Last Indian

Well while Kiwi has some exciting fun, I’m JustA here tinkering away making incremental progress!🤫 The top is close to done, but still some very tedious work to do for the expanded metal body! Very tuff stuff to polish!

What Frosty said!!

Yup! Should be good the ECM is the brains that reads and controls the other sensors. Tells them what to do. The only issues you could see are possible with the MAF on the throttle body. Sometimes they changed the throttle body from one year to the next and the MAF mounting will be different. If that were to occur, either replace the throttle body with your old one or get the correct MAF for that year throttle body, the pigtail should be the same. Before you take the engine out take good pictures of how the wiring harness are laid out for everything. Fuel injectors, coolant sensor, MAP, IAC, IAT, crank sensor, coil packs, EGR, etc!

As far as the engine goes, there shouldn't be an issue. I will assume all you’re getting is the engine? Or just the short block? Either way I again will assume no electronics come with the engine? Your ECM will interface with the components that attach to the engine. MAP, EGR, IAT, etc! So take those from your current engine and you should be fine!

Pocket change!

Great accomplishment Mike! Nothing better than seeing it all come together!

Yes I can still see pretty well for an old fart! I think I had mentioned before that I had been a tool and die maker first, than a R&D machinist for a number of years before doing the engineering?! Those two crafts require very good measurement perception to accomplish. You need to be able to differentiate down to at least .010 of an inch. I hold the copper in place with 3M emblem tape. It has fairly high resistance to heat! And since these will be seeing engine heat I’m a little hesitant to use an epoxy adhesive and a press fit without a shear to cut the copper is out of the question! still need to polish up the copper.

That’s funny! ! I thought the same thing! The cast iron head deal makes no sense to me! There’s got to be more cast iron heads out there than aluminum! Heck the 3800 was still running cast iron heads in 2009!

Yes, I would have a concern! A shop who’s lively hood runs on doing machine work on engines who doesn’t have the equipment to do it would make me question their ability!

You’re on the right track buddy! I have a long 24” square, so I scribe a straight line JustA off the edge. Then move over 9/16” and scribe another line. I use a very fine, 24 tooth, band saw blade and yup, cut slow! Then comes the pain! I put it in the vise, like you see it, only with jaw protectors, and start filing the edge, 6” at a crack moving it and overlapping with each movement to get the edge smooth and straight. Than I flip it to the other side and repeat, but this time I use my calipers measuring the width incrementally to make sure it’s parallel and the right width. When I get really close I trial fit to see where it’s hitting, then mark it, measure it and file it till it fits properly!

Ok this has been really tedious! Where’s a shear when you need it? JustA try to take .030 thick copper flat sheet stock, cut two pieces off it .500 wide 22” long and keep both sides parallel to each other to fit in a 1/2 milled slot! Fun! Real fun!

JustA, you are never late to the party! The party doesn’t start till you’re here! Yes I saw it was a 535! Still won’t generate enough hp to to get to 8 seconds and most likely not even 10 flat! In the Lemans that is! The money you have to throw at a 10 second car is close to double that of a 12 second car!

Welcome! I reiterate what JustA & Frosty said, both in your desire and initiative! I don’t wish to discourage you on your project, but along the lines of what Frosty said, you need to do some good research before you pull the trigger and buy! The reality is an 8 or 10 second car is not realistic for the street! Not from fuel cost, drivability or control! So if you really want a street/race car you need to consider all the factors. I’m not saying you can’t achieve a 8 second car, but a “70” Lemans just from a weight standpoint is not practical! Just the shear physics of it would require more than 800 bhp! A Dodge Hell Cat’s quarter mile time is just under 12 seconds! Yes it weighs more than the Lemans, but not enough to make that kind of difference. The Lemans with the right equipment and the proper mods could achieve mid 11s but that’s going to take a lot of cash & work! So know that we all support you, we wish you the best and will do what we can to help, but I want you to have your eyes wide open! So you don’t get down the road and say, well if I had known that!

Hey Randy, really sorry to hear about your health issues, but great to hear from you and that you’re on the mend! We’re all looking forward to your continued improvement and posting when you get back in the saddle!

What Frosty says is true enough! That said, no this is not a sealed transmission! It has a pan, but the pain is the same pain that any of the transmissions built after late “70s” had! GM was to cheap to put in a drain plug! So you need a really big spill pan when you drop the pan. Basically you take the bolts loose in a manner that drops one corner of the pan to act like a pour spout! My advice is if you change the transmission fluid yourself or if you go to a good shop, drill the pan and put in a drain plug for the next time! And yes at 40,000 the fluid is pretty much on the ragged edge! If anyone tells you different, they don’t have a clue as to how the transmission fluid additive package works! GM sets this standard to CYTA! Nothing else! They what to keep you out of the drivetrain, period! Will till the warranty is up after that they don’t care! I would recommend you do a drain fill, don’t change the filter yet, run 50 - 100 miles change it again! Run it another 50 miles, drain it change the filter and fill with new fluid again. Oil changes in a transmission only get about 2/3 of the fluid out. So each time you put in new fluid it get contaminated with the remaining old fluid, which immediately degrades the new fluid. It takes about three flush changes to get a good oil change. I would also recommend you use Dextron IV as the new fluid!

First of all I am very happy to see that Ringo’s website works JustA the way he would want it to! People pitching in to help one another out! No condemnation, no heckling, JustA working to resolve someone’s problem! Way to little of the today! I would guess that the shop that did the heads the first time put in good aftermarket valve seals. To do so they must cut the top of the valve guide. Perfect Circle for instance! A lot of those seals are white and whether they put those in or not they should replace the seals with new ones this time as well.

Copy that buddy! Been there done that!

Wrongway, glad you’re zeroing in on all the things that need addressed. The white plastic pieces you found? What type of valve stem seals did you use? With all the valve related damage you’ve seen it just might be from them!

Ok!this is all Frosty’s fault! He starts this stuff about redoing and changes his mind and than he goes and balloons it to more crap! Than pretty soon it’s a whole be project! Man oh man! Thanks al lot buddy! The new plenum just mushroomed into a lot more complexed piece! 😳 Had to start over, had an epiphany! Than a what if! This setup will really induce air flow from the hood into, across and out the back of the hood to really cool the plenum & throttle body!

Wrongway, if you’re going to pull the motor, & if it were mine I would, than I would at least take it down to the short block! Clean everything really well, as Bear describes! The one thing you can’t check without disassembling is the pistons and rings! When the valves broke, if that caused enough movement in the rings or pistons that could have caused an issue with either one. So once you have it all apart, move each piston through its full stroke and inspect each cylinders bore carefully for scaring! Then if you do send it to a shop see if they have solid stress plates or some variant of that to pressurize each piston assembly to check the ring sealing. It’s just one more of those things that you would hate to assume is ok, put the whole thing back together and have another hiccup!

Actually I came with a flip card attached to my navel that had all of those and more! 😁

Depends on what the fitting is or looks like! If the fitting is conducive to putting a gage on it and you use a female air chuck on the fill side that would surffice.

Ok, that could at least be some of the compression issue, if not all! When you replaced the valves did you inspect the the valve seats in the heads? Did you inspect the valve guides for cracks? Cracks I the guides could weaken the guides or they could have been deformation that allows enough movement in the valves so they don’t seat properly. Additionally new valves need ground to mate the valve seat! And I always like to lap my valves into their seats as good insurance of a good seal!

All good thoughts! Wrongway let me ask this! I forgot that you had the valve issue until Bear mentioned it. So when you broke them and replaced them, did you as Bear asked redo the head? That’s one, but two did you have the new valves ground as well? And did you lap any of them?

You two are hilarious! I didn’t get any warranty! I came with a buyer beware notice!🥴