I tore down 2 455's for a harvest of parts, both cranks have some serious metal missing from a few rod journals. Are these still useable? I would assume so if they were cut down to chevy rod size, or maybe a stroker? I didn't measure them yet, but to give you an idea one rod bearing was GONE... no fragments, just gray sludge in the pan and otherwise it pulled a Houdini. When I went to loosen the rod bolts I was surprised by ALOT of free play.
Do you have a set of calipers to measure the journals? Doing a stroker, more material is removed from the under side of the throw until it is to the stroke its being changed too. It would be an advantage for the crank to have as much material on the journal to get the most out of the crank to make it a stroker. It does look like it can be cleaned up to the standard stroke using BBC rods though. They even may be able to be taken down to .030" or .040" under and clean up? Would need to be measured to know for sure though. If you want to take them down further and do an econo-stroker using aftermarket 5.4L Ford rods(6.658" long with 2.086" rod journal size that the big end would have to be narrowed from .939" to .928"), you could probably get close to 482 cubes using the 5.4L under sizes to help get you there? The 5.4L Ford rods with a set of AutoTec pistons that you can now get through JW @ Tri-Shield Performance. The new Molnar BBB 482 rods might even do the trick, those use the sbc rod bearings that have a 2.100" rod journal size, Jim Weise fro Tri-Shield would be able to help you with those as well. GL
I’ve seen some spun cranks that were able to be used,and some that were not. Have the crank checked for for any defects or issues result from the spun bearing. If it is blue,like Stevem said,do not use it.
Depends on how much material is missing there.. IT will certainly end up at some undersize for a 2.200 or 2.100 offset grind, I might tend to agree that crank might be better suited to a stock stroke 2.200 or 2.100 grind. If you go that way I could modify one of my exclusive Autotec pistons to drop right in with all the stock Buick stuff, you juse specify a compression distance, if something other that 2" is needed. Almost all small stroker cranks end up .010 under on the rods, because unless they are really pristine, we need some material to remove on the non-offset size, to clean it up. I have done about 30 off these small offset grinds now, and I recall 1 or 2 that made standard size on the rods. From the eyeball looks of it, that crank would end up at least .020 if not .030 undesize on the rods, right off the bat, and I would not recommend that you start there. And it's a rural mailbox holder if it's broken, they often are cracked in the radius of the throw when they get hot like that, Have it magnafluxed before you do anything. JW
it could be welded. the machine shop i worked at had a crank welding machine. it was cost prohibitive. it only got used if a replacement crank was not readily available.
Didn't see any pronounced bluing anywhere, but I'll see after I clean it up. One crank has two separate rod journals trashed, another just has one. Glad I paid "core" prices for these engines.
The catch 22 of them being welded up is that even though it can be done without worry of failure, the cranks 'we' did this to were very expensive and the market is strong enough to not have to compete price wise. If you want to give them to someone that can make use of them, I'm sure they'd be accepted.
Yea I'd rather someone get use from them if needed rather then just scrapping them. I'll measure both to see what is there, and magnaflux the next round to the machine shop to see if they're usable.
