Smogger 440 build (piston height)

[court9155]

For those curious (as I have always been) I had read the stories about how far down in the hole from deck some smogger 440 pistons are. Here is some picture proof. Good news piston and bore look so nice, bad news is piston is .131 in the hole. WOWSA. I have NEVER torn apart ANY engine other than a 3 cylinder GEO METRO that had the pistons this far in the hole. Too bad Im not gonna put a turbo on it. Could be neat with a balance job and some good rod bolts and boost...I digress...

This was a beautiful running 1978 440 with 48,000 miles on it out of a motor home. This is NOT a 440-3 engine. It is just a standard TRUCK 1978 440. I tore it apart out of curiousity and to install a non steel shim headgasket and ARP head bolts along with some decent valve springs (to support a VERY mild camshaft) I am also curoius about the exhaust valve rotator and what will have to be done to put decent springs and retainers on the exhaust side. The seats and guides look beautiful. This is a tapered spark plug (autolite 24s) cylinder head..... I will be adding a small shot (100-125) of nitrous. I am also going to re ring and bearing it and put the new timing set and oil pump I have on hand in it. I have heard the steel shim headgaskets dont hold up well to nitrous, but I am sure the stock piston would **** the bed first. Guess Ill find out.

This is a very budget build.

The motor was purchased for $400


This is a "for the time being" motor until I can build a nice stroked big block and to see how it will live with small nitrous.

Oh yea and I have a 5 year old son to do burnouts for too!!!

To be continued:

 

[Garys1969RR]

Hi 9155, I just tore down a 77-440 think it was a truck engine. The pistons were about .100" in the hole, plus theres a big dish in them to further drop compression! So I am going to use some flat tops from a 71 440 engine. And with a .020 " gasket, and 915 heads, I should get some decent compression and power. Going to compare piston weights from the 2 engines to assure proper balance. Also instead of numbers on the connecting rods big ends, there were various symbols. Like Hearts, Clubs, Spades and Diamonds! No kidding! And yes I am playing with a full deck, LOL. Was yours like that?

 

[court9155]

Hi 9155, I just tore down a 77-440 think it was a truck engine. The pistons were about .100" in the hole, plus theres a big dish in them to further drop compression! So I am going to use some flat tops from a 71 440 engine. And with a .020 " gasket, and 915 heads, I should get some decent compression and power. Going to compare piston weights from the 2 engines to assure proper balance. Also instead of numbers on the connecting rods big ends, there were various symbols. Like Hearts, Clubs, Spades and Diamonds! No kidding! And yes I am playing with a full deck, LOL. Was yours like that?

Hmmmm I havent got that far and thats is weird that yours had a DISH on top of the the **** head height on them...got any pics?

Im not gonna bother with trying to get quench because it will never happen with the slugs this far down in the hole and I am going to give up on compression because that too will never happen, not on a budget which I am only on with THIS motor because my ultimate build will be as nice as my car is.....but money dont grow on trees and Im tired of pushing the damn thing around.

Besides, I got all the quench and compression I need in this blue bottle

As far as the marking on the rods or main caps, I havent taken the oil pan off but I will be in the morning. My oil drain pan was full and I didnt feel like emptying it this evening after wrestling the heads and intake off this motor. Heads (452 with rotators on exhaust side) look PHENOMENAL!!

I am sure the markings are either to identify **** tolerances where they had to under or oversize bearings OR it could be to ID matching caps to their perspective rod or main bores.

I will be gapping the rings a lil for the nitrous and probably gonna run a ductile ring but with no moly....not sure yet. I dont think small nitrous will hurt the moly much and I will barely use the nitrous so.....

Dan

 

[Garys1969RR]

Yea let me know what you find out far as rod I D goes. Yes nitrous is the way to go with a low compression engine. I dont have any pics, but if you send me your cell number I can text some to you next week.

 

[court9155]

Yea let me know what you find out far as rod I D goes. Yes nitrous is the way to go with a low compression engine. I dont have any pics, but if you send me your cell number I can text some to you next week.

Ahhh no need to text em to me. I would look for stampings that show oversize or a part number on the bottom of them. Especially with weird rod bearing markings on them. I bet you got a jasper motor or maybe a marine motor that has non standard mopar **** in it. I know I pulled apart a 67 383 last year and it was a jasper motor with badger pistons etc etc.....pile of ****, but it ran. I ditched it because i had 3 383s at the time. Now I only have one and thats a 69 330 horse motor but I havent had time to disect it so this 440 is what Im going with. Cant argue with a 3.75 stroke to be honest....

Dan

 

[court9155]

Pulled the motor apart further. No pics yet. Gettin ready to go to the mopar drags at sacramento raceway tomorrow. More pics to follow. I did see what looks like a double row timing chain and gear set and the engine appears to have never been apart but who is to say someone didnt add that down the road as part of maintenance. I will document it regardless.

Dan

 

[Garys1969RR]

Ya know Dan, what was a pleasant surprise was a windage tray in the motor, and also had a double row timing chain like yours. Did yours have a windage tray?

 

[Hemirunner]

Find some 6.86 hemi rods or cheap H-beams and take the pin bore out to 1.094 from 1.031 and that'll get you .100

 

[Garys1969RR]

Thats a good idea! Just use longer rods. What are the max positive deck heights you could put in a 440? I noticed the most you can get with a stock type flat head is .010 in the hole. But didn't the 440 6-pak have a positive deck height? And are those pistons available with the taller compression height? Thanks

 

[RustyRatRod]

Put some turbos on it.

 

[Hemirunner]

Thats a good idea! Just use longer rods. What are the max positive deck heights you could put in a 440? I noticed the most you can get with a stock type flat head is .010 in the hole. But didn't the 440 6-pak have a positive deck height? And are those pistons available with the taller compression height? Thanks

Re-use the ones you have and you'll only be .030 in the hole with the longer rod. Deck the block if you want to get rid of that last .030 while you have it apart. I believe it was the 340-6 's that had a positive deck height.

 

[court9155]

I dont want to clutter under the hood of my 66 with turbo setup, tho for power that is the way to go, hands down. My lil 331 sbf single turbo drag car was an animal.

Anyway I am picking up another 440 tomorrow, a 1970 because it is stupid cheap. Im gonna pull the 906s off of it and see what kind of shape the bore is in. If the bore is shot to **** then I will stick one piston and rod out of the 1970 motor into the 1977 motor and mock it up to check deck height to piston height and see what I have.

Then I guess my second question is........what work would be required to the 1977 block to get the 440 rotator into it (forged crank, and I believe 2.067 ch pistons right?) I have been told there is crank thrust differences. How does this correlate from block to block???


And yea, I am being cheap but there are plenty of reasons for this other than dollar$.

Dan

 

[Hemirunner]

Anyway I am picking up another 440 tomorrow, a 1970 because it is stupid cheap. Im gonna pull the 906s off of it and see what kind of shape the bore is in. If the bore is shot to **** then I will stick one piston and rod out of the 1970 motor into the 1977 motor and mock it up to check deck height to piston height and see what I have.

You'll have the same .130 in the hole situation you have now....

Then I guess my second question is........what work would be required to the 1977 block to get the 440 rotator into it (forged crank, and I believe 2.067 ch pistons right?) I have been told there is crank thrust differences. How does this correlate from block to block???

Dan

The early thrust bearing flange is smaller in diameter than the later model version. You can run a small/early thrust bearing in a later/larger block and crank, but not the converse.

 

[Supershafts]

I dont want to clutter under the hood of my 66 with turbo setup,

So install it as the muffler just need a small pump and own oil reservoir next to it and there is no clutter under the hood, don't go over 6 lbs and you don't need to cool it

 

[court9155]

So install it as the muffler just need a small pump and own oil reservoir next to it and there is no clutter under the hood, don't go over 6 lbs and you don't need to cool it

Ive seen several turbo setups in several different locations. The remote mounts have too many issues for my taste and lets be honest, how fast and safe is a 4,000lb brick? I just want a little noise and turbo cars dont cut up and arent noisy. But power is everywhere in one of those.

 

[court9155]

You'll have the same .130 in the hole situation you have now....

The early thrust bearing flange is smaller in diameter than the later model version. You can run a small/early thrust bearing in a later/larger block and crank, but not the converse.

Please educate me here. I thought that the reason these pistons are so far in the hole is because of the compression height of the 77 pistons versus the earlier motors???

Thanks for the education with regards to the thrust issue.

Dan

 

[Garys1969RR]

Yea 9155 I am going to do the same thing you are doing. That is-put the forged crank and pistons from a 71 440 into a 77 block. I also thought the early piston C/H would help raise the C/R in the 77 block. have already put a 77 piston next to a 71, and the compression height is noticeably higher on the early piston. Get a piston to deck clearance of .020", use a .020 thick head gasket with closed chamber heads, then you have good squish/quench of .040 along with 10 to 1 C/R or better. Should make a great running street engine that would be pump gas friendly, as well as fairly inexpensive to build. And porting to increase air flow will help immensely. Keep us posted as to what you find out, and I will do the same.

 

[Garys1969RR]

Just ran those numbers thru the KB compression ratio calculator and came up with 11.16 to 1 C/R. Thats with a stock bore size 440, flat top pistons, and 79cc chambers. Just right for a mile above sea level but may be a bit much for below 2000 feet MSL.

 

[Meep-Meep]

I recently built my 77 440 in my 66 Belvedere and there is one thing you guys are missing. Court, do you see that huge bore chamfer? That is costing us compression. My 440 has the KB 237's, steel shim gaskets and 915 heads. And all that adds up to 10.1:1 compression when I CC'd it.

I have a couple of sets of hemi rods and often wondered the same thing, but you would have to rebalance the engine to use them. I pulled one set out of a running engine and if you want them give me $100.00.

6 BBL pistons are 2.065" compression height, which is what the KB 237's are. My setup ended up at .015" in the hole. Here is what your engine should look like.

 

[Garys1969RR]

Is this the motor that runs 12s in the 1/4 mile with a factory iron intake, AFB carb, and a .484 cam? Yea the KB site says those valve reliefs increase total volume of combustion area by 5 cc.