Hey guys still plugging along! Got the transmission back together.. nothing really wrong besides needing new thrust washers and needle bearings. I just got my best gasket set in the mail today so I can seal up my 8ba... problem is I ordered the "graphtite" set and they sent me the copper ones. I only went graphtite because that is what was on it for 25 years and the aluminum heads still look new. Should I worry about it? Copper set is $35 more... what would you do? Sent from my SM-G920V using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Well things got interesting this morning. Work on the motor has been very slow. I got out to the garage to finish pulling it apart as far as I needed to reseal it. What a surprise I got when I pulled the pan off though. We bought this motor out of a car that was being restored then was sold to a hot fodder. It had been rebuilt and never fired so we took it apart cleaned the rat nest out of the oil pan and put it back together. When the pan came off today I found this! Neither my father, uncle nor I remember cracked and welded pan rails! There's 30 inches of weld in this motor and it has been running like a top for 25. Only thing I'm concerned with is I smelled coolant out of the exhaust every now and then. My radiator had no pressure because it had pinholes on the top tank. I found no evidence of a blown head gasket but I found an exhaust port on each side that had a very small amount of rust. Hoping it's not a crack in the ports showing up after 25 years that will get worse when I put a pressure cap on the distributor. years! Sent from my SM-G920V using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
That's definitely nickel welding rod. The best way to weld cast iron. Conventional wisdom is that a pan rail crack is the kiss of death for a flathead. I think this disproves that notion !
The welding looks pretty good, but it definitely explains the leakage that's been happening. 25 yrs. and more, should you worry now? Do you have a back-up block? Good Luck, this is a great little car!
I would strip the motor down and do a pressure check on it. Makes no sense to put it all back together and then find you have an issue. You've already got it this far - might as well go the rest of the way to be sure! PS: Welding up the pan rails was a very common thing back in the day. A good friend of mine that is 85+ years old said that they used to bring cars into the shop he worked at as a young man. They'd run the engine until it was hot, put it into the workbay, pull the pan (engine still in car), clean everything with solvent, grind out the cracks and he would weld them up with NiRod . . . with the engine still in the car. Said that they fixed a lot of freeze-cracked flatheads in this manner. Knowing Pete and his skills - I'm sure the story is true.
Definitely decided to pressure test it. Anyone in the mass area have the kit so I don't have to get another set of gaskets? Sent from my SM-G920V using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Possible that there's a bit of porosity in all that weld somewhere and you're getting a little seepage that can be handled with the "dog turds" like GM used to put in every car coming off the assembly line. But I agree, you need to pressure test it, and even though it means a new set of cam bearings afterwards, you need to vat the block because any of the stopleak fiber compounds work much better in a clean block.
That is a good looking repair, I have seen lots of repairs like that on race car motors and if it's done right it is good to go. 25 years seems like it passed the good to go test. If you have washed down the cylinders a few times, a set of rings and bearings with a hone would be my play. Put it together, use the old radiator and run some good block sealer through it. Follow the directions which is usually run at running temp for 30 mins or something of that nature. Drain the water pull your old radiator and put the new one in. My money would be that your kiddo will be driving it with the same motor when he is 25.
love the car, love the white. love the green, it sets it apart from everything else on the road. cool man cool
Speedway has a pressure testing kit - has steel plates with thick rubber sealing surfaces - works good. You want to be able to inspect the valves and part areas - so the best way is to have a plate that lets you see all these areas with the pressure at about 40 lbs. As noted earlier, have the block cleaned first, then magged, then pressure tested.
Seeing if a friend has one I can borrow. I wasn't planning to fully disassemble the block. I just want to see if there is any coolant loss at this point? Was thinking the biggest probability for that would be the lower exhaust ports that would be affected by a freeze Sent from my SM-G920V using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
well it turned out the guy I was trying to get to help me test the block just kept putting me off so I remembered my brother had a roll of foam rubber in his cellar and used made my own. using the edelbrock heads, stock pumps with the water outlets blocked with a rubber expansion plug. I added 10psi into the pipe hole in the head for the temp sender and sprayed some dawn into the exhaust ports. one port on each side had a nasty crack and foamed right up. junk block! It just so happened that I found a fresh rebuild without paperwork for sale right before I tested it. after it came back cracked I contacted the seller and now have a stock rebuilt 8ba in my possession. it's very similar to the motor I pulled out of the car. that motor was basically a stock rebuild with .030 pistons and we installed an isky 77b cam with stock valves and springs. this one is .040 over with the stock ford cam. wondering if it's even worth putting a bigger cam in? here's some shots of testing the old motor:
The new engine looks good, appears to have adjustable tappets in it also. If it were mine, I would install the cam in order to take full advantage of the dual carbs and the Edelbrock heads. Not too bad of a job since it's already opened up.
The Isky 77B is a very mild cam - doesn't do much for me (but I like bigger cams). The Isky 1007B is a good cam - has a bit of a lumpy sound and works well in smaller engines. If you're interested, I'd have Pete1 on here regrind you one. He does extremely good work and you'll save about 1/2 off of what a "new" version costs from Isky. Best of luck! B&S
Thanks for the response Dale. I also have an isky max one that only has break in time but one of the lobes is slightly pitted? Thoughts on that? Sent from my SM-G920V using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
I wouldn't run it - the top of the lobe is breaking down - for what reason, hard to tell. Don't know if it was oil starved, wasn't hardened correctly, bad lifter, ??? My guess is that it will continue what has already been started - so why put it into your new engine. B&S
Too bad about the old block being junk, whoever welded it up did a hell of a good job from the looks of it. Cool that you were able to find a good replacement right away.
squablow, I think I'm going to keep that cracked motor together as a unit. try putting in some sealer and run it in another project. see if I can get some more time out of her! I don't remember what we did with the 77b installation but I'm wondering what camshaft grinds if any work with the stock ford springs?? since this valvetrain is fresh and it's a small cube that doesn't need a ton of flow I'm not looking to swap out to chevy valves or huge lift.
think it was street rodder mag. that had a story about a guy who drilled and tapped from different angles, ran good bolts through, cut or milled the extra off... think he welded all afterwords ? 30 years ago flatties were around... always wondered why he did that ?
well, the only reason I can think of why you would do that besides the "because i can" mantra is if you have a lot of time porting a block. just like a lot of guys will go through substantial work to repair a cylinder head on an OHV motor because of all the time and expense to get the heads to flow they way you want them. flathead blocks are twice as bad in that regard because you don't get to separate the two different failures of lower end and top end....
Got the new motor up on the stand last night. What I thought was a EAB cam from a casting number was stamped 8rt on the nose.... not familiar with the 8rt truck grind and can't seem to find specs. One question I have is what cam can be used with stock springs? 3/4 grind that's not wild but will sound good in a .040 over ford that's only 245 cubes Sent from my SM-G920V using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Ok... decided on an isky 1007b cam. I measured my installed height and it sits right around 2" at which my springs measured out to about 50lbs. Only problem was when I tried to get much over .300 of lift the springs would bind. So it's time figure a set of springs. Anyone know what the zephyr springs measure up to at 2"? I'm trying to get into a 60-70lb range and still have plenty of lift left for the 355 that the 1007b requires. Sent from my SM-G920V using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Hi, Revkev... Love your white roadster, as said...'Never see white rods'! All the contro on your Dad's choice of trim... IF (big 'if') you decide to 'freshen' the trim with a new coat, perhaps deepen the color a shade or two. That would compliment your Dad's theme, but slightly more 'authoritive'...just a thought. I'm also doing a .040" over 59A, a 'recent rebuild', I received it all apart; it's one with factory 'relief' in block at valve seats. I had my cam grinder take a N.O.S. cam, and ground it to a Winfield SU1R, so I'm in a quandary about spring tension at X inches compressed, don't own a spring 'tester', so if you get some dope on Lincoln spring specs, please share them! (there used to be a 'table' of spring progression at different heights, it was printed in Hot Rod Magazine in the '50s, don't remember month/year... Rescued some used Johnson adjustable tappets out of two engines...One had all stock tappets, except for 5 adjustables. A 'repair' at one time... Found some Ford 94 carb cores, all three of them are missing the floats! Also, an original Navarro 2 jugger, lucky. Fun to stop work on my 406 and 354 hemi builds...regress to a flathead...LOL I have extensive VW/Porsche background also. Refreshing to read about yours. Thanks for mentioning.
mike, I don't have access to all the fun and funky do-dads for motor building in my garage but I can find ways to get by! I used a bathroom scale and my drill press to get an idea where I was with my springs. Bored&stroked gave me some information on springs that he posted up on the Hamb a while back. basically comparing the zephyr and isky 185g springs. these are his measurements: a) New Lincoln Zephyr Springs (new) - Reds Headers: Height: Pounds: 1.950 80 1.575 170 b) Isky 185G (new) - One of my favorite flathead single springs: Height: Pounds: 1.980 80 1.605 180 once you get your valves done you can check your installed heights. then start shimming from there. i'm not familiar with how radical the winfield cam is or how hard you are going to run it. with my planned isky cam Dale and I figured the 2" installed height I have should be about right for what I'm looking to do.
oh and one more thing that I think is pretty cool. I didn't have my own flathead valve bar so I borrowed my uncles, which turned out to be his cousin's who used it to build his flatmotors back when he raced at riverside park in agawam ma. unfortunately both the track and our cousin has since recently passed! I wish I could pick his brain about some motors he's built. the guy was a legend at that track.
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