Project "Snotty 289" update (long)

[jdean]

Session 2

Tuesday morning I woke up at 4:30 am and could not go back to sleep. So what does one think of at that hour......of course the second thing is wrenching on a some type of Ford V8.

I went out and unbolted the headers, loosened all the head bolts. Crap the alternator mount is attached to the left head. I did not want to fool with that right now, but I took it loose. In Jim's car the whole alternator mount set up is complicated......but I got it unattached.

Pulled the pushrods out, then put on gloves and pulled each head off and layed on newspaper on the garage floor. The combustion chambers were all dark and sooty......been running too rich. Spark plug ceramic was kinda dark, which is hard to get with an MSD box even when running rich. Spark plug gaps were way on the wide side too.

Sign of pending doom

Since Jim complained of noise from the back drivers side bank, I started at the back cylinder and pulled the lifters out. First exhaust and intake pulled out easy. Second intake pulled out easy. Second exhaust would not come out more than 1/4" and then stuck. Uh oh. I put a small rag on the end of the lifter for grip, and to protect it, and pulled on it with a pair of channel locks. Out it comes, sporting a caved in bottom.

Yep, cam lobe failure in the making. Ticking noise explained. With no more than 2-3,000 miles on this car, there is no question that this cam never got past breaking in. Folks see this a lot nowadays. Good news is we caught it just before lots of metal slivers crunched off the lobe and the lifter.

Future upgrades:

1 - Edelbrock Performer RPM heads. Yes I know AFRs are great too., but within this small cubic inch SBF product offering, the AFRs cost 20% more but only flow 1-2% more, and if memory serves correctly the AFRs don't flow as much at mid-lift as the comparable Edelbrocks in this class of head.

2 - Meaner Comp hydro roller cam and lifters. No more threat of wiped out lobes.

3- RPM Air Gap intake. Hope it clears the hood. Will mock up on Saturday.

4- Get that carb tuned! no more running rich.

We will also put in an exhaust bung so we can use the LM-1 Innovative wide band meter to make sure the AFR is spot on after carb tuning.

I put this info into CamQuest.....and it spit out 450 horses. I seriously doubt this but if we get close to between 375-400 fwhp we will have created a little monster in that light FIA Cobra.