brianPA

Parts ordered and starting disassembly. I'll start a new thread when I make some progress.

Thanks for all the help everybody.

gdh

What is your intended use for the vette? If mainly street how much time are you spending at 7200 rpm anyway. Match your components to your intended use. My last engine was built with running 1/4's in mind, it was fun but power didn't really come on until after 4700 rpm and built steadily to well over 7200 rpm. My new engine I wanted something oriented to fun cruising. I got a great deal on the new ZZ383. Both are 383's, both are fun. For track use my old engine would outperform the new one but I much prefer the new one for cruising.

63mako

The operating range for his cam is 1300 to 5500 RPM??? His L48 bottom end is probably good to 6000 redline max.

bluedawg

You know you here that alot, how much time you spend a max rpm, truth be known not as much as lower rpms, but in my case it's not how much time it's how often you hit max rpm and if you or the op are anything like my self it's every chance you get. I'm only reving to 6500 rpm and it never gets old. The trick is to plan and build the combo and when I say combo I mean engine gears and stall so that low rpm doesn't suffer and you loose streetability, this means matching the cam, intake and heads and then matching the camshaft to the stall converter and gears. Your right for sure about intended use but even with a well built street engine, once you get the rpm bug you just can't shake it, at least I can't.

gdh

Well said bluedawg. i even swapped the 3.70's out for a 3.36 that I was given for free. It is in excellent condition, just sitting in his garage taking up room. He had planned on putting it in a past project that didn't materialize. I put the 3.70 in storage after I put about 100 miles or so with the new engine just for me to get as close a comparison of the 2 engines as possible. We did a 200 mile cruise yesterday, filled up in the morning and re-filled in the evening at the same pump in town. Plenty of construction delays but yielded 18.3 mpg. I didn't change anything on the carb just bolted back on from my previous engine again just trying to get an apples to apples comparison. Anyway with 400 miles on the new engine I am glad that I went this route. My original block has 1 rebuild left in it so decided to put it in the crate and store it incase this vette ever gets sold and the original block, heads, intake, manifolds etc can go with it.i had DART IE 200's on it that were ported - great heads made a crap load of power.
I had seriously looked at doing an Ls or 427 swap but in the end I opted for this engine because I wanted to maintain the look of original look of the engine bay although I intentionally left the block black as I'm not trying to fool anyone and actually like it better than Chevy orange. I got a great deal on the new engine (less than most dealerships pay for it). I wanted a completely new engine and didn't want to go through the planning to build from scratch. Up here in Canada we often have to wait on parts arriving from the US and lots of fees charged by courier cos. unless we go to the border and pick them up ourselves. 2 examples of frustration I had dealt with a new flywheel. Since I'm using my Muncie 4 sp I needed a new fw. Speedshop had 1 in stock, billet steel great price free shipping from Calgary and no provincial sales tax (5%). It arrived the day we pulled the old engine, I looked at it and got that sinking feeling as. I didn't see an external wt for balancing. Mooser thought that maybe it was already incorporated onto its build. He went to bolt it on the new engine and nope, same bolt pattern as my sbc1 fw. I called the co complementing the workmanship of the new flywheel but pointed out that it was the wrong one. I needed the 153 tooth sbc2 as outlined in my multiple emails. Well now we're stopped, but gave me a chance to clean everything up and paint the engine bay. Speed shop couldn't find one from any of their suppliers (1st week of July and had both Canada Day and Independence Day going on). They got a price from GM which was more than I got from my local dealership. Next GMPP states that they have 2 fw for this engine with the lighter nodular steel unit able to accept both a 10.5" clutch or 11" clutch. I ordered both as I had an 11" CF dual friction. 1 week later both arrive at the dealership, I bring my old clutch and the GM documentation is wrong, both accept 10.5" only. I needed a new clutch disk and to get the plate machined anyway so for an extra few $$ I bought a new 10.5" CF. The dealership notified GMPP that their online documentation is wrong. There were a couple of other quirks but nothing major in doing the swap. I also liked the 2 yr warranty.
It is a fairly tame cam and even with the GM single plane it has plenty of low end grunt. So for my intended purposes this engine meets and exceeds my expectations, if I ever decided to run 1/4's again in this vette a cam change would be in order as would a few other components. I'm adding a f body serp system next spring and Vintage Air. Will be doing some long distance fun cruises starting fall 2015 with a trip through the Appalachians to drive TOTD and others.

Dega500

I know it's too late but I had remembered seeing this somewhere and just now found it!

https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...ver-fired.html

Good luck with your build Brian!

63mako

Close by too.

M Pete

Brian, thanks for this thread. I will be following your work closely as I have a '80 Vette waiting for me when i get back to the states next summer. I'm looking to do the same thing with maximizing power or original engine. I especially like that you posted links to where you are purchasing the parts. Not new to cars...but new to these old-school engines. I've actually never touched a carburetor before! Should be fun.

Pete

brianPA

DAMN I wish I'd seen that first! It's only a little over an hour from here.

I have been out of town for most of the past month so I haven't had much time to work on mine, but I currently have one head off. When I get back into the country I'll be right back to working on it. I've spent a lot of time on trains this week and the only reading material I brought was a David Vizard book so between the book and this project I've learned a hell of a lot about engines in the past month.




By the way, is the one blackened intake valve cause for concern?