Refresh on a 302: Any Advice or build secrets?

[Dangerous Doug]

First, a mere matter of social grace: If you preface something with, "I don't mean to insult you..." chances are what you are saying is, indeed, insulting.

And as for "my" idea of honing in the car as being "laughable", it wasn't my idea. Actually, the idea came from a seasoned mechanic friend of mine who used to drive GT-40's "back in the day", raced for Porsche, and is a personal friend of (Sir) Sterling Moss. He's a sharp guy and had done the in-car bottle brush hone to several vehicles, including his Mustang (he tells me it was a Ford mule given to him by Henry Ford Jr.?) that has never gone through a complete rebuild---and he still drives it.

As for why I am even thinking about putting new rings on? I think I'm burning some oil, but I'm not certain. I see some occasional light puffs of white smoke on start up, and I was planning on replacing my heads and resealing the oil pan (if I need to...) anyway, so while I had those off...

Why replace rod bearings? Well, they are cheap and while you have the rods off, why wouldn't you? Seems a better practice to replace bearings than put the old ones back on, but truly, I don't know what the "standard" practice would be (anyone care to comment about that?).

Blykins and Era_Chas: You've stated your opinions on how it should be done. I've read it so I understand your position. You really don't need to repeat it. I think you are right. The BEST way to do something like this is to pull the engine out of the car. However, that doesn't mean that it cannot be done in the car, perhaps with quite a bit more time crawling around on concrete, but could be done. Furthermore, I said I was thinking about doing this, not that I am. At any point in my assessment I can think, "Jeez, this is more technical than I have time for..." and then go buy a block from Summit Racing for $689.00 plus $100 shipping, cam bearings included, and find a good 347 stroker kit with H-beam rods and build it at my leisure. I would even need MORE advice doing that.

Life gets unexpectedly busy. I do know how quickly life can spin out of control and projects get sidelined. After getting my young son through two years of chemotherapy, me going in to kidney failure and getting a life-saving kidney transplant (one year ago this Wednesday) and working with a team of Stanford doctors and doing research on "intracranial hypertension" because the pressure inside my cranium is at the 98th percentile on the high side causing severe, debilitating headaches up to three times weekly, not to mention my extremely analytically intense job... Well, tinkering with a 302 to solve a few real or imagined problems sounds like fun. I am, though, a busy man.

So, I started this thread to see if some of the engine-building veterans could shed some light on the mechanics of engine building. It's not all common sense, and I know there is a wealth of knowledge here on Club Cobra. However, I may decide it's much more than I want to get into right now. I find it fun to discuss the process on this forum as long as the thread doesn't deteriorate into exchanging insults or jousting peacocks, each trying to prove they have the best set of tail feathers.

So, instead of "I don't mean to insult you...", perhaps we can try something like, "That's an interesting idea. I've always done it this way:"

I'm pretty sure it's called mutual respect.

Sigh...
DD