Engine decking issue(help)

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I wouldn't do that. The bolt spot face really needs to be parallel with the mating surface. If you are off even a small amount, it will side load the bolt, could bend it and will most likely make the cap out of round.

Nor will you ever get it flat doing it that way.

Can't you ditch the washer and maybe grind a small bit off the head of the bolt and get your clearance? That would be the only home fix I would do
Agreed... there are some grinders and adapters for sanding parallel but it does not sound like the OP has that.

With the flared washer built into the bolthead, I would not be at all afraid to leave the washer out. Lube the cap's flat surface well as said.
 
Well I couldn't read any more you all are a little whacked out on how you square deck a block. Our block fixture measures 7" from the main journal bar. You cut the deck using the block fixture. They cost about $7000 dollars from Rottler.

You land a pointer on the deck and then to the 7 inch fixture . add the difference to the 7 inch and zero the DRO This is your deck height Square decking is making both decks exactly the same deck height from one bank to the other using a fixture that holds the block at 45 degrees using the cam tunnel center line. We have some foreign V6 motors that are 60 degrees. My son got Block bars for SB and BB mopar and SB and BB Chevy. he told Dave and I that tonight

When Dave told me about this thread we went to the garage to ask my son. When Dave told him about using the pistons on all 4 corners he about fell off his stool. Square decking is making both decks the same height 45 degree off of the center line of the cam and crank tunnel.

I would like to give precise advise but I don't know machine work like my son. What I can tell you is the little he shows us that we understand is unbelievable. And the tools he has.$$$$$$$. Right now this thread is the joke of the garage. If you don't have the equipment don't give bull **** advise.

To the poster , Take the block to a machine shop. Ask if they have a block fixture and the tooling to install your block for square decking. Tell them to show it to you. If he can't walk out.

This is the a block fixture. Notice no pistons necessary. Just precise tooling that cost a lot of money. That is the correct way. Right Dave?

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Cmm nice stuff. That does cost money.
 
No disrespect to anyone, Look up the movie The Indian it is a true story about an Australian Indian motorcycle owner who came to America to run Bonneville and broke records with hand made parts.....
It all started in back alley shops and garages and has evolved into high tech high dollar equipment and formulas... doesnt mean the "old"ways are wrong and the "new" ways are better maybe they just get faster results. Old school Max Wedge Cross Rams dont work on paper (look it up) but they still whip ***! Put the gloves away and go racing
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I know that movie. "Worlds fastest Indian" Good movie starring Anthony Hopkins. Yes true story and he was an old guy when he did it like most of us lol.
 
Two things. I should have pointed out that I only use 1 rod and piston as mentioned above. If you are using stock rods, you really need to measure them. You have no idea how many times they've been rebuilt and that can change the length.

Aftermarket rods are usually dead nuts on. Good Pistons are too.

I also want to mention gasket surface. Back in 1995, I went to a seminar put on by Fel Pro or whoever owned them at the time.

The biggest take away from that was surface finish. The upshot is, regardless of block or head materiel or gasket material, you want a very fine finish. Rough surface finish went away a long time ago. The lie about giving the surface "TEETH" to grab the gasket was wrong.

In fact, if you've ever seen a block or heads come in that went out with a rough surface, the first thing you notice is how much smoother the finish is after run time.

This is because the gaskets main job is to follow the head up and maintain seal on the combustion stroke. It does not matter how many bolts are around the cylinder, how big they are, or even if they are studs.

Every firing cycle lifts the head off the block. And the gasket needs to be able to follow that separation and keep a seal. A rough finish does nothing to help that.

What actually occurs is that during start up and cool down (and even in operation as load changes occur) the head and block are growing and shrinking in all directions. That rough finish is actually worn down by this movement. In fact, as this wear occurs, it not only smooths the head and block surface, it removes materiel from the gasket itself.

And, this causes the the fasteners to lose tension. Now, you start seeing head gasket failures. I can't count how many engines I've disassembled that had head bolts that were loose. And failed gaskets. You get it apart and you see a rough surface that it now relatively smooth.

Gasket surfaces should be smooth with out burnishing.
Very good and accurate post. The only thing I would add is that a smooth surface is not quite the same as surface finish.
The best way to gauge surface finish is with a profilometer.
But yes generally smooth will get you in the ballpark. Particularly with Mls head gaskets. My block finish did not look good to me at all but it measures reasonable. Ra 60
 
That's going to be a lot of grinding on that pump housing. I hope there's enough meat there.

I SWEAR it's things just like THIS that make guys switch to Chevy. Everything bolts right on those with no problems. It's really a wonder there are still as many Mopar guys around as there are, given the piss poor support we get.
Ehh..don't be a pussy. Those Chevy blocks crack, barely fit a 4-inch stroke... and yield a stomach sickening rod ratio.
I've run a factory bolt on that side before with no issue. Use the 12 point nut, torque it and then grind about half of it off... then clearance the pump body till it fits. the cylinder notching and the rest, as well.. were all laid out in the rags in the early mid 2000's w/mopar muscle ..mopar action..car crap, hotrod..
 
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Ehh..don't be a pussy. Those china blocks crack, barely fit a 4-inch stroke... and yield a stomach sickening rod ratio.
I've run a factory bolt on that side before with no issue. Use the 12 point nut, torque it and then grind about half of it off... then clearance the pump body till it fits. the cylinder notching and the rest, as well.. were all laid out in the rags in the early mid 2000's w/mopar muscle ..mopar action..car crap, hotrod..

You know what I'm sayin dummy. It'd be nice to get HALF the aftermarket suck up Chevy does. We just "have to do what we have to do" and we always have. All the stuff we have to do would make a Chevy guy give up and run a Chevy. Now hush up, Peter P. lol
 
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We have a Dart block here right now. Dart heads and intake. The machine work from dart was far from being correct. Try and tell the owner of this motor that it is cheap to build a SB chevy. Nothing is bolt on just like every other brand. We do go racing , With every motor he works on he gets the pride of the build at the track.

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Rod ratio? SBM is so well endowed
I've rune a "327" SBC block with 4.250 stroke and a 6" rod
4" stroke with a 6 and an eighth would be heaven for the SBC guys
If you want to better your rod ratio (and I became a long rod guy)
just use a longer rod and a smaller pin and a shorter compression height piston
there is lots of room to do this with the SBM
cam timing changes do plan on some testing
 
We have a Dart block here right now. Dart heads and intake. The machine work from dart was far from being correct. Try and tell the owner of this motor that it is cheap to build a SB chevy. Nothing is bolt on just like every other brand. We do go racing , With every motor he works on he gets the pride of the build at the track.

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That's what most people don't get. Once you get past using junkyard parts, the Chevy is about the same to build as anything else, money wise.

The issue is, you can't buy a block for the Chrysler stuff. If you can, you get one vendor, and if you have to do so much as brush hone the mains for clearance, the Chrysler guys blow a bolt, go berserk and stomp their feet that they got screwed.

I have never ever bought a block, from any vendor, GM, Ford or Chrysler that didn't need machine work. Ever.

You can barely get cylinder heads for the Chrysler. Why? The aftermarket knows to make power with LA architecture, you MUST use an offset rocker.

Well, **** the bed. That rules out 98% of the guys who will buy that head. IDK who all these people were using W2 stuff back in the 80's but I only saw a few guys doing it here in the NW, and I was one of them. The reason...I ain't buying rockers, I can't use my intake and my headers won't fit.

That's why, when the rumor hit that Dick Maskin at Dart was looking at building a SBM I laughed my *** off. He's a business man. It doesn't matter that Bob Book can take the Chrysler platform and make more power than GM or Ford stuff. Doesn't matter. The volume isn't there.

David Nickens told me, personally, he made more power with the dodge, and made it quicker than he ever had with GM architecture. He and several other Pro Stock truck racers went to a meeting at Chrysler. They wanted to make some slight changes to the front and sides of the pick up body, as the aero was horrid compared to the Ford and Chevy stuff. Chrysler said we don't care if you win. We want you so qualify, and get on TV with what looks exactly like what we sell (this was 1999 and what did well on Sunday would still sell on Monday although many retards say that isn't so) and represent the brand.

He was dumbfounded. He said he could put most any engine he had in a GM bodied chassis and qualify number 1 almost every weekend.

Again, Chrysler not being on track. All for nothing though, as NHRA killed the class. If you can't tell, I'm still pissed about that PST far outclassed PS car in many ways.

Ok...rant off. For now. But to do competitive horsepower, it's never cheap, you can't buy the parts off the shelf, and you touch every single part, every single time.
 
same rant even back in the Max wedge days
MOPAR customers are CHEAP
they want WD's to sell to them at cost (even when I was not a "sponsor" If I was a sponsor they wanted FREE + I do the Machine work
IFIK there is nothing out there ready to rely on OTB
same rant even back in the Max wedge days
The Short sighted suits at Chrysler should have realized that better AERO would have helped there MPG
MOPAR customers are CHEAP
they want WD's to sell to them at cost (even when I was not a "sponsor" If I was a sponsor they wanted FREE + I do the Machine work
IFIK there is nothing out there ready to rely on OTB
 
That's what most people don't get. Once you get past using junkyard parts, the Chevy is about the same to build as anything else, money wise.

The issue is, you can't buy a block for the Chrysler stuff. If you can, you get one vendor, and if you have to do so much as brush hone the mains for clearance, the Chrysler guys blow a bolt, go berserk and stomp their feet that they got screwed.

I have never ever bought a block, from any vendor, GM, Ford or Chrysler that didn't need machine work. Ever.


But to do competitive horsepower, it's never cheap, you can't buy the parts off the shelf, and you touch every single part, every single time.


Exactly. Mopar people want perfect for nothing, and life ain't like that. There's "ok", and there's "right". Ok will win some, and last a bit. Right will always win and last past expectations.
 
a SBC dart block is around $1500-$1700

The SB-mopar R-3 blocks were around $4500 - $5500

The Nickle content in a R-3 is so much higher. The block alone with billet Caps is almost the same weight as a complete standard short block.

the reason mopars are so much more money is because of the demand. Production quantity is almost 1000-1 difference and more .
The more you make while tooled for a part the cheaper the cost. The longer they are on the shelf it raises the overhead.

I was at "Ray Barton's Racing". Ray and I went out for lunch and we were talking about his switch to GM. "COPO Camaro"
General motors gives him everything to race for free. Mopar charged him for every part. "And he was building the Hemi Crate motors for them".

Then we came back to the shop and he showed me why LS blocks are so much better. They had 6.2 Hemi's and LS's fresh of the Rottler. The quality of the metal of the LS was like the old Mopar race blocks. The 6.2 metal was actually disgusting. You could visually see the difference. "The new Hemi's are scrap". And that is right out of Ray's mouth. And who is better to compare. He build's both for competition.

Any motor can make power but how long will it stay together.

The new Hemi's have a valve seat problem. Probably because they don't heat them high enough before installing them to save time. The proper heat before the install of the seat the tighter the fit. Also freezing the seat.

When removing a seat you tig weld them and cool them with air. They fall out..

Aluminum draws heat from iron. So what happens to the seat if you get a Hemi real hot and shut it off when hot. The aluminum draws the heat out of the seat.

Think about that . A valve sitting open and nothing holding the seat while the head is drawing the heat from the seat.

If you get a motor overheated with aluminum heads and shut it off. Crank it every couple of minutes while cooling. Could save you a motor.

I can't wait to see how many mile's they get on the New Demon's. They make a lot of power but for how long?

Give a junk yard LS some boost and you have a durable race motor Cheap.

I say this because it is fact . Would we go cheap? That's not happening. I'm a die hard mopar guy. That's how I was raised. And that is how my son was raised. So I am sure my son will pay what ever the cost to keep the big "M" on the trailer.
 
The new Hemi's have a valve seat problem. Probably because they don't heat them high enough before installing them to save time. The proper heat before the install of the seat the tighter the fit. Also freezing the seat.

When removing a seat you tig weld them and cool them with air. They fall out..
Gotta wonder if this is a systemic engineering or manufacturing process problem, and who makes these production heads..... 4.7's had a similar issue of the seats falling out.

More wondering out loud.... maybe there is a tooling difference that makes the different block material usable in the production shop but not good for an aftermarket shop? Based on my conversations with my brother-in-law who has worked at Landis Machine for 30+ years in application design, there are a lot of production tooling and technique differences between now and 20 years ago.
 
I know that movie. "Worlds fastest Indian" Good movie starring Anthony Hopkins. Yes true story and he was an old guy when he did it like most of us lol.
Burt Monro was a Kiwi... he's likely rollling over in his grave!
 
I had two sets of heads done by one of my good shops...a pair of Chevy 993's for my kid's modified and a pair of J heads. The Mopar's cost $8.00 more to do than the Brand X.... did exactly the same work... 5 angle, angle mill, bowl blend, stainless valves (2.20/1.60), similar springs and valve seals, etc.

Good parts mostly cost the same... cheap stuff is cheaper for Chevies. Machine work is the same cost.
 
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