I've put together practically every type of engine imaginable (340's, 440's, stroker 440's, Kawasaki 2 stroke, Briggs and Stratton...), But this current one has got me scratching my head and I'm wondering if anyone has any opinions.

Details:

472 Hemi (build 1.5 years ago with about 2000 miles on it)
Aluminum MP (old style) heads
Single 4 barrel Mopar intake
9.5 comp (Same pistons as the crate motor-Wisco?)
Moly rings, low tension oil rings

This thing has given me fits all year. I finally got it to run great, but in my opinion it's using too much oil (I haven't got an exact figure, but a good guess would be a quart every 500-800 miles. It seems to vary) I've never built an engine that used this much oil.

I dynoed the engine when it was build. It made 605HP and didn't show any signs of trouble. I used the old Rotella T and EOS to break it in.

After a while I notice the engine would ping a little going up a hill in fourth and was also seeing an thin oily-carbon film in the left tail pipe and and mostly carbon in the right. I also noticed that when you first start it up, the left tail pipe would show some exhaust (very slight but noticable, whitish grey like condesation, mostly out of the left side in pulses like it's from 1 or two cylinders. After 5 minutes of running the smoke is barely visible). This was after switching to Joe Gibb 10W30 Hotrod oil.

I pulled the intake and found it was leaking. Resealed using a .060 Mopar gasket and permatex No 2, lowered the timing to where we had it on the dyno (31 total). I replaced the oil with GTX Diesel 15/40 (SL/CI rated. Engine ran a lot better, no more pinging. The oily film seemed to go away, but later re-appeared.

I did the intake again with a Mr. Gasket gasket set and used Hylomar blue on both sides of the gasket.

The film/slight smoking persists. I did a leak down and got 3-6% on all cylinders. A couple of the plugs (1,4 and 6) seemed darker but there did not seem to be wet oil on them (a bit on the threads and the at the weld on the ground strap but none on the tips). The plugs have never fouled out (NGK FR5).

I pulled the breather and PCV off and there are only slight intermittent wisps of smoke out of the valve covers when the engine is running and warmed up. I also changed the left bank valve seals.

The engine runs awesome other than the oil dissappearing. There is no great cloud of smoke following me around. Some suggest there must be an intake/head mismatch.

I really don't want to pull this thing and rip it apart, but if I have to I will. I just can't see it being the oil rings being bad or not broken in.

I know I sealed the head studs that bolt into the bottom of the intake ports and the intake bolts are torqued as per the manual. I do have eagle rods in this and there is .035" gap between the rods. The oil pressure is at 70psi@2500 rpm and 40psi at idle (1000 rpm). I can't see it being the PCV as both tail pipes would show the same thing (PCV connected to carb).

I'm stumpped. Any other opinions?

Low tension oil rings? Why did you use them on a street motor? Very good chance that's where your oil is going. Dave

Use a trusted friend to gas it hard and let off while you follow and watch the pipes for when it smokes. Thats if you can keep up with it!

Low tension rings usually require a vacuum pump on the crankcase. You're most likely overloading the top two rings. Since you don't want to take it apart make sure the PCV valve is working and run a breather on each valve cover.

did you put thread sealer on the intake bolts?

I have also heard of oil seeping by the spark plugs. Do you have any gaskets on the plugs? Hemis do not use them. they use the spark plug tubes as a gasket.

Ok, I'm an idiot. I talked to the guy I bought the parts from and the rings are standard tension. He says the hardly ever use low tension rings on anything. Guess I should have talked to him first before posting. Sooooooo.......

Did you buy the assembled aluminum heads or did you build them. If they are the assembled set you might want to look at the guides. I have seen them set up a little on the lose side.

Welcome to my world.
Intake gaskets for me.

Also, have you tried the plug tube seals? I believe moroso makes them. Press fit into head then o-ring to seal the aluminum tube?

I am convinced that the heads "bounce" under high load and leak oil. Mine also uses oil and has already been rebuilt.

I've run Hemi's for 28 years now and they all used a quart of oil per 500 miles except my latest one. All the other engines had dykes rings on DC/TRW pistons and stock heads and valve seals.
My current engine has CP pistons with the second ring gap wider than the top, it also has Stage V heads prepared by Tim at FHO. This engine doesn't use oil at all and doesn't smoke.
If your problem is the head/intake machining it should be obvious by looking at the old gaskets. I've run the plugs with and without washers and with and without the Milodon tube seals, they all used oil. Although my Stage V heads have built in O-rings and do not require the tube seals.

Sheldon

shop manual says no plug gaskets. I have run them both ways. I do not know if it makes a differance.

I'll add my on this one..
Factory Hemi's when new were using 1 qt per thousand miles.
One of my motor's had some extra valve guide clearance and sucked way more than that, new valves and guides fixed that..
It was very bad when going up steep hills and would ping, even with good gas.
The intake gasket requires multiple times of re-torqueing before it will hold.
I always used the spark plug gasket, and it will smoke like a chimney when ya change the plugs..

Thats what I'm thinking!!

Thanks for input everyone. I think I'll try the intake one more time. If that don't work, I guess I'll go deeper. Maybe a good time to step up to better heads.

I bought a 472 Hemi from Ray Barton for a lot of money.
It had Stage V heads on it with his roller rocker set up on it.
After 1500 miles it started burning a lot of oil.
It looked like I was spraying the town for mosquitoes.
Away I contacted him. I was told to remove the engine and bring it back. Weeks later he tore the engine down. He said that the cylinder walls were very shinny. Almost chrome in appearance. He asked me if I made any changes to the carburation or ignition timing at all. I did not. I installed the engine as I got it. They set the carb and timing when they dynoed the engine.
Anyway - Long story short. He put new rings in it and honed the block. I put the engine in. After I started it I checked the timing. It was where it should be. 35BTDC. The engine ran very well as it did before. He charged me $1000.00 more for the new rings, honing and gaskets. I felt that I gave him more than $17K the first time that this should be free of charge. Anyway, if I didn't pay the additional 1K I probably would not have gotten my engine back.
Now I have less than 1000 miles on it since I got it back.
Guess what, it is starting to smoke again.
I think that the problem is the chrome moly rings.
I think that I'll be pulling the engine again this winter and re-ring it myself.

Built a lot of Hemi's and I'd bet its valve seals. Had several smokers and it always turned out the same. Oil entering the cylinder past the valves makes it look like a lot of other things. You can check this if you borrow a bore scope and look down the intake at the intake valves. If they are caked that be your problem. If the engine was bored without a boreplate I guess you could be out of round, I've heard of this, never seen it. Could also be blow by? How does the PCV valve look?

Engine was set up without a PCV system.
Barton fitted the engine with breathers on each valve cover.