haha :lol: :jester

 

Whenever I'VE started a fresh engine, I made sure that it NEVER idled until after the 20-30 minutes of cam break in time. I made sure they had fuel and that the timing was close. The oil system was also freshly primed. They've started on the first rotation of the starter. I immediately take them to 2000 rpm and keep a close eye on the temp and oil pressure. Prolonged cranking and initial low speed running can do irrepairable damage to the cam. After the half hour varing between 1800 and 2200, I shut it down and change the oil and filter. Once cooled, I restart and check the timing and valve adjustment. A few miles of shake down and any necessary further adjustments, and it's oil and filter time again. THEN, I start to drive it, paying very close attention to EVERYTHING. After that, the 500 mile and 1000 mile oil & filter changes. I may be a little fanatical, but I haven't lost one yet. By the way, the cam break in isn't necessary with a roller cam and lifters. I'm jealous. I can't wait until I can afford to build the next one. Good luck and have fun.

 

This is just a top end kit and cam install , not a short block rebuild.

Also, this is a hydralic roller cam, it doesn't need the cam break in period.
Jesse, trust me, the car is fine.

The main reason to run a car for 20 minutes and change the oil is to let the rings seat properly. Jesse has not installed new rings or even taken apart the short block.

 

Vic,
Thanks for the clarification. I thought that to be the case. Last year I did not make ANY mistakes :rolleyes: ,and did not want to start this year off with a major one.
Still would like to see the other questions answered if possible. I am going to be going home to straighten things up and run it a little more. Hope someone can help out. Thanks in advance.

 

Vic,

Maybe I didn't make it clear that the proceedure I described was for CAMSHAFT and LIFTER break in. I KNOW that I said that camshaft break in isn't necessary with a roller cam and lifters.

Steady speed, no load, running is NOT the way to break in/seat piston rings. Varied speed with light throttle is the most effective way to seat the rings.

Certainly, my oil change regimen is totally unnecessary in a top end overhaul. Once, wouldn't be a bad idea. If only to purge assembly lube and any "trash" that may have found it's way into the opened engine.

 

Thanks guys,
How about the other questions..... :p:

Fuel Pressure...

Base Timing.....

Tuning chip......

Thanks in advance....

 

Guys,
At lunch todat I hooked my laptop up to the engine. Here is the first thing that I noticed. My O2 sensor is only fluctuating at ~87mV - 133mv. Is this due to the fact it is too far away from the engine and is not heated. Right now I have it welded into a short pipe that is angled downward to divert heat from the transmission boot. I also picked up some knock counts while revving the engine a bit. Not an worse than I got with the stock setup though. With the stock setup it seemed like when driving all knock counts dissappeared, I thought it was due to the load no load situation.
Tonight I might try to sneek it down the road. Provided it doesn't snow and the roads stay dry. The main reason is that I want to get some driving logs to start tuning with. All BLMs appeared to be right at 128???? I thought they would be all over the place. Seems pretty decent though. Let me know what I should watch for ect. Thanks a million guys. Hope the Coppers don't catch me :eek: Perhaps they will just think I am a loud snowflake!

Jesse

PS were is Ralph at? Here are some other pics of the finished engine...






















How many times do I have to edit these GDing pics to get them to work????
[Modified by ski_dwn_it, 2:05 PM 1/22/2002]


[Modified by ski_dwn_it, 2:08 PM 1/22/2002]


[Modified by ski_dwn_it, 2:09 PM 1/22/2002]


[Modified by ski_dwn_it, 2:12 PM 1/22/2002]


[Modified by ski_dwn_it, 2:14 PM 1/22/2002]


[Modified by ski_dwn_it, 2:16 PM 1/22/2002]

 

Guys,
At lunch todat I hooked my laptop up to the engine. Here is the first thing that I noticed. My O2 sensor is only fluctuating at ~87mV - 133mv. Is this due to the fact it is too far away from the engine and is not heated. Right now I have it welded into a short pipe that is angled downward to divert heat from the transmission boot. I also picked up some knock counts while revving the engine a bit. Not an worse than I got with the stock setup though. With the stock setup it seemed like when driving all knock counts dissappeared, I thought it was due to the load no load situation.
Tonight I might try to sneek it down the road. Provided it doesn't snow and the roads stay dry. The main reason is that I want to get some driving logs to start tuning with. All BLMs appeared to be right at 128???? I thought they would be all over the place. Seems pretty decent though. Let me know what I should watch for ect. Thanks a million guys. Hope the Coppers don't catch me :eek:

Jesse

 

Well Guys,
Here is the rant for today/last night. I snuck the car out, roads dried up and thought it might be my only chance till spring. I noticed right away while sitting with the car in drive it was lunging forward at idle. Idle was at ~6-8 hundred. To back up a bit, when I went to install the TV cable, throttle cable, ect with the bracket furnished by Accell and the SR it did not even come close to matching the bolt holes drilled in the plenum. Therefore I installed my old bracket and it mounted right up. The only problem was the TV cable was bound very tight under the plenum when placed in the bracket hole. On my maden voyage last night I found the car to be VERY slugish and non-responsive. VERY DISAPPOINTING! I realize there is going to be tweaking issues. I contribute this to the TV cable being out of adjustment. I did make a mark on the TV cable before I removed the original setup. Would this mark be were the cable needs to be now? I finally saw no hope in getting the bind out with the original bracket so I got out Accells again and had to only mount 2 out of 3 bolts. This was after opening the holes up quite a bit. I would love to know how you guys with SR setups gots yours to mount up...I'm an engineer and I think there engineers were smoking dope when they designed that bracket....I'm totally fed up with there quality. Nevertheless, I finally got it were the TV cable was not bound. Adjustment is now possible. Getting back to the mark I put on the cable before...it is now inside the "outer cable"..the original placement must have been further out...now it is back and the cable mark is inside. Anyone with advise on this issue please help. One other thing...I tried pushing the button, and moving the inner cable all the way towards the back of the car. Then opening throttle wide open by hand and only heard 1 click. Is that were I should leave it and try it. I just don'y want to burn up my tranny...Thanks guys and sorry about my rant! Any info would be great....

here is a pic..



-jesse


[Modified by ski_dwn_it, 8:03 AM 1/23/2002]

 

Anyone have any idea how I can get this TV cable close? Also..What size exhaust should I have made for this setup. I was thinking about 2.5" true duels with an X pipe then into flowmasters. Let me hear your suggestions. I would like it to sound really good. Hopefully what I have planned will. You input is appreciated!
-jesse :cheers:

 

Kudos to you ski for having such a clean engine. That is show car quality! I'm impressed. :cool:

I was also very frustrated by the low quality Super Ram castings. Mine had a lot of thin spots. On top of that I found it very painful to install. So much so that I actually sold mine off. I kind of regret that now, especially since I just put in a 383. It is a great performing intake. It really takes patience to deal with it. I think you'll be very happy with it after you have your combination sorted out. I'm still sorting mine out and I already wish I had my old Super Ram. Actually I just wish the Mini Ram was emissions legal.

Good luck with your TV cable issue. Sorry this post isn't going to help with that.

[sarcasm] I just posted for the 100th time! Only 9,900 more posts and I'll get the avatar I've always wanted! [/sarcasm]

 

thanks all keep the suggestions coming...

 

I have TPIS headers with 3" Random bullet cats slipped on the end. From there, I had 2 1/2" pipes custom bent to connect to an LT1 Corsa Cat back system. I have heard that with and auto this is really hard to do. My car has one of the sweetest exhaust notes you ever heard. During cruise its nice and mild mannered, wide open and it just plain old screams. Kinda sounds like a V8 Harley with drag pipes.

How are you making out with the sluggish performance? Here are pics.





Jason


[Modified by 89vette, 7:18 AM 1/28/2002]

 

89vette,
Hey thanks for the pics. I will have to take some of mine once I get it up on a lift. Here are the problems I have now. This is going to be pretty long, but want to bring you all up to date.

1. Passengers side header is leaking a bit. I had a hell of a time getting the very last bolt closest to the firewall tightened down. Guess it still is loose.

2. Probably the biggest problem now is still the Throttle bracket. I mounted the accell one and had to drill out holes to get 2 out of the 3 bolts to line up. Now the bracket is too far forward and is out of adjustment before al the slack is taken up in the cable. I tested my theory by pulling out the excess and crimping a temporary stop on the cable. This took the extra slack out of the cable and shifting got much better, still not perfect like before. I called Jegs and they said to call Accell and they will send a new bracket. I have to wait till ~11:30am they are in California I think. Hopefully they will send me a new bracket and that will be taken care of.

3. I noticed a small oil leak on both the valve covers. I thought I would see if they worked loose and I tightened both of them some more. On the drivers side while tightening I heard a loud snap. Yep you guessed it! I freakin cracked the valve cover! Now I have to see if someone around here can weld it for me. That really has me POed.

4. I think that some of the rockers are making noise, so when I pull the valve covers I am going to start the engine and adjust them with the car running. Back them off till they make noise. Tighten them till no noise and then turn an additional 1/2 turn. Lock the polylock.

5. I think the heated o2 sensor is still too far back becuase I only get reading when the throttle is applied.

Well there you have it. Small problems that need ironed out. Oh yeah one other thing was I had a set of wires get eaten by the headers. All of a sudden after I picked up the car from the exhaust place the car ran like crap, major vibration from teh engine, ect. I thought now what the F. is going on. I got home and obviously that is the first things you check and it looked like the 4th of july under the hood! Had to drive ~75 miles to get some performance wires. All is well now.
Last night after my other two kids went back with the wicked witch of the east. I had an idea. Oh no! I burned the base ARAP bin file for an 89 vette and took it out to try it. Along with that I disabled the EGR and returned the fan temps to 87c and 82c. Left all timing as stock except the base timing I matched it to my 8 BTDC. (not real sure were I should have base timing set) any suggestions would be welcome. Or technique for finding it. Moving along. I started the car and idle was much better and so was throttle response. Knock counts were not as noticable, as was initial driving. I logged some easy driving and BLM were ~130 a tad bit lean but much better than before. As I drove the car a bit harder, the BLM went to 128 with is perfect. The O2 sensor was working fine while driving. At one point I took out and shifted manually and HOLY CRAP...major power and I know there is a whole lot more after the chip gets the right timing. It pulled very hard all the way to 5150 were I shifted. Where should redline be? Also the exhaust sounds VERY tough. Throaty and mellow at cruise. You can really hear the cam at idle. Its coming together and will take some time to get these items ironed out, but that is what it is all about. Any suggestions on the above many items please chime in. Thanks all.
-jesse

 

guys,
I'm impressed! Called accell and they are shipping the correct bracket UPS red! Wow I thought I would have to beg, plead, and pay for a new one. They said that has never happened before and appologized repeatedly. Even going ot call me back with a tracking number. Chalk one up for accell. thought you would like to hear that. Hopefully one problem down! Thanks guys. I think it was when I mentioned the Corvette Forum, they got scared! :eek: Just kidding.
Also I have a guy here at work that is great at welding aluminum. He said just to bring it in and he will hook me up with a fix. I will take it apart tonight.
Jesse

 

Jesse, just redo the valves with the same procedure. If you want to do it running, get an old set of vavle covers and cut out the center section where the polylocks are. Otherwise it will be a mess, not to mention the risk of fire. Sounds like you are well on your way and just need to do the fine tuning that never ends anyway.

 

Well Ralph,
guess you spoke too soon in regards to the old valve covers. I cracked one of the originals trying to get a leak to stop the other day. A guy at work here does aluminum welding and said to bring them in and he will fix the hairline crack I made. Well you may or may not know this..they are NOT alumimum. They are magnesium or something and now I remember reading that somewere. But anyhow he tried to weld them and burned a huge hole through one! :cry So now I must ask were can I get a new set? Or something better that will fit better. What a freaking treat that turns out to be. I saw that lingenfelter has some for ~300 bucks. Don't know if I want to spend that much for something that really isn't gonna make be go faster. That is 1/2 of a PI torque convertor. Let me know what you think.
Jesse Oh yeah how acurate is Craig moates software Hp calculator. Anyone with an answer it would be appreciated. thanks

 

I could of told you that. ;) They were Mg up to 93, then stampled aluminum. You should be able to get a "normal" set for $150 or so from Jegs or Summit.

 

Jesse

I think new Corvette valve covers cost about $70 each.

Vic

 

I just called summit they have billet specialties tall aluminum ones for around ~100 bucks. Do you all think these would be good ones? I figure I might as well get high ones to avoid having more clearance issues. You comments suggestions welcome. Thanks.