Find a shop with a older caustic soda non epa friendly hot tank and let it eat the tubes out chemically or at least break them down enough for easy removal.

Also if it were me id get that block cleaned and get a good mopar guy or shop to look so far up it you can see the back of its teeth.

Who knows how hard of service life that block has had and who knows its real health, id check and see if the oil passages from the main to the cam have been drilled and others as well.

Many times when we used to tube we did drill passages as well.

Caustic dip or even just plain old lye eats aluminum, but doesn't do a whole lot on copper or JB Weld. Doesn't touch cast iron or steel. A gun drill might do the trick.

My tank will eat copper, brass, aluminum, any bearing left in a block and its gone. Ive had this pallet of pellets since the mid 80-s.

Not sure what it is, just says "Caustic Soda" Change it every few years 4x8 by 3 feet deep, 3 heating elements set at 140 if I recall right, just shielded hot water heater elements. 2 inch thick blue foam attached to the outside ti insulate.

I can put a tractor or semi tractor block in for 5 days and it comes out steaming hot and looks crisp.

Im sure others have them as well.

I agree. never know why it was removed from service or broke down/inspected for mechanical issues.

IIRC...per the Hensley 'Blue book' oil mods I am sure the galley feeds would be drilled to 9/32" and the main oil passages from pump/main cap/block drilled to 1/2" along with a full groove main bearings. I do these mods on all of my junk along with blending turns/gasket matching pump to cap/ adding 4 more holes to the filter plate. also install a couple restrictor plug in block just below deck surface at the rocker shaft oil holes to reduce the oil to rockers.

I would be checking for any of these mods along with the sleeve for solid lifters.

with a transfer tube in the valley I would be looking for any of the oil feeds blocked to redirect oil flow at the #1 main bearing to oil galley( IIRC you block feed to galley on #1 main since it now feeds from main oil galley.

and always check to make sure the core plug is in to turn the oil to the filter. IIRC should be about 7" down the oil sender hole.

some machine shops remove it some don't. so check.

The one block I had fits with was the one I mentioned in the beginning of this, it had one tube in it and had spun a #2 main pretty bad it self heat treated. I seen the dirt car it came from but yep had the reed core roller cam =, the old school small block hemi rods and it was a w2 head motor.

Its been long enough ago I will look for the pics of what I found was not blocked off on the other side, I did block a passage off that I determined should of been blocked. And although a semi easy life since its still being raced today but not by me.

OP, you never mentioned the bore I dont think, is it heavily overboard? Not that it really matters.

I don’t know if it has been bored yet or not. Haven’t had a lot of time to mess with it although I did flip it over today and the #1 main bearing oil passage has been drilled tapped and plugged like the article said. Still waiting for my DC book so I can walk through the process. I have a machinist buddy that I am going to take it to and have it checked out. I am still leaning toward undoing it if it can be reasonably done. Thanks for the tips on hot tanking! I’ll ask about that too

Where you at?