That's my story and I'm sticking to it! {until you prove me wrong}

 

pull the head just nuts and bolts, it will be easy to fix whatever the problem is in the garage, but would **** to be pushing it home.
good luck,

 

It's the OE bolts you have to worry about ... there are a couple (can't remember the number) that are actually a little bit longer than the others. If one of the long ones goes in the wrong hole ... the end of the bolt will contact the pushrod.

 

yep!

 

Pretty sure back in the sixty's they were all the same on my SBC motors. I doube the guy that has my 65 'vette would let me take them out to see though Dennis D

 

Thanks for all the good advice! I got a new pushrod, I'll slide it down on each lifter and see if the bolt interferes. But I think I used the right bolts. I'll try pounding the stud back down, and if it goes down i'm starting the motor. If the stud comes back loose, the worse it can do is start ticking again, right? Then I'll pull the head. I won't go too far the first drive, and a SBC can always get you home on 7 cylinders. But I've got to try the easy way first, and several people think it might work, including me. I'll let you all know.

 

"I think I have the right bolts"

WOAH THERE .... never said you had the wrong bolts, just said that the "right bolts" might not all be the same length (from the factory) and that even though you are using the correct bolts you "might" not be putting them in the correct holes.

When you removed the old intake, did you make a note of which bolt came out of which hole? (I doubt it) so even though you are using the same bolts (and the engine ran fine before) you just might have put one of the longer (and I mean just slightly longer) original bolts in the wrong hole. Believe me, it is an easy mistake to make ... unless you line them all up beside each other, it would be very hard to even notice the length difference.

 

Thanks everyone for all the good advice. I pounded the stud back down, put in a new pushrod, adjusted those two valves, and closed it up. Runs good, no noise, no miss. I'm just going to drive it, if anything else is hurt, time will tell.

 

Good to hear but there gonna push out again. Since you know the problem get back in and put in screw in studs. 2 cents of advice.

 

More blue rtv

 

Very possible, especially because a different intake manifold was installed which might require different length bolts. I looked at the picture and it's difficult to tell the angle of the bolt. If it bound the pushrod in the hole it could hold the exhaust valve open to cause the backfire.

I don't like all the silicone squeezing out. I hope it isn't like that inside the intake runners. If so, it could have ****ed that in. At least silicone shouldn't do any damage to the piston or head but it could have caused bent push rods.