Alaskan_TA
Well-Known Member
3A on the VIN pad, so this 318 started life in a 1973 B-body.
Know of any in that yard or area?
Know of any in that yard or area?
318 with random parts.
- Thread starter Princess Valiant
- Start date
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shittyslant6
Well-Known Member
Sounds like someone was trying to make a little hot rod engine but did not quite get it.
I agree with @RustyRatRod , keep the rockers and shafts (pushrods if thy work with the new cam,) and keep on truckin with a cool solid lifter 318.
I agree with @RustyRatRod , keep the rockers and shafts (pushrods if thy work with the new cam,) and keep on truckin with a cool solid lifter 318.
Princess Valiant
A.K.A. Rainy Day Auto
There were lot of 73 + B bodies but they are all gone now. Most of them had a date with the crusher, its an old yard calling it quits
IIRC, ‘70-340 had “Dumbbell” lifters.
The dumbell lifters were solids. I didn't think 340's had solids from the factory.
Well, I should not have put a year in there because ‘70 is wrong and I should have been typed ‘68 instead.
pishta
I know I'm right....
I've used those same dumbell lifters in bigger cMs and they still work fine. Ever hear a 273 purring along with the machine sound going on under the valve covers? Solid lifter 318 sounds just the same...matter of fact I took everything off a spun rod bearing 273 4bbl and put it all into a 68 318 short block. Cam, lifters, heads, distributor, intake, exhaust...and it sure felt to me that it made more power than the 273-4, lower compression (?) and all. Imagine what a matched cam to those pistons could have done.
pishta
I know I'm right....
Idk of any 340 that got solid lifters. The T/A got adjustable rockers but still ran a hydro cam.
My thoughts exactly.
MOPAROFFICIAL
Oogliboogli
All around the intake is room to breathe.
Air does bend around the valve head/satellite some. You can test that on an flow bench by facing a valve till there is no margin left and just an edge...it will flow less than a new valve. That in mind...think if water flowed through 'with pressure' it would fan out and carry somewhat on the chamber across/next to and the cyl wall..the majority/most concentrated will influence near by air too.
Think how a hemi flows so much, think about the valve placement away from the chamber wall. Its rudimentary.
The chamber encroaching sucks UNLESS you can use it as a continuous riverbed, so to speak..to en extent that is. In order to do that..you have to steepen all the seat angles and put the valve down some.
cudamark
Well-Known Member
Almost all poly 318's and '60-7? slants have solid cams from the factory too.
cudamark
Well-Known Member
Nothing wrong with 675 heads. They're open chamber, but, with the right pistons will perform well. They're a good casting without the crack problems associated with some of the earlier 315 and (to a lesser extent) 920 castings. If you have ones with the later date codes, they also have induction hardened seats. I believe that started in late '71 or '72.
MOPAROFFICIAL
Oogliboogli
Well I'm just gonna state the numbers.
The 920 closed chamber 66-67 measured up 66.5 and were touched once by a shop..so I'd bet money they a are really 67 cc's.
The bone stock 675's from 1971 in the thread 318 average joe bla bla measured 68cc. The later 163/563 are 72cc the 315 were 66cc.
They used to say the heart shape 64 273 heads were 64cc. Anyone have some to know and share, please. I heard they were cracking sobs too. Idk. The 302 is an actual, amazingly, 64 cc's. If they had cleaned up the chamber some around the valves they would be the same 66-67cc the rest of the closed chambers are.
Now 302 are 64 CC, look at the chamber closely, the widow's peak between the valves..the encroachment of the chamber...
Now the 273 920 head... no encroachment of chamber, no widows peak between valves... got it?
Now tell me that the 920 isnt 66-67cc stock. 3 cc's is all it is.. but I know some cant wrap their head around that.
The 920 closed chamber 66-67 measured up 66.5 and were touched once by a shop..so I'd bet money they a are really 67 cc's.
The bone stock 675's from 1971 in the thread 318 average joe bla bla measured 68cc. The later 163/563 are 72cc the 315 were 66cc.
They used to say the heart shape 64 273 heads were 64cc. Anyone have some to know and share, please. I heard they were cracking sobs too. Idk. The 302 is an actual, amazingly, 64 cc's. If they had cleaned up the chamber some around the valves they would be the same 66-67cc the rest of the closed chambers are.
Now 302 are 64 CC, look at the chamber closely, the widow's peak between the valves..the encroachment of the chamber...
Now the 273 920 head... no encroachment of chamber, no widows peak between valves... got it?
Now tell me that the 920 isnt 66-67cc stock. 3 cc's is all it is.. but I know some cant wrap their head around that.
That is why I specified LA engines. Big blocks and Hemi's also came with solid lifters.
From the numbers off my 2658920 heads in the 66 Formula S. The chambers measured 63.5 cc up to one at 64.8 cc, with most being 63.5 cc. These numbers are from virgin 50K mile, 920 castings, OEM valves and the lightest valve job to just seal the valves. It took .040 to bring them down to min spec. of 57.3 cc per chamber.
MOPAROFFICIAL
Oogliboogli
They must have been milling them different over the years. I've never seen any factory production sb mopar LA head less than 64cc. Most shops only pull about .002-.005 per clean up that's barely .45-.85cc about but less than 1cc ,valve seat is about .005-.015 deep, valve face .008-.010, hard seats raise the 45/exh valve countering that. In other words it doesn't cover 4ccs.
SS Lancer
Well-Known Member
Remove rear cover at cam and maybe u tap on cam and it will slide out the front .
Bret Tschacher
Well-Known Member
Well it definitely a 318 that some has installed the solid 273 tappets in and used the 273 rockers and heads on. This would give a higher compression 318 set up that would have a stronger low rpm end torque curve. It may have been a situation where someone had a block fail and simply used the salvageable top end pieces. This late in the day no one can say. If it were mine, I would go the rest of the way and find a 360 block and use the heads from the 60 and the valve train you now have or at least the rockers and a new set of tappets and cam. Unless you have a good forged crank that would be a plus for the 318.
As far as the life of the lifters, that's partly in the break in and even more in the oil additive, you must use a zinc additive or replacement in the oil to keep the cam from wiping out prematurely. Or just bite the bullet and put in a neat roller system. Since the factory rockers are adjustable, all this old stuff is still cool to have and use but unless you're into the nastalgia of it there's a lot of better newer stuff to be had.
Bret Tschacher
Well-Known Member
As for the head castings, I don't see the point in those either, since the same vintage 360 had bigger valves but not the biggest, I would be looking for a set of 360 heads that already have the hardened seats for no lead and will fit on the 318 block and give you a better flow without sinking a bunch of funds in them. Then you would have a wider choice of intakes as low as you stay with the correct gaskets, using the ones for the larger ports. Even the 360 2 bbl set up flow a lot more than the smaller engines 2 bbl systems. Now I have no idea how you intend to build this or for what purpose, but since the later engines all used cast cranks as does the 360, it just doesn't make a lot sense to me to build a 318 anymor, other than how many of them there are around. They all went to a thinner casting than the earlier blocks so not much to gain there. Later heads went emission direction and lost performance. I just wouldn't mess with iron anymore either. New alloy heads can cost less in the end than trying to save old iron.
Phreakish
Well-Known Member
Most modern aftermarket hydraulic lifters are junk. Doesn't matter what is or isn't in the oil. Lots of very experienced people have had problems with them in various ways. Often having to go through several sets of lifters to assemble a decent set. Even when a cam survives break-in, many hydraulic lifters lose their function and begin either tapping or causing trouble at moderate RPM which shows up as power loss.
A mechanical flat tappet cam really has few drawbacks and the service required isn't near as often or as difficult as many make it out to be. With proper oils and moderate spring loads, mechanicals can go quite a while without service, and have no added complexity of an internal hydraulic spring, cup, and check valve that's failure prone and sensitive to manufacturing hygiene and tolerances.
Roller cams aren't a fix-all. There are issues with distributor drive gears, cam core materials, heat treats, etc. Bronze drive gears are fast wearing, and melonited (melonized, qpq, nitride treated, etc) gears are hard to come by and few cam companies will warranty anything run w/o a bronze gear. Stock hydraulic rollers aren't an issue, but those don't off the performance most are after in a hot rod.
Everything is a trade-off, and using flat tappets is not a 'nostalgia' thing, but rather a common sense thing to ensure a sustainable engine assembly.
Bret Tschacher
Well-Known Member
Doesn't matter what's in the oil? I guess in the past the zinc was just an accident. So maybe new lifters are junk as most is likely being made in China but how many cams were ruined by improper break in. I've been building for over 40 years and I never had a cam go out in 15 minutes but I have sure seen plenty of other people wipe one out before the first oil change. As for roller cams being a fix all, that wasn't my intention either. I do however go along with the idea of building old stuff just because it's what I grew up with and I love it but I also love new tech like OHC, SFI and COP's. Now that brings me to drive gears, I've had to replace my share of cams in stock vehicles that wiped out dist. drive gears too. The last engine I was working on was a roller cam STOCK 5.7 L that would not time up and run right because there was so much wear in the distributor drive that the cam sensor system would not phase in. It would run good at idle but run like **** anywhere else. I never finished fixing that one because the guy couldn't afford the repair bill and I retired since then. Nothing warrants indefinite life expectancy aside from good oil and maintaining the vehicle and even that's a given. But I can assure you that cam manufactures make much ado about using cam break in additives with cams requiring it! So as far as what's in the oil, I'm going to stick with my opinion and what has worked in the past and lines up with the instructions on the cam sheet and use an additive in any vehicle that requires something in the oil to keep the lobes with a peak on them. Now at the time, I own a Cummins 5.9 with a flat tappet system and I have no idea how many miles are on it anymore. I haven't used anything but some Slick 50 in it many years ago and good oil, haven't changed it as much as it should have been at times but I did replace the valve springs a while back with stronger springs because it needed them after I turned up the Inj pump and increased the boost press.. The last time I needed to install a stronger set of springs was in a 360 AMC which in those days was something every AMC needed because the stock springs where crap new, after a few months the cam and lifters went away, none of the parts got move from their OEM holes. The cam simply was not hard enough to handle the load. I did the same thing to an later 360 I had but I traded it off before it went down on me so whomever got it, it was their problem, I did it because the engine would not idle right without the springs. All old 360 AMC were low on springs and would miss fire at idle do to lifter pump up. But this is off subject. Factory rollers and old flats and zinc are all a part of something few of us have the expertise to argue with, so it does matter what's in the oil from engines to old Jeep Quadra tracks. If it wasn't in there, it would die an early death! Trust me on this ! You don't run cheap oil in a Diesel and expect it to last half million or more miles. Don't expect a G360 trans to live behind a Cummins with the wrong oil in it either. Wait till you find an engine that has been run with multi visc oil in the very old days and take it apart to see build up on everything that looks like a coating of rubber strings everywhere, with so much wear on the parts it looks like sand went through it because it gelled up and would not pump. What was in that oil? What ever it was didn't work.
Phreakish
Well-Known Member
You misunderstand: a junk lifter is junk regardless of what you put in your oil.
Proper oil is always necessary, that's not in question.
Dave_J
Well-Known Member
The early closed chamber 273 heads, when worked by someone that knows their *** from their elbow, can flow well when you use a better and larger valves and work on the intake shrouding a lot. Chamber shrouding is the biggest issue even with the X heads. The later open 273 heads helped in the shrouding issues somewhat.
Put a set of worked closed chambers on a 360 and with a 340 resto cam made more BUTT Dyno power from 1,500 to 3,500 RPM. It was not a 6,500 RPM drag race engine. It spent its life in the 1,000 to 4,500 RPM range with a few blasts above that.
Put a set of worked closed chambers on a 360 and with a 340 resto cam made more BUTT Dyno power from 1,500 to 3,500 RPM. It was not a 6,500 RPM drag race engine. It spent its life in the 1,000 to 4,500 RPM range with a few blasts above that.
920 castings 66/67 heads, closed chambers. Never milled. I did the valve job. Probably had new exhaust valves. Also used N10Y Champion plugs. I use a glass burette graduated to .2 of a cc. That's all I can see that may have been different. Milled to Chrysler numbers and chambers came down, spot on.
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