Right at the moment I can not go into complete details but in a nut shell, I entrusted a local machine shop...CA Street Machines in Suisun CA to put it together for me. This actually took place over 7 years ago while I was being deployed and still in service. The owner's Son was all over me to do the work as in the past I only had farmed out my head work to them and he wanted to do the whole job. I had had great success with my past builds...nothing fancy just a stock 383 clean up and slight upgrade of internals...without any glitches. Well I gave in and after getting the motor back, it sat for a few more years while I finished up my AF career and worked on the rest of the resto of my 66 Ply Satellite. When it came time the first time to install the engine it went in great but I could not turn the crank completely. It would stop suddenly one way and when turned the opposite it would do the same. That is in a 360 degree turn. Almost like stop to stop on steering. WTF????!!! Turns out that the #1 piston skirt was hitting the forward crank counter weight when the piston would bottom out. Crank was a stock 383 crank 10/10 and was the original to the engine. The builder said to just grind down the counter weight to get clearance and press on. Now I'm a novice when it comes to a lot of mechanical things but I didn't feel right about it after doing it. Something in my mind about "BALANCE"??? I subsequently decided to pull the motor and tear it down to replace the crank with another 383 crank @ 20/20. Took it to Bailey Bros here in CA and they suggested I use the replacement crank and put the #1 piston back in and check for clearance. It worked perfectly???
Completed the rebuild and re-installed the engine. Initial fire up went as planned...all though the roller rockers were noisy and I had difficulty at first with the Valve Lashing. John/Dart4Forte was even present at that time and commented on my work as being really neat clean and good. Any way...after some further set backs...power steering pump failures, fuel leaks, etc. I finally was able to get it all back together and ready for the next fire up. Now initial break in had been done so there was no need to completely re-break in the engine although I did follow the same steps as before. So Monday I fire it up and whamo... Rear Main Seal leak. Damn!!! It didn't happen the first or the other 2 times prior to this last Mondays fire up??? This is not a slight leak either. Over 1 1/2 qts on the floor of the garage. Only way to do it correctly is yank the engine and fix it. So that hopefully brings you all somewhat up to date on this. Why am I looking for an engine builder after doing it all myself you ask??? I am still not convinced that the original build done by CA Street Machines was done properly and correctly...ref first crank piston issue...and now I want a reputable, MOPAR knowledgeable engine builder, to go over what has been done, what I have now, what direction I originally planned for this build to be, to include my parts that were put into it. I cannot afford any more set backs with this build as I have come too far and spent way too much $$$$$$...I am sure we all can relate to that statement...to bail on it. It has been an on-going build now for the past 7 plus years and I really want to see it through. But as the clock keeps turning and I am starting to get longer in the tooth if I cannot get this sorted out, then it will have to go so I can move on to other interests in my retirement. Monday I came real close to it....
