I know nothing about Fords...but did you check the bearing clearance on EACH journal? Crank is straight, yes? So runout was checked and in-spec?
Beyond this, perhaps looking at restrictions in the oil feed is the next place to go? What does that routing look like on the 302? Where in that feed sequence is #5: start or end?
Last, visually it just looks to me like #5 was simply too tight, or there was a pile of dirt that got dumped into that somehow??? (maybe stuff was trapped in the oil feed passage and when things came up to pressure it all went straight out)
Yes all clearances checked, crank straight? dunno but the motor it came out of had bearings that were like new.
#5 is at the end... so ya oil starvation is a possibility.
Block was cleaned pretty thoroughly so kinda doubt the dirt theory
The .0015-.002” on the mains would concern me, I run more than that on my rods. Remember what Monte Smith always said, “build a loose engine, only you’ll know, build it tight and everyone will know”.
I mean it was that after polishing to b00t *shrug*
that looks like crank to bearing rubbing, not enough clearances or not enough oil flow on start up
Well clearly it rubbed at some point, 0.00175 shouldn't be toooo tight tho, was primed before start-up and also had plenty assembly lube.
