Tomorrow I'm going to get some rubber hose and see if I can narrow down the sound. Any of you heard anything like this?

first, no, it's NOT an accessory belt/pulley issue. I removed the belt and the sound was unchanged. I hooked the belt back up to circulate water with the pump after trying it without a belt.

Details are: stock 5.9L block, stock cast crank, new rods, new pistons, everything balanced together, edelbrock heads, and 1.6 adjustable roller rockers from Hughes. cam is 220/230 @ .050 114 LSA, hardened pushrods.

I didn't notice the sound initially, had some isues on first fire-up with the headers getting hot and starting to glow faintly, looked at cam timing and found it was 6 degrees retarded (never again will I just line up the dots!!!) advanced it with a different timing set and 2 degree key so it's now at 110installed centerline the way the cam card says it should have been originally.

noticed the sound after I got the rockers re-set and started the engine back up.

pulled the distributor out and spun it around, it feels fine, smooth, no squeeks when spun by hand. pulled oil pump drive shaft and it looks normal, wear marks are dead center on the teeth of the gear, and the bronze bushing in the block looks ok, so I don't think thats worn and causing mis-alignment issues.

tomorrow I'll pull the crank position sensor and check it just to be sure it hasn't moved and is rubbing on the flexplate, maybe kill a cylinder at a time and remove intake/exhaust to see if it goes away with any one cylinder, run a compression test, leak down test, and see where I'm at.

if I can't find anything, I'll probably be pulling the intake for a visual inspection, and probably take the timing cover back off again.


any ideas on what this sound might be? aside from the roller cam and rocker arms, the internals to this engine are the same as all the other LA small blocks out there.

http://youtu.be/oYVDffxuduk

did u check to see if oil is getting to the top end??

Kinda sounds like a dry rocker?

Your rocker shafts aren`t installed right and the sound is the rockers.

yea it sounds like something is dry. check all valvetrain and look at bushing in block for oil pump drive. maybe something rubing in the timing chain ? I have heard some strange noises out of fuel rails before also..But first hand I want to think it sounds like a dry rocker ??

I thought rocker too. Can u pull a VC and try it to see if it is louder. Then try the other vc

sounds bad.... I wouldn't run it too much, pull a valve cover and run the oil pump on a drill or @ least on the starter with the plugs out @ see if its oiling up top

I'll check the rockers, I THOUGHT I remember seeing oil flying everywhere when I had it running -- I actually set the valve lash with it running, based on the advice of a lot of the other Dakota guys, got the stuff close enough to run, then as it was running, tightened down the lash and locked it up solid.

I sure hope it is just the rockers somewhere though, those are easy and right up on top!

the bronze distributor bushing looked good when I looked at it with a flashlight through the hole in the block, and like I said about the distributor/oil pump drive gear, the gear mesh pattern was right in the middle of the teeth, so I don't think the bushing is worn out causing slop there, otherwise the gears wouldn't be meshing properly, right?

these are the rockers I'm running:

http://www.hughesengines.com/Index/produ...mp;partid=25423

also appear to be the same as these cheap chevy rocker arms for $100 less:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/SBC-GM-350-Chevy...ecc&vxp=mtr

do the heads have new guilds in them ? fresh heads ? maybe one of them is to tight ? just throwing out ideas here. new style heads so no rocker shafts right.

Well them heads are know to have to tight of guilds. OOB.. I took my apart before I put them on and check. my was ok. But I have read storys

Well if you was careful.. and you got the tools to take the springs off. you could at lease get a feel for them. lot of diff ways to do this..I would not pull the head to check it out some.

well I would roll the cy up to TDC that I was checking and put some rope in the spark plug hole to keep the valve from falling. I say this because with air in there it is holding it tight and not let it fall down a little. so you can move it. you need to be able to slide is up and down and side to side to get a feel for it to see if it is to tight. I know this is not the corrected way to check them..but will give you some idea.I mean if you got push hard or pull hard to make it move you know it is to tight.

Did you pull the belt off and try it?

I swear I have had idler pulleys screech just like that.

I would think if you ran it with the covers off... you would remember cleaning up the mess

I have heard exhaust leaks sqeak and chirp just like that Usually in the collectors When you got closer to the right valve cover it sounded like a part rotating and rubbing or hitting some other parts I hope not, good luck