use the true roller.. I am using the same one.. looks much better then stock..

Also to get the cam out.. you may have to unbolt the motor mounts and move the motor approx 1/2" up to get the cam out all the way.. I had to on my 89 the first time I did a cam install

 

Definitely go for the cloyes timing set. Very accurate with the LPE cam...should be right on the money. Also get yourself a Felpro one piece oil pan gasket. It sure beats the 4 piece job that GM cam up with. May want to get a new oil pump (inexpensive) and have the pick up welded in place. If ya really want to get adventurous, get yourself a nice baffle like the Milidon diamond something or other and maybe even a crank scraper. I'm sorry i didn't do this when i was in there.

Here's another suggestion (experiment): you might want to consider retarding the cam 2-4 degrees. Beach Bum did this with his 383, so maybe he can fill in here. It should give you a little more top end at the expense of some low end torque. The 219/SR provides lots of torque down low, so this might be a good trade-off. It will also make it a little easier to hook up at the track. I don't have any 350 examples to point to on this, so it would be a bit experimental.

 

Hey Ralph,
Nice to hear from you. You are always full of good advise! That is two for the cloyes set, so I will order that one. Thanks guys. Ralph, I appreciate your suggestion on the degreeing the cam a bit behind, but this is the first cam change or major mods I have EVER done and I am afraid I will not get it back together the standard way, let alone deviating and experimenting!! LOL :lol: I will hold off on that till the next time. :p: One other thing I am not sure of but I thought the 89's already have the one piece oil pan gasket? And how do you change the oil pump???? I have always had really good oil pressure and is this really a must? How much and what kind? Let me know the details that will be involved and yeah I probably should change it if you guys suggest it. See I am easy, that is what all the girls say too. :D But what I tell them is, "you see the big smile on my face, that why." Thanks guys and I look forward to hearing about the above. This is great stuff and just keeps costing more and more!!! :lol:

 

Oil pump is not necessary. Just thought if it had some mileage on it, you might as well change it while you're in there....if you're like me...you never want to have that oil pan off again. I actually started to pull it apart last year to add the windage tray, crank scraper and Main Studs. I had all the parts in hand, add just said fxxk it when i remembered what a pain it was to pull the pan....drain the oil & coolant, remove the starter (requiring the removal of the headers/exhaust), remove the oil cooler hoses, fight with the tranny lines, drop the pan (breaking the perfectly dry seal i have)...you get the picture!!!

Which reminds me, if you are using LPE headers, get yourself a mini starter. The LPE headers wrap around the starter like a cage...in fact the starter and passenger header have to go in together (can't do one without the other). Eventually the starter will get heat stroke and die. You can install/remove the mini starter with removing the headers and you can fit a heat shield between it and the headers. It is a bit of a pain bending the heat shield to fit initially, but once its in, you're cool. in addition you might want to wrap the headers near the starter to help things a bit. And it will save you some weight. the stock starter must weigh 20-30lbs and the minis come in 5-10lb range.

Have fun.





[Modified by ralph, 12:22 PM 12/4/2001]

 

Ralph,
Yikes with the oil pan. I will probably hold off on all extras for now because I am doing the work in my garage on jacks and it is not too condusive to work under the car. My father owns a car dealership with 4 car lifts. I probably should have just done the work out there, but did not want to tight up one of their lift for a month or two and have the car in their way. Everything you mentioned would be so much easier to work on out there, even if I have to go back in. I am a bit closterfobic (sp??) and I last night I got freaked out being under the car :eek: Its barely high enought for me to squeeze under laying flat on my back and the transmission pan is pressing on my chest! If one of those stands would give out, my head would probably pop right off and roll across the floor! Therefore, I try to limit my time under the car until I find somebody stupid enough to go under the car for me. Hey I just thought of an old buddy from college that just moved back to the area. I will have to give him a call. :lol: Anyways I will be going with the Hooker Headers. Will these pose the same problems? Thanks.

 

No experience with the Hookers. Doh, headers that is!!!!!!

 

Ralph,
I will be pulling the cam tonight. Is there anything to watch out for? Thanks.

 

yeah.....dont nick the bears. Make a handle outa a long threaded rod so you can handle it better. You may have to raise your engine. I didn't with the 85, but the cross member is higher in your car...might be in the way.

 

Ski you might want to reconsider the PCV elimination one of the advantages of a pcv is the scavanging of air in the crank case (the pistons pumping up and down creates pressure waves in the block and the PCV helps to eliminate it) The ZO6 has "windows" in the block webbing to help eleviate this. I think the best setup would be to plumb 2 breather lines from the valve covers into the collectors on the headers to "Scavange" these gasses out (just like the pro mod and bracket dragsters do. Just another Idea for ya. :cheers:

 

ASRoff,
Hey thank for the suggestion. I would not have thought of that. Thanks. I have the timing cover down off and am going to be replacing the stock chain and sprockets. Just out of for knowledge though, how much play should there be in the timing chain? Thanks all.

 

I'm not sure the idea of plumbing the valve covers to the exhaust will work. The drag cars that run this set up usually have open headers or have the oil line plumbed in just after the muffler. With a street car & full exhaust, you have a different setup which will create back pressure vs suction. I'd keep the pcv valve as is and put a breather on the other valve cover.

 

Ski-
I'm thinking of doing a very similair set up on my car. Only thing I may do different is the SR. Its the age ole MR vs. SR question for me. I like the simplicity of the MR, but don't like that I would lose so much low end torque so maybe SR.....

Did you buy your heads straight from AFR? Were they all set up with 1.6 roller rockers?

What type of power are you hoping to make with this set up? Thanks.

 

Black85,
I went through the same decisions as you with the SR vs MR. My conclusion was this: 1. The miniram will make you go fast at the track due to the higher top end. But you will loose some lower end as you are already aware. 2. The super ram will create gobs of torque and make street driving much more enjoyable (which is were the car will be used mostly), Yet will out perform most all other cars (in the same class) at the track. With all that being said I opted to go with the SR. I may change my mind after trying to install it, but I usually do not have the problems most complain about with cars. Perhaps its my great mechanical skills :rolleyes: Never the less that is why I chose the SR over the MR. I guess you have to ask yourself how much upper end you need, and how many times are you going 100 MPH?
The heads were bought through THunderbolt motorsports. But I mainly delt with AFR and no the 1.6 RR will not come with the heads. I was going to get some Crane Gold RR's Good luck and plan your stategy carefully. It is a lot of hard work and you don't want to screw something up. If I can help in any way just let me know. :cheers:

 

Hey all,
I have not reported my progress for a while, so I thought I would fill you all in. I have been waiting for some more parts to arrive mainly the AFR heads. Man it seems like it is taking forever. Hopefully they will arrive today. Well here is where I am at.
I have removed all the carbon buildup off the pistons, cleaned all gasket surfaces (boy was the timing cover gasket on there, that thing was harder than heck), removed the timing sprockets with no problem at all :D , got the cam out, but had to take one motor mount out and jack the engine up a tad so the cam would clear the brace. Basically I have everything ready for reassembly just waiting for the heads. Boy am I ever pumped up. I have two questions for ya:
1. I have a felpro gasket kit for the engine. The instructions suck for the head gasket. Is there a top or bottom to them? There is writing on the one side and nothing on the other side. Other than the writing there is no real noticable difference. The instuctions said to follow the marking on the gaskets or if no marking just install? I don't want to make a stupid mistake like that and have to take it all back apart. Just need some guidance. Thanks.
2. After cleaning the gasket surfaces and trying to keep everything as clean as possible I notices that when I turn the engine over there is a bit of residue/dirt left behine from the pistons. This seems to be dirt that fell down in there along the pistons. I am going to continue to wipe them out, but don't know if I will get it all. Is this something I should be overly concerned with or will it all just get blown out of there upon startup. Common sense says clean as much as possible out and the rest will be taken care of during the startup. I have vacuumed the hell out of it but still some remains. Perhaps you can shed some light on this for me. Thanks a million.
In addition if any of you have any tips for reinstallation of the parts please share them with me. Thanks. :cheers:

 

Use a shop vac to get whatever crud you can out of the cylinders. You can also rotate the assembly which will push the stuff back to the top. Lightly oil the cylinder walls when you're done with a clean cloth soaked in 30 weight. Orientation is marked on GM head gaskets - I don't know about FelPro, but make sure you got the ones compatible with the heads you're using (aluminum or iron). What is the condition of the deck - especially around the water and steam holes? If you've got galvanic corrosion (this was a problem on the '89 due to poor design of the production gasket) and since you've come this far, you may want to consider pulling the block and getting it surfaced.

 

Thanks for the advise SunCr. The deck for the heads was in tip top shape no buildup anywere. The inside of this engine was about as clean as can be. My father could not believe how it looked. Nothing at all is caked or varnished. Guess that is a pat on my back for changing the oil every 3K. I also should say that I used Castrol oil every time except the last were I switched to Mobil 1 synthetic. There are no marking on these gaskets. I told the guy at summit that it was for a corvette and he said this kits would work. I think I am going to call them and double check. Thanks for the advise. I did want to ask also what the larger holes are on the deck surface that appear to go down into the block. And I am not talking about the pistons either, before you start bashing me. And its not the holes that the bolts go in either. The gasket has much smaller holes in it than the block. What is the purpose of these holes. Thanks.

 

Ski, those are the coolant passages into the heads. The holes are big, but the gasket holes are small....that is normal, in fact many shops will plug the holes in the block for strength and then drill small holes in the plugs. As far as the head gasket, i ran into the same concerns...no markings whatsoever. Same on the GMPP gasket and the Victor. GM had no idea and Victor told me to put the side with the most steel showing toward the block. I really don't think it matters. Clean you cyls as best you can...whatever is let will blow out when you start it. However clean the heck outa the deck surface before you install the heads.

 

Ski, are you replacing your cam bearings? Some say to do it with the new cam. If you decide to, you'll need a special tool. Maybe you can borrow one from your dads shop or a friend.

I will be undertaking nearly the same project next year. LT4 hot cam or comparable, and port & polish my heads. So...I'm reading your ongoing saga with interest. Mine is a 92 LT1, so some things are considerably different, but the basics are still the same.

 

it is a good thing to change the cam bearing when you are doing a cam change but that is only done when you are doing a rebuild because you have to knock them out from the front and get them from the bottom but the last one you will have to knock out through the block on the back you knock out the plug and everything.
It would be a hard task to put new ones back in if you have the engine in the car because you have to line the oil hole in the mains with the oil holes in the cam bearing if you dont it will not oil right.

Hope everything is going ok

Jay

 

Guys,
Hey thanks for the answers. I checked the cam bearings really good and they look great. I still would like to change them, but think it would be nearly impossible to do in the car. Taking the engine out is, well not something I really want to do. I would imagine in the next 2 yrs or so it will be coming out to make it a 383 or better. Depends how I like this setup and how fast it is. Last night and today I spent cleaning the other area of the engine. The AFR heads never came last night, keeping my fingers crossed for tonight. Guess you could say I am 1/2 way with no problems. KNOCK on wood. Now it is reassembly time. Yippiii. :D
See you all later I have to do some work that I get paid for. :p: