Help me tear down and inspect my 440..

[BSB67]

What's everyone favorite way to clean up the heads . Get a Tupperware tub and go to town with some degreasers ? Obviously a parts washer would be ideal but I don't have one of those!

Small hand/detail wire brushes and various wire wheels chucked in a drill. You can buy those plummer hand held wire brushes for cleaning the ID of tubing and cut off the handle and chuck it up too. Works pretty good for getting into the ports. Mineral spirits. Final clean with lacquer thiner or carb cleaner.

 

[Canadian1968]

Thanks

Small hand/detail wire brushes and wire wheels chucked in a drill. Mineral spirits. Final clean with lacquer thiner or carb cleaner.

Thanks I always appreciate your input .

Answer some of your questions

Yes MPH was 107 for the 12.6 run. PB is 109 mph..

Yes running pump gas , 91 octane. Never had any detonation that I can tell. I did not install the cam , I sent the motor off to shop for full rebuild I think 9 years ago now. Never did find out EXACT compression I hope to do that this time with motor pulled apart. But figure around 9.8 : 1

I'm thinking it was head gasket , there are no OBVIOUS signs yet that I can see. I do belive my head bolts to be a possible culprit . They are the originals and think they are probably stretched?

I want get the templates and see what they look like. I had done some general pocket porting when I had the motor rebuilt. But I only did the intake side . I want to do the exhaust and again check my intake with the templates. The valve seats were a definite point of conversation when I had them rebuilt. The way we did it was I did my porting then gave them back to the shop and they cut the valve seats and assembled the heads/ motor . I am interested to see what it looks like when I pull the valves out .

I plan on doing a quick leak test , just putting some alcohol down the ports to see if anything leaks past the valves.

 

[Canadian1968]

Well...... pretty sure that's not supposed to leak.... and yes those are those are the 2 low reading cylinders !

 

[Moparfever65]

I had checked for exhaust leaks over the years never really found signs of one... the "ticking " on passage side was more dull, pretty sure It wasn't an exhaust leak

How did you check for exhaust leaks? I agree with exhaust leaks causing a ticking sound. I usually take a piece of fuel line, hold one end to my ear and move the other end around where a leak might be. It'll be really obvious when you find it.

 

[Canadian1968]

Did a quick clean up the heads with some carb cleaner , wire wheel , and scotch Brite wheels . I'm going to grab a valve spring compressor tomorrow and will pull the valves out and inspect the the two leaking cylinders and whatever else I can find!

 

[Canadian1968]

How did you check for exhaust leaks? I agree with exhaust leaks causing a ticking sound. I usually take a piece of fuel line, hold one end to my ear and move the other end around where a leak might be. It'll be really obvious when you find it.

Yup that's what I did. The sound i was looking for seemed more from valve cover , valley pan area than an exhaust port. When I put everything back together will make sure to use some decent graphite exhaust gaskets.

 

[Orig69]

When I was breaking the head bolts loose, they sure didn't feel like 70 ftlbs I was surprised at how easy they seemed to break loose .

After you started up this engine for the very first time (9 Years ago) did you do a cylinder head re-torque?

 

[Canadian1968]

After you started up this engine for the very first time (9 Years ago) did you do a cylinder head re-torque?

I did not. Before I pulled the driver side I did check a few bolts they torqued correctly . I know only checking 4 is not really very thorough but better than nothing. Are soon as break the bolts loose they could be take out with my fingers .

I will be putting are bolts in when I put everything back together

 

[Canadian1968]

I grabbed the direct connection templates from my buddy today. They are pretty old and just made of some very thin plastic. I got on it right away and 3D printed a more durable and strong set

 

[qkcuda]

If you have a plunge cut made with a modern serdi or similar machine, that will remove pretty much what the porting templates are showing you. Then you just have to blend the transition.

 

[Canadian1968]

Well got the valves out. The cylinder that had the lowest compression has alot of flakey carbon . The other cylinder beside it that also tested a bit low, shows a bit of pitting on the valve seat. I quick wipe with some scotch Brite showed that thr pitting does not seem to be that bad. I think it should clean up just fine with some lapping compound.

The intake valves have a decent amount of carbon build up on them as well. First will be to clean up all the valves . I was just going to put then in a drill and clean them up with scotch Brite pad and carb cleaner ?

Then lap all the seats / valves and see how things turn out. Probably reassemble the valves and springs and make sure thet are sealing well before doing the porting

 

[Canadian1968]

Pitting on one seat

 

[Orig69]

The size of the intake valve bowl looks like it's too big to fit a porting template.

 

[Canadian1968]

The size of the intake valve bowl looks like it's too big to fit a porting template.

I had done some basic clean up already . I threw few templates in to see where I was at. Good at 4 , 6 and 8 o'clock positions. The templates show more material to be removed at 9 , 10 and 2, 3 o'clock positions .

 

[Canadian1968]

Picked up some lapping compound today and went at the 2 cylinders that had the leaking valves. The pitting in the one came out very quickly.

I lapped them and then threw the valves back in to test for leaks again. I had to do the one cylinder that was leaking the most , twice. But looks like everything cleaned up nicely .

I will do all the valves but those were 2 that were showing problems. And wanted to make sure they would clean up before I went and did any porting.

Time to get out the grinder !

 

[69conv]

Nice pics! Thanks for posting. Glad you found the culprit.

 

[Canadian1968]

Got 90 % of the porting done on the one head. Just waiting for some 80 grit sandpaper rolls to clean up the rest of the intake ports I can't reach with the bits i have.

Used the templates, cut down a fair bit of the guide webbing in the exhaust ports , made sure that the short turn was a nice smooth curve as it comes into the combustion chamber.

I did get into valve seat ever so slightly on one of the intake valves. There is still a full contact strip but does get narrow in one area we're i got carbide on a little to much angle.. Hopefully it's OK will find out when I put the valves back in an do another leak tes t

 

[69conv]

That should show some nice improvements.

 

[Canadian1968]

Well I have one head all done and back together. Leak checked them with some isopropyl alcohol and every thing stayed dry . PHEW ! Haha

Starting to compile my list of gaskets I need for putting everything back together. I think in going with the fel pro 8519 pt1 gasket Im pretty sure that's what was on there before.

I don't really think it's worth trying to put a thinner head gasket on there.

That being said I still need to cc a combustion chamber and check my piston height in the block.

 

[69conv]

1 down, 1 to go! No surprises please. I'd like to know how they cc.