Well, got the whole long block assembled. Stock push rods and rockers (1.73) worked fine, no binding to speak of. Tim said that they would probably work since my cam only had .487 and .493 lift. The original rockers and pivots are pretty worn, so I think I'm going to purchase OE replacements. It's hard to justify spending another $240 for rollers when the OE rockers should work fine. If I had extra money to burn I would maybe go with rollers anyway. I'm going to call Tim tomorrow with a few questions. One question I have is regarding the timing chain. I have three options on the crank gear as to where I slide over the key. R (retard 4 degrees) O (original timing) and A (advance 4 degrees). If I remember correctly, the factory timing was retarded 2 degrees for emissions reasons. I'm thinking that I would want to put the gear on "A" so that the overall cam timing is advanced 2 degrees. Is this correct? Another question I have is regarding my rockers. It seems my stock rockers with a 1.73 ratio work fine. Would there be any benefit to going with a different rocker are ratio? My final question is regarding break in oil. I have the ZDDP oil additive, but what is the best oil to run? I've heard some people say to run diesel oil because of it's higher zinc content. Any recommendations? Sorry for the newb questions, I'm new to this. I've very fortunate to have my uncle to help me with the build. He's making sure I don't screw anything up. He's done this countless times (did it for a living for many years) and there is no substitute for experience!

Picture time:

Bare block back from the machine shop. .040 over on the bore and .010 under on the crank and mains.


Short block assembled. Spent a lot of time cleaning out the block with mineral spirits and compressed air. Made sure to blast through all the oil galleys assuring the was no grit residing in there.


Long block assembled. I did bolt on the rockers (not in the picture) and we turned the engine over to check for binding in the valve train, there was none.


This is as far as I could get for now. Waiting on a bunch of parts to come in this week, including my intake manifold which is my current hold up. I also have all my ignition parts coming in. I'm just using a new stock distributor, but I ordered a MSD Blaster 2 coil. Hopefully the engine will be totally assembled next weekend. God willing, I may even have time to put it in the truck, but we will have to see. More to come soon!