Guys/Gals
Thought that I would show you what Jim and Cody LaRoy of LaRoy Racing Engines found wrong with my 528" Hemi now 533" Hemi, see the following
There were quite a few issues that the engine assembler overlooked or cut corners.
1. The exhaust rocker shaft bar was mounted upside down making a gusher of oil squirting like a cut juggler vein being that the rocker arm was not covering that “banana” oil groove. This is only one of the reasons for reduced oil pressure.
2. The spring spacer separators on rocker shaft bar started wearing a groove into the rocker bar hold-down block. We are going to eliminate the springs and put in a machined spacers to eliminate this problem. See third picture as Jim just was messing around with a bunch of spacers but we will have perhaps one or two solid spacers with maybe a few thin spacers for finite shimming.
3. All 8 exhaust pushrods were rubbing on the side of the block. So “the fix” was to put in narrower pushrods on the exhaust side only. It did not work, but they still forced it in to work – no wonder you had a hard time setting the valve lash. Solution is to grind the block for proper clearance – not a big deal. In essence, the 8 intake pushrods are larger diameter than the 8 exhaust pushrods.
4. All 8 pistons are scored badly and need to be replaced. Why, because they cut corners and did not hone cylinder bores with a “torque plate”.
5. All 8 connecting rods need to be replaced and the crankshaft needs to be machined on the rod throws in the fillet area to stop galling into the edge of the rod bearing. The new rods will have the proper “big end” width for additional oil pressure control. The clearance was only 0.038” which is too wide which promoted to more oil spillage internally. Plus the big end of the rod was NOT concentric which also added to more oil spillage or lack of oil pressure control. Another corner that was cut by not checking or resizing the rod.
6. One of the cylinder head bolt holes was stripped (lifter valley area) and will need to be heli-coiled. Another cut corner.
7. This cylinder liner will probably need to be replaced. Not sure yet, Jim is bringing the block today to Idaho Falls at Performance Automotive Machine and to see how much boring will be needed. Indy has told us that not bore larger than 0.030. This is again due to the lack of Torque Plate honing.
8. Block Mains – it appears that the mains were not completely finished machining. Jim is going to check with the machine shop to investigate this which may need to machine down the caps and do a finish honing on main bore. They will gun drill the 2 camshaft oiling bores while there too.
9. Another cut corner – lack of assembly cleanliness. Dirt in the main bearings and rod bearings too for that matter.
10. Camshaft was starting to go south - #7 cylinder lobe was starting to gall. Replacing the camshaft anyway – not a big deal. No pictures.
Jim thinks that Aldon Miller (machine shop) owner can fix the crankshaft on the fillets on the rods being that Aldon is a crankshaft specialist. Waiting for Aldon to tell me what size pistons to buy and go from there. Anyway we know why this engine had oiling problems and have solutions for all of that. This is why the guy back east is not selling motors now (as far as I know) because of his short cuts and sending stuff out the door to cut a “quick” buck. That kind of attitude will get you in trouble all the time. Later, Aldon fixed or machined the crankshaft on the fillets without having to undersize the mains or connecting rod throws. Had to bore the cylinders to 0.020 overbore to clean up the cylinders. No cylinder linings needed.
11. Forgot to mention. 2 of the exhaust valves were leaking badly with one bent valve – so essentially 2 of the cylinders had no compression. To me that is probably at least 100 Horsepower. Deck heights were pretty close stock as expected. Now with all this fixed properly, can you imagine how this thing is going to run?
Replaced all pistons, rods, better rocker arm assemblies from T&D, pushrods. Send some updated pictures tomorrow
aboard!
