Well, for everyone that has wanted to know....I found out for you at Norwalk. On the second pass of the day, at the end of the track the throttle on the car hung open (the screw that was holding the return springs on busted). The bad thing is that on a 68 the key is not on the column, so I couldn't reach the key to shut the motor off once the throttle was stuck with my harnesses tight (that will be changed this time). By the time I got the belts loosened enough to reach the key to shut the motor down, the tach was at 7200. As I got the car stopped at the end of the track, there was a lot of smoke coming from under the car. I knew right off the bat what was wrong.....I didn't expect the stock rods to hold up to this. I pulled the motor last night and the pictures are the results of what happen. Overall, it could have been a lot worse, but it still sucks anyway
What a bummer. There seemed to be motors blowing up all over the place at Norwalk this year, it was makeing me nervous. That seems to be a good example of pure rod failure. Most of the time you have a black journel from a spun bearing. Guess we now know that stock rods are good to 7100 :Brow: . Hang in there, like you said it could of been worse. You could have ended up on your head and on fire.
I have to agree with you on that Shayne. Ran my GS for 17 passes at Norwalk logged in 60 runs total on the engine and each time down on the high end I cross my fingers. Man I can't wait for that new block. Denny, damn shame about your engine, but on the other hand it could have been far worse had you been unable to shut her down, or if the engine let go through the pan spraying oil under your tires. Just ask Doug, he mentioned that he was totally blinded in the car while trying to stop it. Pretty scary ride. Glad at least you stopped the car safely.
Denny, hate to hear the bad news. Like Rick said, the big end of the track gives me an uneasy feeling too. I know that I'm on the edge and have been for a long time and will continue to be.
Block john Looks as if the block will be saveable, i think that we can get away with 2 sleeves on numbers 7 and 8 cylinders, it never went into the block, just the bottom of the skirts. I am not feeling bad about the motor at all considering that my first concern was trying to stop the car. I was pretty much figuring that it is a lot easier to rebuild a motor than it is to rebuild the entire car, if i would have ended up going of the end of the track. But i will say, that i would have never thought about having a kill switch mounted anywhere since the car still starts with the key, but as of right now....this car will have a kill switch mounted on it somewhere that is easy to get to.
Denny- sorry to hear about your rod failure but yes, the engine can easily be replaced or repaired compared to the whole car, or for that matter you, if you'd done a little sand surfing But there's an opportunity here: take a lot of photos of the sleeving process, and post them, maybe some other folks will be encouraged to save what they feel is a 'junk' block :TU:
Ok, I have to ask, Denny: Why doesn't your ignition have a rev-limiter? Would a rev-limit chip prevented this? Thanks!
Denny, We need to put that 6AL in. I can set up your HEI to use it with the MSD. Steve ps- Should have let me go get it Thursday nite like I wanted to!
Rev-limiter George When we got to Norwalk on thursday, the car had a rev limiter in the tach. There was actually 2 tachs in the car, when i bought the car back, the buddy of mine had one tach that was a good one (that read more acurate) and one that he used that had a built in rev limiter in it. I had some electrical bugs that were giving the car a really bad miss. Once i located it (it was the wiring on the other tach) i took it out and the car ran fine. I figured that i could run it till we got back home on sunday and then put a good rev limiter in it......well, it never made it that far...as you can see. And to answer your question.....yes, i think that a rev limiter would have saved this motor. A VERY GOOD LESSON LEARNED HERE.
