CRAP! I'm smoking!

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Sorry forgot to respond to ya AJ. I think I'm a pretty good tuner. Haven't had a cam in twenty years UNDER about 260 dur@.050. Usually get good results at the track for my combos.

No holes in my throttle blades and I'm not into the transfer slots. 78's front and rear with 4.5 powervalves. I have around 10 inches vacuum at idle(1200rpm). It SHOULD be right on......should be. I did change from 6.5 pv's to 4.5 for this new combo. Maybe oughtta go back to 6.5's.

Like I said before, this is killin me:banghead:
 
Look closely at the plugs; if a dull, carbony black, that points to a slightly rich tuning issue or too cold a plug, not oil. Oil will be a shiny black and will not smell like gas. I am with RRR and others: don't get to caught up in the plugs being different colors on opposite sides; not unusual. The symptoms point to an intake, stem seal issue so focus on that. BTW, I ran Total Seal gapless rings in racing years ago and they sealed up fine with my normal break in process. (Did not experience any special benefit from them so went back to normal ones.)

I WOULD suggest you look at the plug reach while going through all of this; the black is much further up the plug threads than I would ever expect to be normal, and it looks to me like the reach is to too long.
 
Thanks for responding in a polite way, and its good to read that you are well versed in the ways of the bigger cams.
And with 10 inches of vacuum at 1200, it looks like you have the timing pretty much under control.
So Im switching tracks, and joining those that are pointing to seals.
As to the PVs. If youre spending a significant time, running on the street, getting the PV as lean as runs well, to me, is pretty important.
 
Mostly all street. That's why I still run the PV's. I have to check 'em before I move on to your plugging breather holes test. Makes sense. I shoulda thought of that. But then again that's why I ask all you Jedi's:prayer:
 
Are you measuring vacuum in park or drive?
 
Well today I put my "readers" on, got a nice bright light and looked down the ports. Saw a real nice little puddle of oil laying right where the intake mates to the heads. Son of a gun. Nice thing about this Super Victor is you can actually see down there.

Yank off the intake to find the gaskets were oil soaked at the bottom of all 8 intake ports. So got everything all cleaned up. Set the intake back on, no gaskets...and resting on the china rails I measured .060 at the gasket surface. I WAS using .060 gaskets. Not to mention the port alignment was no good. Intake needs to be higher. Ya know, my heads were milled when they were CNC'd you'd think someone woulda told me ............then again, I should have checked it more carefully in the first place.

After trial and error what I found was with a .050 shim on the china rails, and bolts at the corners, my port alignment is perfect.
I can run an .075 feeler gauge in the gasket surface all the way around and it looks like the angle is good, too. So I think a 100 thou intake gasket will get me pretty darn near perfect, after snugging it down nice and tight.

Just gotta find a .100 intake gasket. I think Cometic and SCE both make one.

I can't tell you guys how many problems and setbacks I've had with this whole head/cam/intake upgrade. I'm actually a little pissed how much money and time it has cost me.

Hopefully after this issue, things will be ok. Hopefully.

Can't thank you guys enough for your advice, help, thoughts and insight.
 
Sometimes a plug's burn pattern is affected by its position when it's tightened down. If one side is toward the cylinder wall and the other toward the center of the cylinder when it's tightened, it could certainly have a different pattern on each side. I wouldn't let that be a blip on the radar. That's how you get too caught up in chasing ghosts.

plug indexing is a nice move...
 
Well. I did use AJ's diag for an oil sucking intake and of course , it was. Ordered .125 gaskets from SCE, cleaned everything up, sealed it all real good and still smoking and sucking oil.

Finally today I tore it down again. Pretty sure my intake was milled a bit too much, so getting everything ready for a new intake. Yeah. It bites! The paper .125 SCE gaskets came apart at disassembly, of course but are oil soaked at the bottom of all intake ports. So that's a forsure issue. The angles are OK so not sure why it won't seal. I'm using Dave Hughes "intake sealing" info to get that all straightened out.

After looking real close down my ports, now I'm questioning my valve seals also. TotalSeal says to use a positive Viton type valve seal with their gapless rings and I did. After my first dyno session I found the seals were pulling off of the guides so I switched to the white teflon seals. Well they're still on the guides but now I wonder if they're letting oil get by.

The pic below is what I saw in every port with a closed valve. A smal "puddle" oif oil at the fender side of the valve. The car has been sitting since Sunday. The intake runners were pretty darn oily, especially the downward turn, towards the valve. Seems like a good bit of oil that pooled after shutdown, from JUST an intake sealing problem. I'm wondering if I should find a Viton seal that works while I have everything apart. Kill 2 birds with one stone. Kinda.......I'm exasperated over this whole thing. Brand new EVERYTHING.

What are your thoughts guys? I need counseling.
 

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Are you sure that intake manifold is not bottoming on the front/rear (china) rails of the block?? Were you able to verify after your last install? I assume you are not using a gasket there, just RTV? Dowel pins removed or at least not bottoming in the pin alignment hole?

When I had this problem, my heads had been milled along with the intake port sides of the intake manifold to match. It would not seal due to interference along the front/rear rails. I had to mill a good amount off the front/rear rails of the intake manifold to allow it to seal properly.

Maybe you've eliminated this issue as a possibility. But thought I would raise the question one more time as it seems to me if your angles are correct and there is no interference at the front/rear rails, the intake should seal.
 
Ironmike - Assuming the intake is not bottoming on the front/rear rails of the block, have you tried attaching the intake manifold without gaskets using all intake bolts ( I know you had the corner bolts in before but I would put them all in)? I imagine if the intake side of the heads or intake were milled way too much, the intake might just "hang" on the intake bolts thus leaving a gap bigger than your compressed gasket thickness. Just another thought.
 
I always fit the intake as an assembly procedure. You want the bolt holes to be biased towards the top of the bolt holes, but fully visible with no gasket. I use the Mr. Gasket Ultraseals with sealer on the end rails and that always seems to work well. Sounds to me like the manifold just doesn't fit. The valve seals "may" also be an issue but I think it's the gasket predominantly.
 
according to mike at mrl cnc ported eddy heads are known to leak oil under the intake valve springs on the port roof and a few other places i am going through the same thing.
 
Hey thanks for jumping in, guys. Thought after a week this post died. Glad it didn't.....

So had to buy a brand new intake. Old one just didn't fit. After comparing it with the new one, it measues out like it was milled about 100 thou PER SIDE! Yeah. I know. My heads were milled .020 cylinder surface only. Cut waaay too much.

So brought the new one home from my machinist today. He cut it 40 thou and it looks like it's gonna be perfect with a .060 gasket. Angles are dead on. You would not believe how small those ports are on a brand new Super Victor. I have to port it tomorrow. Looks like it's gonna take me awhile, too. Ports aren't even close. I've never done it before but bought 2 new carbide "burrs" today and have a bunch of "tootsie roll" drums. Thankfully I have the old one for a porting guide. The ports were done really nice.

Also, installed new Viton seals. Just in case.

I sure hope this all cures the issue. One of the machine shop guys introduced me to the term "reversion" and I almost puked. I just can't believe my oil rings could have gone bad.
This thing had 12 dyno pulls and all was perfect. Put it in the car and....smoke.

It make me sick to even think after all the money....the clearancing, degreeing, ring filing, careful everything...that these Total Seal rings could have went south on me. Before I tore the intake off this last time I ran a compression check and had 194 psi average with less than 3 psi deviation AND a leakdown less than 3 percent.

Hope that ole fart who said "reversion" was wrong!
 
Reversion is common on larger cam engines that have heads that flow well at low lift. The marks are usually more carbon from fuel (and wet, sticky deposits) and you'd see them way back up the intake ports if that was the case. I doubt it's oil rings but it's possible that the 2nd ring isn't fully seated. The top ring is the compression sealing ring. the 2nd is to scrape any oil the bottom rings miss. 2nd is not a compression ring although the oil typically on it does give it more sealing properties. Get the intake to fit, and then drive it a bit. You may find the smoke goes away after a few hundred miles.
 
Be sure to have a wire brush and a spray on lubricant handy to help keep the carbide burrs free from aluminum build-up. I use Zep 45 and it works great, but I still have to wire brush them frequently to remove the aluminum to keep them from clogging up.
 
Be sure to have a wire brush and a spray on lubricant handy to help keep the carbide burrs free from aluminum build-up. I use Zep 45 and it works great, but I still have to wire brush them frequently to remove the aluminum to keep them from clogging up.

Dip the burr in ATF every once in a while. Makes a slight mess, but you won't get aluminum stuck in the burrs anymore! Works a treat.
 
why are small blocks such a pain in the ***...i notice a lot of different probs the small blocks run into...
 
Seriously? Small blocks appear to have more issues simply because the population of people who run them is multiples greater. For every big block car, there are probably 5-10 small block cars, so naturally the chances for problems will increase...
 
Did all the stuff I mentioned in post #40. All good. No smoke, clean plugs, etc. Now, once again I notice just a tiny bit of smoke. All plugs good except #7 and #8. Just a wee bit oily.

I'm giving up at this point and think maybe a PCV valve would solve my problem. I know some really bright guys are huge proponents of a PCV, so what do ya think?

Can't run it to carb as it's a HP950, but my air cleaner does have the "knock out" for the fitting. If someone could reccomend a valve and filter of some sort, I sure would appreciate it.

Right now I'm running a breather on each valve cover. No header evacs.
 
I didn't read all the replies, but my guesstimation is bad valve seals since you said it does it after letting off the gas, and then getting back on it.

When I was in school for auto mechanics we were told that deceleration causes high vacuum which pulls oil down the valve stem and into the combustion chamber. When you hit it again, it's burning off the oil.

Best of luck with this.
 
Thine Iron One...... you may feel rock bottom right now. And we have all been there. But that day is going to come when you will feel just the opposite you do today. I wish you lived closer to me. Four eyes, two brains(well 3/4s of one; mine not yours) is better than one. I wish I could could help. I've help a few in the LA area. Especially the young 'uns just starting out with their slant six Dusters. A couple of hours and they drive off happy and have a friend for ever. or until my mind goes. Install a PCV valve. Can't remember...are you running a roller rocker assembly?
 
Yep. Rollers. Hughes 1.6 ratio. Just hoping a PCV system just might pull enough vacuum to stop my intake from sucking.

Went for a long ride last nite, whacked on it pretty good a few times....today all plugs look great except for the 7 and 8. As usual.
 
I'm giving up at this point and think maybe a PCV valve would solve my problem. I know some really bright guys are huge proponents of a PCV, so what do ya think?

Can't run it to carb as it's a HP950, but my air cleaner does have the "knock out" for the fitting. If someone could reccomend a valve and filter of some sort, I sure would appreciate it.


The knock out in the filter is to actually let filtered air into the engine, then the PCV valve evacuates it.
 
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