72-76 455 Engine Build

Discussion in 'Street/strip 400/430/455' started by Christopher Spouse Drew, Jun 16, 2018.

  1. Christopher Spouse Drew

    Christopher Spouse Drew Well-Known Member

    Hey guys, quick question on removing the pistons, rods, and crank. I have to rotate the crank to get the rod and pistons out, whats the easiest way to rotate the crank now that I removed the timing cover assembly.
     
  2. hugger

    hugger Well-Known Member

    Put the bolt back in and use a socket, wrench, or even a good tight adjustable wrench
     
  3. Schurkey

    Schurkey Silver Level contributor

    Pull it around with the rim of the flexplate or the flywheel.
     
  4. Christopher Spouse Drew

    Christopher Spouse Drew Well-Known Member

    Hey guys, I have my original engine disassembled and want to get the wrist pins out of the piston, it moves side to side so its not a press in piston, so there must be a c-clip or a snap ring, right? How do you guys remove them?
     
  5. hugger

    hugger Well-Known Member

    It is a press fit into the rod not the piston, floating pins are slip fit in the rod and piston, they are retained by locks, you have to Bush the rods to achieve this
     
  6. Christopher Spouse Drew

    Christopher Spouse Drew Well-Known Member

    Okay so I just have to press the wrist pin out. Thanks.
     
  7. Schurkey

    Schurkey Silver Level contributor

    ...which may ruin the piston(s).

    Any machine shop I've dealt with won't guarantee the pistons will be salvageable once the pins are pressed out of the rods. Sometimes they're OK. Sometimes not.

    This is not a big deal, because OEM pistons and older aftermarket pistons are "less than optimum" to begin with. The compression height is too low even if the rest of the piston is otherwise "ok".
     
  8. Christopher Spouse Drew

    Christopher Spouse Drew Well-Known Member

    These pistons are toast, they are from 74, I think it's time to throw them away haha.
     
  9. Christopher Spouse Drew

    Christopher Spouse Drew Well-Known Member

    Hey guys, I need some advice for my heads. I'm going with stage 1 valves, and im not porting the heads. I cant find a flow bench nearby to see what these heads will flow. So without these flow numbers, its hard to know at what lift will the heads start back flowing at. I'm thinking about picking a cam with 500 lift. Now someone explain to me how to choose valve springs? I know TA has the Stage 1 Valve Springs which go up to .500 lift so it will match the cam lift, but is that it?
     
  10. hugger

    hugger Well-Known Member

    No need for a bench, just clean up behind the valve, if the heads are going to be cut for the big valves that will be a must anyway. I wouldn't get undone about flow #s , pretty much nothing can be done to "hurt" flow behind the valve, that happens when guys start hogging out the runners and get the cross section so big velocity goes down and flow suffers. No worries in "squaring" up the entry a little, dropping the short turn a touch, knocking the hard edge off the guide boss and blending the bowl in,...

    But for the springs essentially yes, for a mild 500 lift cam the "stage 1 plus" is what you want. No need for a dual spring, and the stock spring would be on the edge so go with the "plus" spring
     
    Last edited: May 1, 2019
  11. 12lives

    12lives Control the controllable, let the rest go

  12. Christopher Spouse Drew

    Christopher Spouse Drew Well-Known Member

    No money for aluminum heads, my machine shop is giving me a good price on the stage 1 conversion. and I just decided im going to port the heads and manifold, as much as I dont want to spend the time doing it haha but it will be worth it.
     

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