JoeliusZ28's LT1 cam swap thread

[WMCCjames]

you know James that is exactly what I thought too but just about everyone I asked said i just needed to hit it harder. Guess I gotta trust my own judgement a little more.

All i can do now is hope to get lucky really. If it spins a bearing over something this stupid its gonna suck. I have taken all kinds of precautions to keep this install clean and safe, i missed the boat on that one.

You won't spin a bearing because of this.....if anything, you have damaged the thrust bearing's front surface......the rear main bearing (with the thrust bearing surfaces) never spins unless something catastrophic happens in the motor. Your saving grace here is that you have a manual trans car...manual trans cars are notoriously hard on thrust bearings, but that would be on the opposite thrust surface you would have damaged by beating on the crank from the front with a hammer. Cars with clutchs always put alot of forward thrust on the crank (engageing and disengaging the clutch does this) so it is likely that the front surface of your thrust bearing is in very good shape because it probably is not touched very often by the crank itself.

[Virtue]

The timing set is on and A-O-K. even though it didnt eyeball correctly, when bolted up it lined up just fine. Although it still makes no sense to me, way to freak out about nothing Joel. The driver side head is on and ready to be torqued down. I cleaned the deck and pistons up real nice. Just need to pick up some thread sealant tomorrow.

Getting things into gear starting now, I want to hurry up and spin my bearing (kidding)

see all is well haha funny how like i said when you torque down the cam sproket how stuff shifts and lines up perfect

wish i coulda stayed longer but nicole didnt tell me how early she had to be up

[klrlt1]

I cant wait to hear it running..

[JoeliusZ28]

You won't spin a bearing because of this.....if anything, you have damaged the thrust bearing's front surface......the rear main bearing (with the thrust bearing surfaces) never spins unless something catastrophic happens in the motor. Your saving grace here is that you have a manual trans car...manual trans cars are notoriously hard on thrust bearings, but that would be on the opposite thrust surface you would have damaged by beating on the crank from the front with a hammer. Cars with clutchs always put alot of forward thrust on the crank (engageing and disengaging the clutch does this) so it is likely that the front surface of your thrust bearing is in very good shape because it probably is not touched very often by the crank itself.

thanks James thats very relieving to hear. I was worried sick about this thing all day yesterday.

[JoeliusZ28]

making progress. heads are on. Torqued them in 3 stages with a torque wrench that was just calibrated last month. Cleaned the deck and pistons up nice too.

IMG_7592.JPG

IMG_7594.JPG

IMG_7595.JPG

IMG_7596.JPG

IMG_7599.JPG

IMG_7600.JPG

[s.reef]

Looks good!

[tenpin842]

8-O looks great!!

[dgrizz122]

glad to see its comeing together

[my95z28]

very good, I have seen heads cracked from people just going to the full 55 ft-lbs right away

[Transamsfast]

wait wait. where is the oil dipstick tube?!? That was such a PITA on my car! do what we did to save time right away. I get to do what you did soon.... except no cam for me.. just ripping it apart

[JoeliusZ28]

wait wait. where is the oil dipstick tube?!? That was such a PITA on my car! do what we did to save time right away. I get to do what you did soon.... except no cam for me.. just ripping it apart

its laying on our bench somewhere with all the other odds and ends.

Tonight or tomorrow I will be working on putting the oil pan back in (that will be a *****), re-installing the headers, and re-mounting the engine and trans.

I want all that done before I put everything else back together.

[Transamsfast]

Dangg so like another 2 hours
Looks good though man!
Yours is going together and mine is coming apart im gonna rip the top end off early next week and if its nothing there short block is coming out the bottom

[JoeliusZ28]

Dangg so like another 2 hours
Looks good though man!
Yours is going together and mine is coming apart im gonna rip the top end off early next week and if its nothing there short block is coming out the bottom

nah ill have it done in a half hour

thats exactly what i would do bro.

[Boost Addict]

It wasn't as hard putting the pan back in compared to taking it out, for me anyways,

[JoeliusZ28]

thats good, because that was not fun.