Blueprint machining videos, B.B. Buick

Discussion in 'Street/strip 400/430/455' started by MN GS455, Jan 14, 2019.

  1. MN GS455

    MN GS455 Well-Known Member

  2. MN GS455

    MN GS455 Well-Known Member

  3. Bens99gtp

    Bens99gtp Well-Known Member

    nice to see more places being able to fully blueprint our motors the correct way as other makes have been able to been done.

    since for most of us this is new territory, what window of cost is someone looking at to index cam tunnel, and lifters, and all the dowls.


    say a block has already been alone honed correctly on the crank, block tried, and bored, can this work be done later......say when the next refresh time comes about.
     
    Last edited: Jan 14, 2019
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  4. MN GS455

    MN GS455 Well-Known Member

  5. MN GS455

    MN GS455 Well-Known Member

    Yes, it’s all the same machines, just more tooling to add. Sometimes tough for a shop to justify a $7000 for main and cam tunnel honing mandrels or $3000 worth of engine specific lifter bore and cam tunnel tooling if they don’t see a lot of these.
    Shops with CNC machines can do some of it with what they have though.
     
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  6. MN GS455

    MN GS455 Well-Known Member

    You can certainly do the cam tunnel and lifter bores at a later time. If the block has been trued from the front, that’s where the cam is indexed from, so it will all be in alignment with the decks.

    I don’t do pricing or retail work here. I’d guess it would vary a little from shop to shop.
     
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  7. Bens99gtp

    Bens99gtp Well-Known Member

    had to hear it should be able to most likely be an add on to an otherwise" basiclly done block".

    my previous motor had some issue going on in the cam and lifter area.......If I degreed the cam in on #1 and then on #6 I was off be about 6 degrees if I recall......I split the difference and ran it, it always had heavy wear on the front cam bearing, had to replace it a few times over the 2500 passes I put on it
     
  8. Bens99gtp

    Bens99gtp Well-Known Member

    so question,

    the cam bearing bore is sized already to the correct size.....I think something like 1.915 rolls around in my grey matter. could be wrong..... but anyway. let's say a cam was off .005 vertically and .003 perpendicularly now to get a new correct center line for the cam the hole will be to large to retain a factory bearing correct??

    I know on rods and mains they grind the caps make the hole too small the resize to be round......but that cant happen the the middle of the block.......you would have to use some form or oversized or other motors bearing......what is used
     
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  9. MN GS455

    MN GS455 Well-Known Member

    We use oversized cam bearings. T/A makes oversized set and I Machine some too. Nice thing with the oversize is, the thicker wall. I'm able to do a single oiling groove on the back side and have much better bearing rigidity than the stock thickness bearing. The housing bore for the .020” over is 1.9365” and then I have a 1.9625” as well, which is .046” oversize. That will fix about any spun or damaged bore.
     
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  10. Mark Demko

    Mark Demko Well-Known Member

    VERY interesting:cool:
    I love machine work, just wish I knew how to do it, use the tools, AND had the equipment:eek:
     
  11. Thumper (aka greatscat)

    Thumper (aka greatscat) Well-Known Member

    This is a machining process that 's worth a few hp. besides making things "right"and promotes longevity . some 25 years ago we had to do this on a motor that spun a rod bearing, unusual but happened. We honed the tunnel then used v6 cam bearings. Didn't do lifter bores though. When he sold the car many passes later, the motor was still going strong.
     
    Last edited: Jan 15, 2019
  12. MN GS455

    MN GS455 Well-Known Member

    You can hone to the next oversize but it won’t correct the Center to Center if it’s off. Probably harder on stones than I’d want to be but it would work. When they’re bored, even if sway is not corrected, most anyone can get the main and cam back to parallel by using a main datum bar and measuring the distance between the two bars when it’s in the Machine.
    The V6 cam bearings work great, plus they offer the .025” over that size as well. I use them too.
     
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  13. Jim Weise

    Jim Weise EFI/DIS 482

    Thanks Ron for posting this stuff.

    I asked him to do it, as he is the exclusive machinist for TSP here, and a video is worth a thousand words.

    He does not do retail work directly, it is all done thru TSP. He stays busy, he is one of the most experienced Buick block guys out there now.. he's at 48 iron blocks and counting for me at TSP in the last 8 years, plus probably a dozen he had done before that, and a couple of his own.

    That block in the videos he is working on was for me, belongs to Larry Berte (Buizilla) from the board here. I just delivered it a couple weeks ago to him down in Milwaukee.

    To answer your question Ben, the cam tunnel and lifter bore operations are $375 each.. so having a fully blueprinted block is another $750 investment over the standard machine work.

    A fully blueprinted block, ready to wash and assemble, with cam bearings installed, is $2250/exchange..

    A block that the lifter bores and cam tunnel are checked, and noted, but not blueprinted, is $1500/exchange

    I personally do all the prep work/ sonic testing/ oil mods, install the bearings, and make sure it's ready for use.

    Obviously we are not going to ship anything that we think will be an issue, when it comes to non-blueprinted cam tunnels and lifter bores. A spec sheet will be provided with each engine, and this block will be a perfect match for our 470 and 482 rotating assemblies. 10.550 deck height is standard... Will work with anyone's parts, and you can customize your block (bore and main housing sizes and deck height) if you wish.

    Deliver cost is $175 to any fastenal location in the USA. You simply put your core block in the crate that your fresh one arrives in, and take it back to the fastenal that you picked it up at, and they ship it back to me.

    We think this is a great resource for guys that don't have machining connections locally, are ready for a change, or just want to step up to a fully blueprinted block. I don't know that anyone else offers this level of service.

    I plan to have them on the shelf for immediate delivery this summer. Even if we are sold out, we can turn one in a couple weeks normally, let us know what your time constraints are.

    Thanks
    JW
     
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  14. Bens99gtp

    Bens99gtp Well-Known Member

    for an extra 750 that's money well spent. it will of course free up some hp, but the have all 8 cylinders under closer timing events, the lifters running true equals less parasitic load and wear, less oil leakage around the lifters equals more oil pressure to the places we need it most. timing chains wont be pulled on as hard and last longer with a cam not wanting to corkscrew around, less loading on the distributor gears, and actual timing staying truer... .......awsome

    look we will have mail order blocks now too.......on many different levels for all our power needs
     
  15. hugger

    hugger Well-Known Member

    You got a need for any blocks so some could be stocked and ready to ship? In exchange for some $ off a prepped block?
     
  16. Jim Weise

    Jim Weise EFI/DIS 482

    Sure, we can do something I am sure Ethan..

    JW
     
  17. MN GS455

    MN GS455 Well-Known Member

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  18. chrome yellow

    chrome yellow Well-Known Member

    I doubt that I’m the only one but this sounds like a great deal. Machined and blueprinted block ready to wash and assemble. I’ll be in for one when there on the shelf. Be nice to start a build with a Buick block done right.
     
    Mark Demko likes this.
  19. Tom Righter

    Tom Righter Well-Known Member

    Jim just curious, do you also have grooving the main saddles in your program?
     
  20. Jim Weise

    Jim Weise EFI/DIS 482

    Tom, I am sure we can, although with the advent of aftermarket blocks that already have that feature, we have not been doing it on the factory blocks.. for the mild to moderate builds that I do regularly. You need that extra oil groove, and the extra bearing holes, for high bleed deals.. big main clearance, full time rod oiling mods, big rod bearing and side clearances.

    Thanks for mentioning this.. we will nail down the procedure, and pricing, and offer it as an option on our block program. I am doing a couple iron block moderate HP bracket motors this spring.
     

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