Hi Rich, Just a few things that I thought you might want to check with that Stef's oil pan. First- Check the pan rail width at the motor mount and starter locations. I have seen interferance at both of these locations. Second- Check the clearance of the pan to your crossmember, and to the center drag link, and where the outer tie rods attach. What I have done in the past is bolt the pan on the block (or a dummy block), and drop the block in the car and bolt in place. Turn your steering lock to lock and check for interferance. I know that this is a pain, but better to find the issuses before the engine is all buttoned up and installed. I have spent countless hours doing R&D on my pans to try to avoid these problems, however each application is a little different and sometimes some tweaking is required. Stef's builds a good product, but I think that because of the low volume of the Buick products, they don't spend enough time testing and finalizing the final fit and function. Unfortunatly that's part of big business! Hope that this helps as I understand you are working with time issues. Steve Reynolds / SRE Performance Fabrications, Inc.
Hey Steve, Thanks for the Suggestions :TU: I'll give all those things a once over. At this point, I wouldn't doubt if I experance 1 of the above that you have mentioned. Hopefully it's the starter, or the motor mount issue :grin: . I figured there would some fabing, but not as much as I have done this far. The real pain in the but is making a change, then cleaning the pan spotless so you can test fit it. I think I've spent more time cleaning than I have grinding and filing on it I really appreciate your suggestions and time! It say's alot about you stepping and giving pointers on a pan that you didn't even build :TU: You should speek with Dave Dehaybe about getting a pan that fits for his girdle instead of using the stef's pan. While the stef's may be a good pan........... I would think they could have at least made it a bit closer than what it is (the crank is still hitting..... I may have to oblong the holes as scoot it over a bit ) Thanks again.
Re: balancer Thanks you guys!!:bglasses: :TU: I appreciate the responses... I like as many options as possible! I WILL keep this info in mind when choosing a new balancer this winter!
Small update. Chad came up last night to degree the cam. It's a good thing he did........ As it turns I had orginally set it up on the wrong key ou: Just one more good reason to degree the cam instead of just taking some marks for their word! Looks like I'll be taking Wed's off work. If all goes well, I'll have her fired up by then.
Man..... FINALLY!!!!! Fired it up and broken in the cam this morning......... Now I have another issue. Went to put the car into gear, and SNAP. Shift Cable broke What Next Eh? I called ShiftWorks. He's sending me a new cable and it should be here by Saturday. Hopefully the GS will be crusing around getting broke in tomorrow. I must add...... John (I think that's his name) the owner of ShiftWorks has been VERY good to deal with over the years. You couldn't ask for things to go smother! I recomend him 100%. I still have the trany to check out from Chad sticking the hardend drum and 3/4 cluch pack....... Looks like the Black Car and Vegas are coming down to the wire As long as nother somewhat major setback doesn't happen, it will be there............ somewhat untuned, but there all the same.
GOOD NEW's guys. Dispite having a broken shifter cable, I took the car for a drive to check out the trany. I just manually stuck the car into OD (700R4) and drove it for about 8 to 10 miles. Everything worked like a CHAMP!! One the good side, my hot oil presure is exreamly good. In drive at Idle 800rpm I have 22lbs of presure Going down the road at 2500rpm I have 60lbs of pressure. For now everything seems really good :TU: Vegas Here We Come!!!! I must say a big thinks to my good buddy Chad! He did the Trany and helped me thrash on this thing for about 7 hours until Midnight on Weds. I couldn't have completed this without him. :beer
Well Guys, she's back on the road and all seems really good. I've logged about 200 miles on here, and the rings have seen about 10 to 12 heat cycles. Where the pistions are already seasoned to the holes, I'm not going to worry about much more breakin time. The new Cable cam from Shiftworks yesterday, and everything seems great with the trany so far (however, now full throttle shift tests have been done). The tranny does seem to be sifting MUCH more consistantly that it was in the past. I'm pretty sure the mods done this time curred the 2 / 3 sift issue I've been fighting the last year and 1/2. I think I'm going to stick the blower on the car once I get off work today. That should allow me to atleast get one test run in before putting the car in the trailer and heading the Vegas................ Still not real sure what to expect ........... I guess will know in about 5 days :Brow: On a nice side note, Chad (my sinsay) made a nice little gig that alowed the inner valve spring to stuck back in on the #8 cylinder (with AC) after the cam breakin. I'll post some pics' so you can see his nice little simple to make tool.
You Go Boy!!!! Good Luck at Vegas. I wish we all had a Chad to help out when needed. Buy him several and thank him from all of us. :beer Can't wait to see how she performs. :TU:
Thanks Bill, Your absolutly right. If everyone had someone as smart as chad (car wise) the world would be a better place for all car guys! It's amazing the stuff he keeps in his head! The Fam and I (wife and 2 boys) just took the car out for it's first taste of boost on the fresh motor....... Sure seems strong. It will be cool to see what it will do if we can get a nice clean pass at Vegas. The tranny under boost hit the limiter once (now set at 5600 rpm down from 6000). I'm going to put heavier weights on on it and hopefully that makes it happy Can't wait for Friday...........
Well Guys..... I hate to say it, but the trany has been doing the same old song and dance (not wanting to shift under WOT). Chad found a GM bullition on the 700R4 that showed to drill out the seperator plate in one spot when the trany doesn't shift under WOT. I just got the valve body back in, and the car is getting put in the trailer shortly for Vegas in the Morning. If this did not correct the issue, I'll have to get out of the throttle for it to shift into 2nd and 3rd (talk about killing your time and consistancy). If this didn't fix it, when I get back from Vegas, I'll be putting a manaul valve body in the trany to fix it once and for all. I haven't had a hole lot of time to play with the new motor and trany, so hopefully all is well I should have vid's of the meet once I get back (as long as someone will run the camera) I'll post them for all to see. Catch you all in a few days.
Well Fellas....... I wish I had good news, along with a vid of the car, but I don't. This is how Friday night went. Got to Vegas about 2:30pm. I Put the larger pulley on the night before (it made the boost about the same as what I had here). Jetted it up 2 sizes all the way around. Stuck 1 step colder plugs in and left the timing at 30 total. First run with the alky injection on 9, it bogged way bad out of the hole and into second gear. While in second gear, I was turning the alky down slowly, shifted into 3rd, kept turning alky down until it was on about 2 (not working at all basically). She finnaly cam alive and ran pretty hard about 1/2 through 3rd gear. It ended up traping a 12.7 @ 107mph. Took the car back to the trailer. Since the car was bogging with alky, we knew it was rich. We took 2 jet sizes back out of it on all the corners. and went back to run with the alky on 5. The car came out of the hole the best it ever had 1.71 60ft time. Chad said the car was all but pulling the left tire (this is with the nittos). I hit second gear, and there was the bog again (still jetted rich). I just reached down and turned the alky off. Man the car cam alive. Shifted into 3rd, and by about the 1100 to 1150ft mark, the car was hitting the revlimmiter (6000) at the top of 3rd. I got out of it and coasted through to a 11.8 @ 115mph (with lots of SMOKE) The motor didn't make any noise what so ever, so I figured the PVC leaked some boost and blew it out of the breather on the valve cover onto the header. All the engine signs were good gauge wise. The ticket both guy asked if I blew a head gasket from because I had a bunch of smoke coming out of the tail pipes :eek2: . I drove the car back to the trailer and shut it down. After looking at it, we desided to pull it into the trailer to start taking things apart. When I fired it up this time, I heard what sounded like a lifter tick. (the guys out side didn't hear anything other than the blower wine). We went and borowed John S's compression gauge and did a test. Number 7 was DEAD didn't read at all. We thought maybe we had lost a valve kepper or something so off cam the valve cover.......... Nope everything was in tacked. Chad had me slowly start bumping the motor over until his eyes went like this :eek2: He said "Come tell me what you see". I went and looked......... The piston in #7 was sideways! You sould see the ring lands in the piston :eek2: . Needless to say, it stayed in the trailer and we just watched the rest of the time We had a GREAT TIME watching everyone and meeting lots of the guys there! The Track had the best Prep I've ever used, and the facility is TOP NOTCH!. We had a blast dispite loosing the motor in the car :beer Since the car was running out of gear at the 1100 to 1150ft mark, with tuning that would have just got worse. We wouldn't have been about to run mush anyway (not enough gear, and NO CAGE). Next year will = Better Motor, Cage, and Less Gear!! :beer Stay tuned, I'll post picks of the carnag once I've got the head off in a few days (I'm kind of sick of working on it now).
Thank God for trailers! WOW!:jd: I didn't even know that was possible!!?? What gears? I thought you have 3.73's and 700R4? You shouldn't have been tach'ing that high.. What diameter tires? Yep, time for a cage.. Not looking forward to seeing some photos, but curious.
WOW.... I really need to slow down and proof read my posts :grin: Yeah, you cold see rings through the spark plug hole. I didn't think it was possible either especailly not having water in the oil and vise versa Your spot on with the Gears and Trany. The tires are 275-40-17's. They are 26inches tall. With the 3.73 gears, that puts you toping 3rd at 6grand right around 118mph. The 700R4 will not shift into OD under full throttle (I'm not sure you would want it to with 500+hp and torque anyway :grin: . Here's our thoughts............. 3.23 to 3.42 gears....... Lock the converter up in 3rd, and a motor with light weight forged pistions, nice rods and internaly balanced. That should allow us to rev it to say 6500 or so without worrying to much.......... we will also stick a bit or hardblock in this time. This motor combo has way more potential that we thought. With Gears and a motor that revs a bit higher, I don't think 11.00's or 10.90 is out of the question at about 128 to 130mph on my nitto's (I like to race how it's driven from show to show :beer . Time WILL tell :grin:
Extremely sorry to hear about the carnage Rich!!!:ball: :ball: Especially after your recent 'thrash' to get it there. This sure emphasises the need for the upcoming heavy duty blocks!! On a positive note...your combo has some serious potential left in it!!!:TU: :bglasses: As the Cubs fans usually say (maybe not this year though)...JUST WAIT TIL NEXT YEAR!!!:Comp:
Thanks Scott, It was alot of time and money to get the car there for 2 runs. However, you to figure these kind of things can happen..... Dispite what happened it was ALOT of fun! Thanks for the kind words and encouragement! It will be back next year.
Sure would like to talk you out of using the 700 R4... but that's up to you. I spent a LOT of time deciding on tranny, rear gears, and tire size. Ultimately, I decided on reducing rear gears (numerically), from 4.33 to 4.10. And increasing tire diameter, from 28" to 29". That also helped traction a bunch, and kept finish line RPM's right where they belong. I thought LONG & HARD about OD tranny, (especially to reduce crusing RPM, which is about 3,400 with 27's and 4.33's! :eek2: ) but I have ALOT of $ in my tranny/TC now. Plus, no one would/could(?) GUARUNTEE an OD tranny behind the 455, especially the 700 R4. 4LE80, but MAN that was expensive!!:jd: I think it makes much more sense to get a GV/OD, $-wise for me, since I've went down a different fork than OD tranny. I'd have to REDO everything... Anyways, enough rambling. My LONG point was, why not just increase tire diameter? +1" increase makes a big difference:eek2: And 28's would work better for you anyways IMO.
Well..... the 700R4 has taken everything I have thrown at it so far! My only complaint was that it wasn't shifting when I told it too. That now Fixed! I have no reason to not beleive this trany is not good for low 11's to high 10's. It's got every upgraded hard part availible for the 700 in it and has been VERY stout so far. Until it fails from too much power, I will keep running it :grin: I like going down the freeway at 2700 at 80mph. and still clicking off nice quarter mile times. (in street trim). Beleive me, if they made a tire for 17's that was 28 inches tall, I WOULD have it! They don't make one! I run my car as It's driven on the street. I could swap to slicks on 15's, but I think it's more fun running them how they are driven. .........
GOOD NEW's Just pulled the head. The piston is good! I'm not sure what Chad, John S. his mechanic and myself saw, but all four of us would have swore it was the piston in sideways!.... He's the pick....... Just bad head gasket damage!
