Your engine builder is WRONG and the geometry isn't correct. Is it good enough? Maybe. Is it correct? Nope.


Why push it? You've spent all the time and money. Fix the geometry. If the engine builder thinks half assed geometry is good enough, I'd be finding a new engine builder.

He definitely didn't say it was correct, but didn't seem worried about it having problems for my setup knowing that I was trying to make this all work on a tight budget. Not arguing with you, just specifying what he said. I spent way more on this engine than I ever planned to, not that I expect a good build to be cheap...but this was a terrible foundation in the first place to do what I wanted to do with it. I was mainly just throwing it together to have fun with using parts I had lying around or bought second hand for cheap and I was just planning on running it until I can get my other LSX powered project car finished. After that, I was hoping to do a gen 3 hemi in this car or a 5.3 LM7 I've been using for mockup in my LSX car. Most of my friends are making more power with their junkyard 5.3's than I'd ever be confident pushing through this LA block.

I'm listening though, and taking everything I am hearing into consideration. What would be involved with fixing the geometry? Not really sure how I'd go about doing that, as of now there is no interference with any parts, but it looks like if those pushrods straightened out even a little bit more then the heads would have to be clearanced. That's just not going to happen. I'd most likely try to sell the LA stuff off and start over with a late model, it would save me a lot of headaches in other ways as well as I'm still dealing with major FITECH tuning issues on E85 and blower belt alignment/tension issues on the procharger bracket I built. If there is something I can do that would be fairly easy/cheap, then I'll do it.

do we need to see the wipe pattern to determine if the geometry is correct?

Mad, thanks for your input. I contacted Mike at B3 and he asked me to take several measurements which I will today and then send them back to him so he can let me know how badly the geometry is out.

I will most likely be fixing it pending what mike says about the geometry/kit I am probably going to fire it up today just to see if I can straighten out the FITECH tuning issues, I figure a few hours of run time hopefully won't hurt anything with that geometry (it already ran about 500 miles like that).

Didn't mean to seem resistant to changing it, truth is this car still has a ton to be sorted out with spitting blower belts at WOT and unable to go more than half throttle without falling flat because of the FITECH dumping fuel. If everything ran good, I'd be happy to fix it, but it sucks putting more time and money into the valvetrain when I don't know how much it's going to take to fix the other issues and make a clean pass.

Truth be told, I am strongly thinking about a Hellcat swap. I didn't originally because at the time of starting this the crate engine was still in the 20k price range and a stand alone harness wasn't offered, but now it's all out there. It's what I always wanted to do with the car, could support the power I was hoping to make and won't be a time bomb like a factory LA block making it. I might as well fix this though, as even if I sell it, I'd feel better if it were correct. Hellcat would involve me selling off the parts I have for my other project car but that car's a chevy so it seems totally worth it haha