It sounds like he's already put all the piston in. From that you can usually tell what is going on by the distribution of clearance variations. Front to back, side to side, rods lengths and/or the throws. At this point I would simply look at the data he already has, see what its telling him, and then make a decision on next steps, if any.
Like Cab, I find its usually the rods.
Thanks for all the replies! Yes, the motor is already together and I was looking at the spec sheet and noticed that they were not all the same. The following is how it measured out:
1-.010
2-.013
3-.010
4-.010
5-.012
6-.014
7-.014
8-.014
I really appreciate all of the help and input from you guys. This is a motor that I got along with a car I bought and the short block was already assembled by the machine shop. Any more input so far as the head gasket thickness?
Are these your measurements? If I did anything at all, I would first double check all the numbers two more times and convince myself of what the numbers are. Then for fun, I might switch the #4 with #8, and switch #3 with #7 and see how the numbers change, if at all. If it changes for the better, switch #1 with #6, but you might need to turn the piston on the rod.
At the end of the day, you're plenty good to go with it the way it is now. And it's unlikely to swap around to get much better than 0.003 difference.
