Hey everyone. Please ignore the low post count- been with the board since 2000 but lost my ID after not logging on for awhile during the dark "Elvis" and "70 Daytona" days.

I have a 383 that was built in the 70's and never fired that I put 40 passes on in the late 90's. It needs bearings (don't ask) and has aluminum rods. I seem to remember reading on the board (maybe by Fast68) that there can be issues with getting proper torque on the rod bolts if "old style" alum. rods are taken apart and re-assembled. Is that true?

This is a nostalgia build that I would like to stay true to and use this motor to get the car going again and making passes. It had great oil pressure, ran well, and looks good inside. That said, it is a 383 of unknown build quality and has boat anchor Jahns(!) pistons and probably needs a cam. I'd like to use it but it may be better to go in a different direction.

It has 915 iron heads that again have no time on them that I would like to port into the 260 cfm range (very committed to factory looking heads so Stealths could work). I understand the cost/benefit of iron vs. aluminum but I think these heads are still pretty fresh with very low miles so I might get away with minimal work other than the porting.

So- are the rods a problem? I know that 200 or so passes might be it for them. Am I nuts to put any money in it? Looking for opinions- be gentle!

My vote: Pull the ancient aluminum rods and replace them with some decent steel rods, if you intend on running it hard again.

What bolts?

Thanks for the responses. I am talking about the connecting rod bolts- they thread into the aluminum rods and I seem to remember reading ages ago on this board that cycling those bolts on old school aluminum rods could result in a loss of clamping torque as the aluminum threads are easily damaged. I can try and add photos.

At the end of the day, I would like to make some passes on this motor until I decide on a more long term combo. I can send photos of the bearings- they don't look terrible and the crank is fine. Maybe I run it as is with the current bearings- it had tons of oil pressure.

As BradH indicated, new known rods is probably safest but at that point why run ancient Jahns pistons- Once I replace the rods and pistons, I might as well start fresh and build a real motor.

Polyshperic- I might have misunderstood you- I don't know who made the bolts. They are some type of aftermarket bolt with an allen head. They don't have a nut on the other side- they thread into the rod.

Years ago I assembled a SB Chevy motor that had a set of the old Ansen aluminum rods that had sat on the shelf for many years before being bought for this motor, they had shrunk on the big end and needed resizing
I sent them back to Ansen and they did that for no charge and did what they describe as a ditch cut on the rod caps and told me that If the motor was going to set for more than 90 days to have the customer loosen the rod bolt and retorque them before start up when it was going to be ran again
My message is to remove them from the motor and have the big ends check for size and roundness