Hey guys, looking for a little advice on freshening up my motor. Machine work just isn't in the budget; I've actually got the opportunity to have an engine built by a local Hemi/big block guru so later this year hoping to start putting together a 400/451 stroker with him.

This motor is for my pulling truck, a 67 W200 4 speed. Started pulling last summer and by the end of the season I found enough power that I was breaking Dana 60 axles the last few feet of every run.
-The bottom end is all original out of a 68 Imperial, the flat top pistons are sitting ~ .050-.055" in the hole
-Heads are ported 915's flowing 240cfm on the intake and 170cfm on the exhaust @.500".
-Cam is a mild solid Comp, .494" with 236* duration @ .050 on the intake/exhaust. Last year -Intake was the stock cast iron intake, but this year I'll probably be running an M1(3 other 440's in my class running/recommending it) or a ported Victor(probably too radical for my combo though)
-Holley 750dp w/mechanical secondaries, I dropped a rebuilt 850 from a swap meet on for a pull and it ran worse, never tried to tune it in, just put it back on the shelf.
-Headers I'll hopefully get made in the next few weeks(had a cobbled set on before to clear the crossmember) and will be running a header evac system

Planning on a set of cast iron rings and new bearings inside, haven't plastigauged/mic'd the crank journals yet. I've got the bore specs at the shop, I'll have to post them later, but the largest spot I found was 4.328".

Rules state:
must pull 14" of vacuum @ 1000rpm
pump fuel, we have 93 local but I like to run ~90 for everyday driving (could run 87 in it last year)
no dominator carbs

I know a rebuild is the way to go, but it just isn't possible at the moment.
Any advice on rings?
What about bearings? I put about 800 miles on the truck last year just driving to the pulls so longevity is important. I kept the RPM's conservative last year(under 6000) with no plans to go beyond that.
Any other advice anyone has that would fit with this build would be great.

thanks everyone.

Hi,Corey Who is doing your engine in C.C...

The engine will be in the hands of Lynn Balek in Mason City. I was fortunate enough to meet Lynn a few months back and know it'll be in excellent hands.
Another great stroke of luck was earlier this month when I got hooked up with R & J Performance. I'd bought my 915's several years ago here on Moparts and had since lost the paperwork on them. Radar got me the flow numbers I'm working with and this winter I'll have him change from the 2.08 to a 2.14 to pick up some flow on the intake side.
It's still hard to believe these opportunities, it's like I won the lottery or something

Corey

Hastings rings have more radial tension than others thus work well on re-ring jobs--I would use the standard cast rings no moly--they just seem to do better on re rings. No reason you can't hone the normal way--just go with your shops advice on finish etc--they have done tons of them so let him do it his way --ball hones are OK but I feel it is better to use std type with the honing oil gushing --know that it will take some TIME for the rings to " conform" to the old bores so drive it for a few weeks before hammering on it Good luck! Go get 'em!

I agree completely that I'm rather limited, I pretty much figured I was sitting at that point where there's nothing more to be done without spending the big bucks.

That's good to know about the Hastings rings, they're what my dad would always use so more than likely I use them too. I'd read about the plain cast rings being the route to go on a rering also.

I'm going to remove the rotating assembly today and plan on plasti-gauging all of the journals as well as mic'ing them to see how the clearances are. Oil pressure wasn't bad last year, 20-25lbs at a warm idle and around 50lbs on a cold idle with cen pe co 20w50. Just looking at the power level the motor's at and the number of street miles it sees, does anyone have advice on bearing choices? Originally I'd had planned on running Clevite77, but recently started reading about Kings bearings. I know some guys really love them, but there were some discussions about longevity. I'll get some measurements from the crank today in case it makes any difference on a bearing choice.

How about gaskets? From what I've read, the orange crank seal works well when trying to build vacuum and I'll be running a set of fabricated aluminum valve covers to help seal the motor further. I'd like to find a valve cover gasket that will seal up nicely without having to glue it down to make lash adjustments easier.

thanks again for all the help,
Corey

Do you know what lobe seperation angle you have the cam (intake lobe) installed at? If not check it before you pull the motor apart and the let us know, maybe advancing it will help if it wasn't already, maybe not How long is your pull track?

I think you best bet is just to re ring it and put new bearing and save your pennies for a real upgrade.

Im guessing your breaking you dana 60 in the rear? Shouldn't have any problems with a 60 in the front until you pass the 800hp mark or you're bouncing

If your breaking the 60 in the back now you better upgrade to a 70 before this season starts.
What are you actually breaking? axles, crown? joints? Alot of dana 60's had the same joint as that you found on the old slant 6 cars!

I'm not sure of your rules but you have to make sure that rear differential is not twisting! And if you can just make the rear solid when you get to the track that the best.

Sorry for the delay in updating, but if it hasn't been one thing keeping me from working on my truck, it's been two others.

Finally got the ridges cut on the block, wasn't happy with how the old ridge reamer I have was working so I ordered a new Lisle off of ebay. The guy sent everything else I ordered, but forgot the reamer, then ended up sending me a used reamer. I cut my loses and ordered a new cutting blade, then the o-ring that holds everything together snapped after 4 cylinders so I've had a little down time in there as well.

Hastings cast rings and Clevite bearings should be arriving at the parts house either today or tomorrow. I've read different places that opening up the 2nd ring gap can be beneficial since gases that make it past the 1st ring can cause ring flutter, sound viable or am I over complicating things here?

The cam card lists a lobe-centerline angle of 110* and an intake centerline of 106*. I degree'd it before I took it out and it was sitting about 1* advanced.

Based on last season, I came off the line great and a few times I was still part throttle until about the 75-100' mark before laying the hammer down, but down around the 260-270' mark (300 foot track) the weight would start to drag my rpm's down by 500-800rpm's. Didn't appear to be spinning out, just ran out of steam so I was thinking maybe I could stand to actually retard the cam in order to gain some power in the upper rpm range, any thoughts?

And yes, the 60 was in the rear, breaking the shafts about 4-6" from the splines and to make matters worse, it's a coarse spline 60 so we had to play heck running down shafts to put back in it. The axles broke around 270'-280' with the exception of one breaking around 240'. I found a Dana 70 last fall and needed to change to the right gear ratio, but then a week and a half ago found one already set up with 4.10's so that's covered and I actually picked up a Dana 61 front a few weeks ago that I'll get installed some day. And, knock on wood, the truck's never hopped once.

thanks again for the input.

what converter plus at what rpms did it fall off and to what rpms?
you say the cam is in at 105???

Running a NP435 4 speed so no converter and I was staying pretty conservative with the rpm's at around 5500-5700 down the track and would get pulled down to around 5000 almost like I was letting off the throttle, real smooth like the last 20ft or so. I don't think it was lack of fuel, but to be safe I'm running all 3/8" line this year. The guys I've seen run out of fuel usually get shut down pretty instantly.

And yes, the cam dialed in at 105*. I've only degree'd one other cam before, but it was years ago and my dad was running the show and I was more or less the assistant. I checked it twice as a precaution and came up with 105 and about 105.5 so I'm pretty confident it's an accurate reading.

Well at that RPM with a mild cam you could try moving the intake degree back to 108 or even 109??
in the 5000 to 6000 range it should show a gain.
At RPM you would think the 850 would pull better?
Maybe way to rich guys jet the crap out of them at best and at worst mess with the air bleeds then they end up at flee markets. my guess would be to big of jets.
but at under 6000 probably not enough to worry about!

Drive train wise i think you are going to much happier and sleep at night knowing nothing should be breaking in the front 60 or rear 70 at your power level.

4:10 gears can still be hard on the drive train and maybe 4:56 would be better in the future.

years ago when i ran a 440 .060 over with ported 906 heads .509 cam it only ran between 5500-6000 but i don't remember it dying off. Although an auto trans is more forgiving when being or a track that doesnt match your gear ratio. With you running a clutch if its a sticky enough track its just going to pull the engine down. Even in our mod class up here i've seen a clutch pull down the 600ci engine until the tires were not even turning anymore.

I would recommend what dodgem is saying about the cam for this year and then upgrade the engine in later years.