Well, just an update... My girdled short block is at Chris Skaling's shop, he will do the alum head porting final assembly and dyno NA then ship it to me. The car hauler project is coming along! I will use this to carry light vehicles around when I don't want to hook up the big enclosed trailer. Next thing to do is headers and new exhaust off the 460, and then air bags in the rear to help level it out under load.
We are building some longer ramps to lessen the angle between the ground and the beaver tail... The deck does not slide it just tilts. The deck tilts much more than in the pics but that only makes the angle worse. The plan is to do some trial runs and see exactly how the ramps need to be and then build them. I had no issues getting my parts car Buick skylark on there with the existing setup and 5 foot ramps to lessen the angle at the bottom but my other car sits lower on the front... It drove around fine with the car on the back, the other one is about 700 pounds lighter too. Will still need air bags to level it out but that's easy.
Unfortunately the new owner of my car is having some issues. This is the same thing I had happen on my engine, so we are closer towards sorting out the problem. The car was running great on 7 PSI of boost, good at 10 PSI and then at 12 PSI it blew the head gasket on number 3 cylinder. I gave him some Scotty Brown gaskets and again it blew the number 3 cylinder head gasket. It was making 460 HP at the tires on 10 PSI and running 11s in the quarter. This is the car: The plan for both of us is to add a Air Fuel (02 sensor) in the header tube at the #3 cylinder as well as an Temperature probe so we can monitor things better. Right now we are only seeing an air fuel ration of an average of the 4 cylinders on that bank.
Let Scott know about your issues with the head gaskets and hopefully he'll look into it. Those are supposed to handle 25 PSI, blowing @ only half of what they're rated for would make me mad if it was mine. Is the deck on that block machined or is it the factory finish? Thanks. Derek
Block was machined. It was not the high boost that was causing the failure I think it is that cylinder going lean and detonating.
Exactly, that's a tune-up issue not a gasket issue, get rid of that carb bonnet you need an OPEN extreme velocity or Steve Morris hat,
Yes it's a tune issue. When you go over the timing edge on the Buick v8's with boost it is not a good thing. I took out an "orange crush" gasket when I first went to boost but it was nothing like that! I mean there are blown head gaskets and then there are BLOWN head gaskets..
I'm not sure what his timing was at but I was running 20 degrees and still blowing that same #3 so I think it is leaning out. Will get the air/fuel meter bung and pyrometer (temp) installed into that header primary. Read the plugs and sort it out.
Yes looking into options for MPFI they just keep getting better so quick so I've been holding off... Will do a good Efi system for sure.
Quote from Scott brown as I filled him in on the info and photo: Hi Sean, I agree, it is likely lean in that hole and causing you issue. I don't have a lot of blow through carb experience to be honest, but even with EFI it is easy to have a hole that is out of whack with the others. I do a lot with Jim Monson on his single turbo Mustang and most of the time I have worked with him he has a single hole that is always finicky, and that cylinder has timing out and fuel added to help alleviate the issue. He uses a big stuff 3 so it is easy to make those adjustments. It runs several degrees less timing and a good percentage more fuel. He has a well designed, well ported manifold, as well as a Wilson throttle body and elbow and still has issues, so it just comes with the territory. The more you lean on it, the bigger issue it becomes. I'm not sure what to recommend as far as addressing the issue. Is it possibly starving for fuel? Remember pressure isn't volume so even though it may have plenty of fuel pressure, it still may not have adequate volume. Perhaps the carb hat is an issue and causing that cylinder to lean out. Thanks, Scott
The current hat doesn't have enough area above the carb for the air to straighten out I can almost guarantee a good hat will probably resolve the issue, plenty of guys have lost engines with bad hats, the more psi the more important they become
If anyone goes Mpfi I can help point you in the right direction. This is one of the scenarios I was worried about with blow through or TBI. Although mpfi won't be totally effective without a wideband sensor in each primary (which is a little overkill for me on a mild boosted motor). I already think I went overboard with the efi. Sent from my VS990 using Tapatalk
#3 huh? Odd thing there, it was #3 on my Olds 215 that I nibbled away the top ring land to the point where it exposed the ring. Never blew the head gasket though. That was with 16 psi of boost and some intercooling, but not a whole lot. But also stock cam, valves, and runners. Still, #3. Odd. An alternative to O2 sensors is to use EGT probes. I fitted my headers with ports for those at the start of each runner. But the probes are about $50 each and you have to have something to read them. It's a work in progress. I did fit up a Holley fuel tank mat and clone Bosch 44 fuel pump with bigger lines. You can't rule out starvation until you have a reliably supply side. But with the EGT probes in place, a good engine management system can tailor fuel to the cylinder. Spark advance too after COP is added. That is where I'm headed but it'll still take awhile to get there. Jim
Yes I will add an EGT bung in #3 cylinder and may add more later... 8 EGT probes would be ideal so I will buy a good setup that can support that. A good EFI system may have EGT inputs too! I have a mega squirt setup here but there are much better setups now...
http://www.motorsportsinnovations.com/Holley/holley-efi-sensors.html#egt That kit should work with a holley dominator ecu
