My freind and i redid the top end on his 455 olds with one of Dick Miller's kit's. Edelbrock heads, and comp cam, redid the installation meticulously, and carefully, now we have coolant in it. What gives? Its a 1970 Olds 455. Comps XE284*** (cant remember the exact grind). DMR oil restricted push rods, and oil splash shield. New Crane gold 1.6 roller rockers. Edelbrock RPM aluminum heads, ported. Used Holley Dominator intake manifold, with a strange hole at the very center of the plenum, directly below the carb.....? We sanded the grime off all the mating surfaces, oiled all bolts, and cleaned out all threads. Thread locked the two little bolts at the bottom of the waterpump that go into the timing chain cover. Torques all bolts to specs specified on instructions, used oil, and antiseize where specified. All gaskets went on dry, except for water pump. We tried to fire it up, and eventually got a water pump leak. Took it back off, and resealed it as best we could, with MUCHOS ADDITIONAL RTV. It worked. Once it fired, we found coolant in oil. Off came the intake manifold. We noticed the gaskets were soaked. New gaskets replaced, with RTV around water ports. When the intake was off, there was coolant sitting next to the lifters, ON THE BLOCK. This was pure coolant, not mixed with oil.... Leads us to beleive its dripping from above.... Intake sealed, waited 24hrs++. Then went to break it in again. We fired up, ran for about 1minute, we noticed oil PSI was good. Held steady at 2200rpm, but after abut 40 seconds, we noticed the water temp gauge (mechanical) was fluctuating between 200-220*F. I didnt even know this was possible. We immediately cut the engine. Checked the dipstick, and it was like watery white milk...... We dropped the drain plug, and collected about 1qt of oil. It was dark watery looking, smelled wierd.... Like toxic oil, but also coolant mixed in.... Were kinda ticked off, and very lost. Background: My freind bought the engine used. It was built by someone around Toronto. Whoever built it bought it thinking it was a buick (atleast thats what we were told), and rebuilt to be mildly more powerful than stock, but very very tame. The parts list looked promising. My freind decided he wanted more power, so he got dick miller's stuff. Once we started taking stuff off, we noticed ALL the gaskets were gooped with some incredibly adhesive gasket/glue type thing. They were all cheap gaskets. Cam button was missing. That wierd hole in the plenum. The machine work looks good, but the assembly of the engine looked like it was done by a Chev guy.....o No: Heres a few things we noticed. 1) That wierd hole at the bottom of the intake plenum. Whats it for? What could it be for? 2) Head gasket went on dry. But how could it leak into the oil so easily? 3) There is a heater hose that goes from the water pump, to the BACK of the holley intake manifold. We cant seem to agree if this is the proper routing. (I know it normally goes through the heater core, but for running purposes we just ran them to each other). 4) The water pump was resealed, but were not sure about the timing cover. It was RTV's around the water pump holes, but maybe we wiped it off, while trying to line it up. 5) MOST WORRYING, i dont think its a gasket leak. Simply because thats ALOT of coolant to get into the oil, in under 1 minute of run time. Its almost as if we (or someone before us) forgot to plug a passage or something. 6) Coolant mixed into oil in the oil pan, but no oil mixed into coolant in the rad. (checked this by draining rad). ANY IDEAS????
Would like to see a pic of the hole in the plenum. I would check the heads, you stated they were ported. Maybe they went through a water passage when porting? Any moisture out of the exhaust? JKaz
As far as the hole in the plenum, that's where the egr comes out, if you have one. As far as the leaks, could be a number of things. First off, I would hesitate using sandpaper on the head sealing surface. Leak at water passages on timing cover, wrong head gasket, leak at intake water port from intake/ head being improperly machined, no end rail clearance, keeping the intake from sealing to the head,gasket installed wrong, etc... too long of bolts/ studs on head or intake,cracked head/block/intake. bunged up or warped head/block/intake. The holley intake is old & likely been messed with. did you use any end rail gaskets? Use rtv instead of end rail gaskets. use rtv on water ports on intake & timing cover. Use composition gaskets on intake,(such as mr gasket 405 sbo,404 bbo. Just a few suggestions. good luck!
ill try and get a pic. They are CNC "port matched" to the gasket size. The porting wasnt done inside the chambers. No moisture, or smoke in the exhaust.
If the heads were milled excessively, the intake will not sit correctly. On my Olds 455, I use the turkey tray AND a set of side gaskets. Use Form a Gasket or Spray Tack on the surfaces, and The Right Stuff on the water ports. Be sure you use the correct torque sequence and amount (35 foot pounds) I would mount the intake on the engine with no gaskets and see if it fits. PS - Don't keep running it with coolant in the oil. The bearings will be eaten up quickly. AND, get a cooling system pressure tester, and pressurize the system BEFORE you start it!
Sorry i couldnt answer this all in one shot. Here goes again; 1) Ill try and get pix of the hole. 2) Sandpaper on deck surface was a non issue. We used 800 grit, and the machining marks were much deeper, so we didnt hurt it. Probably helped it. 3)Leak at water passages, timing cover. This was probably the issue. Were gonna fix this tommorow night and see what happens. Maybe we wiped some of the RTV off while installing. 4) Wrong head gasket? It was identical to the one that came off. All the bolt holes and water passage holes lined up. It was the one recommended by edelbrock, special order, 3 weeks to come in. 5) Excessive maching on the heads? Head wasnt machined that much. Standard Edelbrock RPM aluminum heads. However, im 99% sure the block was decked. 6) Endrail clearance? Not sure what this is, but out of the box aluminum heads shouldnt cause an issue. The intake manifold worked before, but we didnt run coolant in it till now. 7) Bolts are all new ARP bolts. It said to use oil or antiseize on them. We used antiseize, and torqued to the specs. It was pretty low. I think its 85 for iron heads, we used 70ish. Intake was around 30. 8) No end rail gaskets, just RTV. Sealed well, except for 1 pin hole. We will probably seal it again. Were not using cheapo gaskets either. The intake and head gaskets are both edelbrock, which are the fancy ones needed for aluminum components. The other gaskets are from a summit rebuild kit.
I think you might be right. We used RTV around water ports, and Spray tack on the rest of the gasket last time before intake install. (the first time we just used Spray tack). Thanks for the pressure test idea, i didnt even think of that!!!! No more starting the engine till we get that right. The engine has 1 minute of run time on it only. Each time we had the intake off, we smothered each cam lobe with assembly lube. And the engine was primed to 60psi of oil before each start. Im sure the bearings are ok. It runs REAL nice. We also popped off the valve cover, and saw pure oil in there. It was being lubricated properly, so we caught the coolant issue early enough. Assuming the intake manifold is not working because the block has been decked too much. What is the solution? Should i run 2 gaskets, or get a spacer? I know they sell spacers for this kind of stuff, but we dont have machining specs or what was done to the engine. How would we measure what spacer is needed? Also, any ideas on why the temp gauge was fluctuating? Obviously it was air pockets in the system. But i had a rad cap installed, and coolant was readily spewing out of the over flow...... I put the cap on after filling, and waiting about 20 seconds when it started to overflow. I assumed the air had been worked out of there, but maybe not. Temp gauge is mounted on the intake manifold towards the front, next to the thermostat housing.
I'll throw a couple suggestions into the mix. Assume nothing; check everything. The best gasket in the world won't seal if the surface is not flat. Did you check the heads and deck for flatness? How about the intake manifold? Also, most head gasket manufacturers recommend a particular surface roughness and a particular adhesive (or not). Follow their recommendations. If the gap at the intake end rails is too small, you may not be obtaining proper crush of the intake gasket at the heads when you torque it down. If the gap at the end rails is too big, that might be a sign the passages between intake and heads are not lined up properly either. I'm leary of the history of this engine, between the previous builder and you two. Are you sure no machine work broke into a water passage?
Assuming until i can check.... I am in school, full time, so if i need additional parts, i need to know ahead of time to allow for shipping. Didnt check the flatness, but the engine ran great before we got it, so it should work ok. There arent compression issues or leaks aside from coolant. If the deck surface wasnt flat, wed probably have coolant leaks outside the heads, i dont think thats the issue here. 800 grit isnt going to change the flatness either. We followed the manufacturer's recomendation for treating gaskets, it didnt work. So now were adding RTV and tack. Where would i find the end rail clearance specs? Im also leary of the history, but were not gonna throw away $5000 cause we ran into a mishap. It looked like a good engine when we bought it, it just doesnt look like it was assembled with too much care. Bearings and short block look good, but the gaskets were questionable. The heads are NEW RPM EDELBROCK ALUMINUM HEADS, when i said ported heads, they ONLY received gasket matching about 1/2 inch deep into the intake runners. THATS IT. No where near water passages. Thats not the issue. If there was some kind of water passage mishap on the block however, i wouldnt know. We were told some oil mods had been performed to the block, but im not familiar with what gets drilled out on an Olds. Where would i check for this?? If the end rail clearances are off, how would i fix them?
No need for a pic. The hole IS for the EGR !!! I've had several of these intakes. I've given a few away! As far as the end rails , as long as the end of intake isn't metal on metal after torqueing you should be OK. It doesn't cost anything to put a straightedge across the heads & block while you have it apart, good insurance! As far as torque, assuming you have 7/16 studs, use 30w motor & torque to 85# with a known good toque wrench. Just because you paid a lot for the gaskets don't mean they're good! I got a set of felpro 1155's for around $125 that leaked like crazy into the valley area , just like your's Good luck!
So just incase anyone was wondering; It was 2 things. 1) The intake manifold gaskets. The instructions said not to use RTV, the instructions were wrong. 2) Timing chain cover, to block mating surface. This one needs to have the thermostat housing hose put on, line up with the dowl pins, and the bottom gasket must go into the oilpan's front sealing area while it is dropped an inch or so. Kind of a juggling act, in which some of the RTV from the driver side water port was wiped off. The coolant had a straight passage, past a bolt into the oil pan down the timing chain area. All surfaces were cleaned, RTV applied, and the cover installed in one go very carefully this time. Seems to have done the trick. All broken in now, sounds mean.
http://www.compcams.com/Cam_Specs/CamDetails.aspx?csid=1173&sb=1 That's a very healthy cam and should sound mean: 240/246 @ .050, .541/.544 lift Range 2500-6500. You don't want to be winding that up to 6500 very often without some improvements to the oiling system (bigger pan, high flow pump, oil restrictors). Olds small blocks like to run up there with the small stroke (3.375), but the 455's with the large stroke (4.25) last longer below 6000. Even more critical for rev control (highly advised) are the 403's. With the monster bore to stroke ratio, (4.375 bore to 3.375stroke), they love to rev fast then go kablooey due to the weak blocks. Girdles seem to keep them alive in the really hot ones. Lots of power there, a natural for Gbodies.
Very mean sounding indeed. I havent heard the idle yet, but aparently its quite lumpy. It sounded like a competely different animal from before the build during break in also. It is oil restricted. High flow pump and oil pan were done by last owners (builders). Dick Miller supplied the oil restricting rods. He didnt seem to think it needed a girdle. Dick said not to rev it past 6300 MAX, so it will probably limited to 6100 with MSD. Probably be nice in a G-body, but its goin in a 69 Cutlass.
