I took 5 weeks off of work in January - February to try to finish the 31 coupe for drag week 2016, and to beat Jeff out of a dinner. I was going to spend a week or so assembling and dynoing the 392 hemi, then 3 - 4 weeks making major progress on the chassis and body. As usual, lost parts, (launched a circlip, never to be found, had to order a new one from diamond) stuff that didn't fit right, machining the rods for side clearance, cutting the main stud girdle for stroker clearance, remodeling the oiling system, setting up my ridiculous 8 carb intake, etc slowed down the assembly, and I took way more than a week but I got it done, and put it in Jays dyno hoping for big power numbers. (BTW, Jays 427 SOHC Ford headers fit with just re-drilling some holes )



Made some check out pulls, then some full throttle pulls, increasing the rpm a little more each time. The oil got milky, changed the oil. After the 1st 6000 rpm pull, I cooled if off an lashed the valves. Went to restart it, and it hydrolocked. Found water in #8. Pulled the head and #8 cylinder wall was cracked. Figured it was a head gasket issue. Pulled it off the dyno, tore it apart, found shot rod bearings from the wet oil, had the #8 bore sleeved, pressure tested the block, took great care with the copper head gaskets when re-assembling, put it back on the dyno, made several pulls, but again milked out oil. Pulled the heads, brought them to a head shop and had them pressure tested and milled .003 for flatness, put heads back on with thread orings around each water hole in the heads and block, put it together, filled it with water and pressure tested it, leaks, pulled it apart, new custom head gaskets with all the un-needed holes gone, extra-extra carefull assembly with permatex red coppercoat. Mounted a radiator sytem on the dyno to use a closed cooling sytem so I could put moroso ceramic seal in it. Pressure tested with no leaks, made some pulles testing 3 intakes and dialing the carbs on the 8 carb intake. filled the oil pan with water again. Now my 5 weeks was gone, no work done on the car, and a broke motor.

Last night I finally started working on the motor again, and found a crack in the #8 intake port in the head that leads to water. I poked it with a probe, and it went right thru. Why didn't the head shop that did the pressure test find this and save me 3 weeks of chasing a head gasket problem????





Sent the head off today to get repaired. Like jeff said, I'm going to pay someone to get stuff done on the car that I had planned to do on my time off, while I re-do the motor. Will it be ready for drag week? Who will buy dinner? And what about Naomi?