Got a 454 at Cruisin the Coast. Seller said it has all the best parts in it and it should make over 550hp.

Dynoed it a couple months ago with no problem made 480hp at the crank (no where near 550hp). No over heating or other problems.

Put it in my 76 a couple weeks ago. Cranked last night idled fine ran it a couple minutes then shut it off to check for oil leaks around new mechanical oil pressure Gage. Everything ok.

Checked oil level today and found water in the oil, milky. A very small amount of oil in water.

Pulled intake., no signs of leaking gasket.

Pulled plugs on drivers side, all are dry. Pulling head tonight. Will pull other head tomorrow.

What's most likely cause? Anybody taking bets?

Leaking head gasket
Maybe leaking around intake bolts or head bolts
I pray it's not a cracked block

What else do I need to check?

Roger

 

Check your cylinders for cracks. Note the tops of your pistons, checking for small amounts of water. Turn the engine over by hand and look for trace amounts of water at the top of each cylinder, where the rings top out. If you find any water there, you have a suspected crack in either the cylinder, head or intake, but it still could be a head or intake gasket. In times gone by, while motor was still in the car, I would fill the radiator with water and pressure up the cooling system with a cooling system pump. After keeping the system pressured up for a couple of hours, I would roll the motor with a wrench with the spark plugs out. If water came out of the spark plug hole you know you found where to look.

 

Looks like the drivers side head gasket has 3 places where water was leaking into the lifter valley.







There was water in 3 of the 4 cylinders but when I took the head off water went all over. I cleaned them out so they are totally dry the sprayed the cylinder walls and all surfaces with WD40. It's been raining here all day and will rain more tonight and tomorrow. Any exposed metal surfaces, even in a garage will rust with 100% humidity. Tomorrow I will wipe away the WD40 and turn the engine over by hand and look for water on top of the pistons.

Thanks,

Roger

 

Update-water in oil is back. After changing head gaskets and intake gasket I drove the car a couple of times, maybe 1 mile per trip, now the oil is milky and my radiator is low.

I bought the engine from Charlie Lyons (Charlie's Classic Cars) at Crusin the Coast in 2010. The motor was supposed to be top notch with all the best parts and make over 550hp. All a big disappointment. Motor only made 480hp, Charlie could not get the me the specs for the engine as promised, then when I took the heads off to change the gaskets I found 2 different pistons. 5 pistons were GM brand, and 3 were TRW.

Anybody ever seen a motor with different pistons? I've never heard of that before.

Roger

 

A few months back somebody posted a thread about a motor with pistons that had been installed backwards; i.e. intake (large) valve reliefs on the exhaust side of the cylinder and vice versa. Luckily for him there was no valve-to-piston interference and it seemed to run OK as I recall. What you have is definitely more ridiculous than that and it's a minor miracle that your motor made as much power as it did without blowing up on the dyno. Realisically, you're likely not gonna get to the bottom of the oil-in-water issue until you tear that thing down and get the block and heads magged to verify that the leak isn't coming from a cracked cylinder wall or other such defect. Sorry to hear that you got a raw deal, but you may be able to salvage quite a few decent parts from what you've already got and put something together that really DOES make the originally-advertised HP once you get to the bottom of the problem.

 

The pistons being different isn't your problem. The reason why they're different very well could be.

 

If the motor is still together borrow a radiator pressure tester, it might help locate your leak...BTW, did you put sealant on your head bolts?

 

different pistons could be from a slap together spare parts motor or the 3 pistons were hurt and replaced.
Rotating assembly would have to be rebalanced before re assembly, machine work etc. U have to think of what kind of person would go thru the trouble of a build, only to use old/different mismatched parts-not good.
Could be the deck surface is not true anymore if it were not machined after detonation and that "could" contribute to your water issue.
I got burned on a used motor, thing was junk-got my money back though cause I used VISA thank God.

 

Just a thought as I'm wondering if you changed the oil along with the gaskets since you didn't mention it.

 

Jud,

Yep, I changed the oil and filter. With the intake and heads off I flushed the engine with a couple quarts of oil through the engine and had the oil very clean.

Thanks

Roger

 

Using sealant on head bolts is an important step on a BB. If you pull the heads and find you have the same problem in the same place, you could have a deck that's not flat or a head that's not flat. Another thought is if you're using stacked steel head gaskets, you might want to consider something like the FelPro Blue "perma torque" style...

 

To me the water in oil or vice versa, is a moot point. I couldn't button it up and run it knowing of that mis-matched piston brand situation. Also, I've never read that TRW made GM's pistons.

 

Tekvette - i spoke with the guy I bought the engine from and he will pay for parts to fix what's leaking. I asked for my money back but he wouldn't do it, said it had been too long since I bought it. I do feel taken advantage of getting a pieced together motor. My fault for not getting anything in writing, and for not buying from a well known builder.

Redvette- I used sealer on all the bolts and used Felpro permatex gaskets. Used new head bolts. Torques head bolts in correct sequence using three torque steps.

Damoroso-the shop doing the work is gonna pressure test thev cooling system. They are also going to run a compression check.

69 Chevy-don't worry I'm gonna get it fixed right. The motor is still together. I'm gonna pull it out of the car and take it to a local engine builder. He's gonna take it down and find the problem. I need a third party, reputable engine builder to determine the problem so the seller will pay for the replacement parts. Next I'll pay to have the block, crank, rods, etc inspected and see what can be reused. I'll definitely go with new pistons, oil pump, timing chain and gears. Will also change heads and cam. Looking to make 600hp and still be street friendly. I want to run it at the drag strip occasionally.

Thanks for the input. I grew up working at my dads mechanic shop (30 years ago) but mostly foreign cars and motorcycles. I never heard of mixing pistons.

Here are the piston numbers
GM 3963550
TRW L2349

 

Did you ask the guy you bought it from WHY he put in 2 different brands of pistons? It certainly couldn't have been a performance tip of the month on the inside cover of SuperChevy mag.

 

69Chevy

Yeah I asked him. The answer made me sick.

He said They put in slightly oversized pistons in the cylinders that had some wear instead of boring them. Said they do it all the time.

I wish he would have told me that before I bought it.

Roger

 

Ouch! This must be the grand daddy of all Bubba's.
Terry

 

slightly oversized??? i thought pistons come in standard, .010, .020, etc.. and then you bore and hone to get the clearance? they do that ''all the time'' and then sell it as a 550 HP motor? are there any sleeves in that motor?

 

Joewill,

No sleeves that I could tell. I have never seen a block with sleeves. Is it easy to see the top of the sleeve?

As cheap as Bubba was to only change three pistions, the cost of a sleeve and time needed to put it in probably removed it as an option.

Plan to pull the engine this week. Before I pull it I will run a compression check and see what it looks like. I'll post the results.

Thanks,

Roger

Roger

 

A sleeve is generally not that easy to see since its surfaces are machined level with the surrounding block (deck and cylinder) surfaces. I once had one installed in a small block Ford; I think it was a $50.00 job about 20 years ago, and that motor had the same problem that you're describing in this thread-water in the oil. Basically, the old cylinder is machined away and a 'step' is also machined into it at the top and bottom surfaces for the sleeve to fit into, which is then chilled and dropped into place. When it warms back up it has what amounts to an interference fit that should not leak. IMHO it's not a job to be attempted by a less-than-competent machinist, such as somebody who installs mismatched pistons. As for Bubba being cheap, he may have had that block sitting around with a rust pit or other such damage in one cylinder wall and this was his way of saving the block...I HAVE heard (unconfirmed) stories of blocks with several sleeves in them, and as a point of comparison almost all aluminum-block racing engines have O-ringed steel sleeves in them.
You may be able to see the sleeve (if there is one) by looking very closely at the lower parts of the cylinder walls; and if that's where the water is leaking there may be some evidence of it there, but if not having the block magged would show a discontinuity where the joint is. I spent years as a machined parts inspector and it wasn't easy for me to pick up.
You didn't mention how much $$$ was exchanged for the engine but this might well be a case of "If it sounds too good to be true..."
The reality of building an engine with lots of horsepower is that it can be done with the cheapest bottom-end parts available; if you have the right cam, head porting, and ignition and carburetor tuning you can easily make the desired horsepower but the real money has to be spent on the bottom end (good forged pistons, quality rods/ bolts, steel crank and proper block machining) or it won't likely hold together for very long. While 550 hp isn't an astronomical figure for a big block Chevy you should absolutely tear the thing down and have everything inspected. Hopefully you won't wind up replacing the block but I suspect that's where this thing is headed-best of luck.

 

Thanks Birdsmith,

I spent $4500 for the motor. It didn't seem like a ton of money for what I was getting, the seller said it had forged pistons, 4-bolt main hi perf GM block, forged crank, 990 rect port heads, GM aluminum dual plane intake, solid roller cam, 850 holley carb, and made in excess of 550hp. Probably all too good to be true. Plus I picked it up that day. I was impatient and didn't want to wait to have one built buy some of the companies with good reputations, shame on me.

I plan to take the motor out this week. Was hoping tonight but work just scheduled me an out of town trip today so I won't get to work on it until Wednesday night.

Thanks,

Roger