Hopefully you are just going to be missing testing and not any points races..and atleast its happening before the season... not LONG before... but still...

 

Another local racer here has a fresh built 454 for sale, but im sure i am going to be in the same boat as you... not enough CASH...

 

I had to use my girlfriends debit card (for bills only) on monday to buy our $186 pushrods. Haven't explained that one yet and I am not sure what I am going to say.

I was at a friends about a week ago and he had a 454 in his garage. i can check and see if he still has it.

 

That would be great. I was pretty bummed , not only because of the engine locking up, but because My girlfriend is coming up tomorrow and the last thing i said to her before the engine locked up was "Ill make sure the Dodge is ready for tomorrow so you can take it for a drive". Shes had a pretty rought ime the last few months, her grandpa passed away 4 months ago, and then her grandma passed away monday... She was looking foward to taking it for a drive lol.. but atleast, thank god it locked up today and not tomorrow when she was driving it..

As far as the pushrods go, you had to spend the $186 so you can win the $10,000 in August...

 

I will talk to him on friday. He had a chevelle for the motor but i think that he sold the car.

Sounds like she has had a hard time lately. I guess you could get a couple friends to help push the Dodge around the block a few times??

 

Hopefully i can get it back into the garage and her and i can just sit in it for awhile..

 

Are they hydraulic or solid lifters? I have a solid roller and the wheel wore out and wiped out the cam.

I don't run any points races, I just go to regular street nights and test and tunes. I want to run the NMCA True Street when it comes to my track in June then the Pinks All Out is in July so I got some time. My daily driver is down too so I got nothing to drive, lol.

 

We are running all hydraulic roller. Not the best but a friend had the lifters, pushrods, rocker arms, springs, retainers and keepers for $1000 so we bought the whole setup. Planning on running solid roller when this engine is done (hopefully about 5 years).

 

I think I would rather have a hydraulic roller but its expensive and it doesn't make as much hp as a solid. I never heard of problems like you are saying though. That sounds wierd. My truck gets driven alot and they are saying you can't do it with a solid roller. Im going to give it another try. If this one goes I don't know what in going to do.

 

We called crane a few times about the problem and they told us that our oil was diry and that they wer willing to do an oil analysis. Did seem like a real safe bet since it is their test and they are in florida and we are in wyoming.

 

Have you guys noticed any substantial increase in HP or torque by going from flat tappet to roller?


Rod bearings 5,6,&7 seized up. When i took the oil pan off the oil pickup was laying in the bottom of the pan so i am guessing it worked its self out of the pump and there was no oil being picked up. I wasnt driving, so i do not know if there was oil pressure or not ( mounted the gauge where the driver could see it very easily.... ) but im guessing the pickup came off, engine ran without oil, 5,6,&7 are probably first rod bearings to get oil and get oil starved so they locked up.

Heres a photo of where she died...



Guess next time i will tac weld the pickup tube to the pump!! Hard way to learn the lesson of using about $1.00 in wire and gas to avoid this.

I need to find an inner / outter mic and mic the rods and another crank i have to see if another new set of bearings will work in the engine.


DroppedF100, I like the photo of your truck pulling both the front wheels... Is that with N2O right off the line?

 

How does the pickup tube attach to the oil pump on a BBC? Never worked on chevy anything.

How do the rest of the bearings look? and the crank bearings?

 

The pickup tube "presses" or slides into the pump.

Not sure why it came out, but ive been asked 3 times "did you spot weld the pickup tube to the pump?"

All of the bearings looked great except for those 3 rods. I had another full set of .010 / .010 rod and main bearings in the garage with the other crank. I assembled the bottom end (fun with out the piston ring compressor, man my thumbs are torn UP) ."Wiggle tested" the crank with no oil, seemed ok so did the same with the rods out of the block... seemed ok. Re assembled all mains and rods with plastigauge got 15 to 20 thousandths on everything.took it all apart again, cleaned everything. Put it all back together with lube, spun it over about 35 times spun pretty good so i took all mains and rods off again and checked all the bearings... No scratches, rubs, slices or any signs inadequate / excessive clearances so i assembled it all again.

I have the shortblock put together now and think after seeing everything that im going to try and run it. I just need to get the welder over here tomorrow and find a tube of silicone. all of my gaskets are still good from intake gaskets, to head gaskets, to water pump gaskets..

Except for the 3 bearings that got destroyed they all looked brand new still. But they are all in the trash now with the old crank. I am VERY happy that this happened at an idle and not at 5000RPM.

If i can find a tube of silicone, 4.5 gallons of coolant, and 6 qts of 10w40 the car might be pulling out of the garage again tomorrow unless it starts to snow again lol.

Im thinking about throwing in a switch which will kill the ignition if there is no oil pressure...

How is progress on the f-100 coming along?

 

Seems sort of weird to me that they wouldn't bolt the tube to the pump like ford does. Seems like a good way to avoid the problem that you just had. Sounds like you have it all sorted out though. glad to hear that. I will bring you a ring compressor sometime. The guy that is helping out ours together has 8 of them.

i had to put the truck on the backburder this weekend to do some remodeling of our house. The 60's wallpaper wasn't really doing it for me. I also have to get ready for a trip to Famoso dragstrip on tuesday. I did talk to my dad and crane shipped the pushrods on friday after a bit of a mixup. Somewho the order sheet they got was for 5/16" pushrods and they called to say that they would take several weeks to deliver them because they were a special order. Got they all straightened out now and have 3/8" pushrods on the way. He was going to install the ladder bars for the last time and put the box back on for the last time. He was also going to work on the battery boxes and the fuel cell. Leaves us with the tranny, carpet and finish the valve train. Hopefully running and tuned by april 1st.

 

A ring compressor would be great lol...Its funny because i have halped a few friends build engines and even though it is the first engine they have put together they have a ring compressor.. I still dont have one..

Have a photo of the 60's wall paper? Im looking for something to do the rear package tray of the dodge in..Figure paper is lighter than carpet which is important in a 3800 pound car

All i can say is i hope your first road test is alot better than mine was. I found a couple other problems with the car thanks to the drive over to my friends shop. My timing was about 8-9 degrees retarded (great for power) and the front tires were rubbing on the tie rod ends.. so ill have to swap over to either a narrower front wheel or to the slot mags i have and see if they will clear or not. I could feel something rubbing on the ride over here but it wasnt until yesterday when i was dropping the trans out that i noticed the rub marks on the sidewalls.

It was pretty funny...As soon as my friend and i confirmed the 454 was seized up he mentioned to me that he had his 472? 476? BBF and i asked him at the same time if he knew where any Ford front sub frames were at... Maybe after 1-2 more 454's get eaten up ill look at throwing a ford drivetrain in it.


What kind of HP and TQ does your engine builder think your BBF will put out NA and with some spray?