THE oldsmobile rocket 303 324 371 394 post to end all other posts, (lasalle related )

This is my buddy's new ride that we took to the lone star round up in Austin Texas and will be at the good guys next week in Nashville. The engine comes from Ross racing engines and tony is a wealth of knowledge on all vintage engine but Oldsmobiles are his specialty. Those aluminum heads are his design. Lots of vintage parts on this engine

 

This is Tony's personal ride from Ross racing engines. He knows oldsmobile engine. It's no trailer queen

 

If it is as simple as picking any 11" pressure plate and lining up the holes I'm going to feel pretty stupid...but it wouldn't be the first time.
Or should I have new holes drilled in the flywheel for any 11" pressure plate I choose?

 

The clutch disc has to fit the input shaft on the trans and clear the recess on the flywheel and bolts. If you have that it will work with any 11" pressure plate. Find someone with some old parts store clutch books. I'm sure there is something out there that will work. Are you sure the bolt pattern is the same as a Flathead? Be very careful who you let drill holes in your hard to find flywheel. They have to be dead on. You don't what to sling that mass off center, not even a little bit.

 

I know the previous owner had a Ford Flathead transmission on my 303. I took a picture of the pressure plate last night when I pulled it off and a couple people I showed it to said it was a Flathead pressure plate. I thought it sounded funny that it would fit but what do I know? Apparently the site I had been using to post pictures here now ants money to be a third party site and I'm not doing that or I'd post it.

The drilling thing was more thinking out loud. That would only be a last option, everything else has been exhausted, possibility.

 

You can post pictures here from your desk top, at least I can. I the '60s I had a 303 in my '38 Ford coupe. I had a '39 trans behind it, several of them. It had an 11" Ford truck disc but I don't remember what pressure plate.
What is this in? What rear end? If the car is light a 9 1/2" -10" clutch is probably enough if it's not s race car. If it is a heavy car an 11" clutch might help you break stuff. I'll try to dig out my old books. I have some Flathead flywheels and pressure plates laying around . I have a Cad 331 too but no flywheel which is the same as Olds. I'll be knocking around in the shop tomorrow.

 

Wilcap can redrill your flywheel to match whatever pressure plate you need, that's what I had to do.

 

Alter Boys Car Club
Deuce Sedan Build, Now Oldsmobile Powered But Still With No Improvement in the Crummy Cell Phone Pictures

Holy shit gonzo... I missed the switch to Olds in that 32 sedan! I never had a problem with the first SBC choice, but Dayum!!! Olds AGAIN? in ...another early Ford?? far fucking out!

Come on down and we will rip up the streets but good! I know where all the cops aren't and where all the Blondes are!

Got no clue why, but Blondes from 45 to 55/60 sure do like oldschool "HOT"..Hotrods!! If they stare at the car rolling by, I point to them, then put my index finger up, like "Wait a sec, Hun, THIS one is for YOU!" Then boil the tires but good!

No lie. I was gassing up a few months ago, there was one gassing up a SUV... I get done, she is still staring... I roll up alongside her, still filling her car, roll the window down and said "I'd take you for a ride..but I'm busy today"...oooohhh yeeessss, then lit them violently for a few feet... I then am in a store a half mile away?...she walks in and smiles at me! No date though , she had a child with her.. lol

I actually love driving the "Rocket powered" 32 so much that I did use it as a true daily driver through some of this winter.. got caught in a snow squall in early Feb.. yes, that IS slush on the glass...
and the other pic on the Frog Bridge...that stuff on the yellow lines...it is pure road SALT... oooopsieee.

 

Well, it's certainly nothing heavy, it's a '52 Henry J with a 8" Ford rear. I think the engine and trans weigh more than the entire car...ok maybe not more but close. lol

I'm not really going for a race thing yet, defiantly not a gasser, but I will be hammering on it every single chance I get. I ordered an 11" clutch and pressure plate yesterday and it will be here today so I'll know by tonight. I'm trying to get this ready for the Hot Rod Dirt Drags on June 1 so time is of the essence.

I know a very old local engine shop that does a lot of work on vintage stuff and I feel confident that, if I need to drill anything, they can handle it. If it wasn't for the hydraulic throw-out then I could just do a three finger pressure plate and that would certainly make this easier, but I'm trading off the hassle of shift linkage for this.

I had a nice folder setup on this picture site and it would be nice to continue there as most of my highly neglected build thread pictures are linked there. I'll post it but I wish I'd gotten a better picture .

 

If you want an "11 clutch and P.P. that will fit an early Ford, just go to Rock Auto and look up a clutch kit for a mid 60's Ford pickup with a V8 and truck 4 speed. It will have the same spline as the early Ford and is a Long style P.P. the same as early Ford, like the one in the picture. These kits are brand new Borg Warner and come complete and are reasonably priced!

 

I've got an 11" GM clutch disk as my trans is a Saginaw but finding a 11" Ford pressure plate has not been as easy. I just ordered one you suggested and we'll see how it works when it gets here. I do order quite a bit of stuff from Rock Auto and the only thing I wish they had was a better description of the parts. Speedway and others had hole spacing, bolt radius, and other info. Thanks for the suggestion on the truck option.

 

Why won’t a hyd throw out brg work with a 3 finger PP. I installed one on a 303 with a t5. It looks to have plenty of disengagement.


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I was going by what I'd read when ordering the bearing. Plus after talking with a couple guys the reason we came up with was that the hydraulic bearing needed a more dispersed pressure area which the diaphragm style provided.

Either way, I'm going to use a hydraulic ram from Speedway to move the stock throwout bearing and pressure plate.

On that note, I ordered a pressure plate from a '65 Ford pickup and it matches the holes in the flywheel and I picked up a pressure plate from a 55 Chevy to match the spline count and shaft size. Clearances all match everything I took off and I think I'm ready to go. I need to change the pilot bearing but I've got a few of those for replacements.

 

Better off with external hyd. cylinder if you have room.

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Good job. Doing the research is part of it. We used to be able to use the parts catalogs and parts on the shelf or in the wrecking yard to do this. Computers sometimes get in the way because the parts house programs are written by computer guys and not car guys. Also the parts we need are falling out of the back end of the catalogs. It is part of your build to solve these problems without going to the after market prefab kits. Good job!

 

Well, everything fit together but I haven't installed the slave cylinder yet. There is maybe, at most, a 1/16" play between the throwout and the pressure plate I'm not worried about that. I figure if there needs to be no play I can take it out when I place the slave.

Thanks everyone for your input, updates coming as this moves along.

 

I recently bought a 41 Olds with a 1962 Starfire 394.It has a bad leak from the back of the valley pan. This engine has a breather tube not a PCV valve.
The engine has 160 K since last build in 1990. Maybe adding a PCV would relieve some crankcase pressure.

PO tried to seal with RTV from the outside.

Are there any bolts on the valley pan or is it held in place by the intake manifold ? Would RTV be better than the gasket for the valley pan ?

 

That gasket is very tricky to get right. Goes around perimeter of valley cover, resting on small flange. 2 long 5/16 bolts in center Personally, I use black weatherstrip adhesive. IMHO lack of gasket would make bolts too long??? Modern RTV’s definitely superior to gasket in the right application, where 2 “machined” surfaces come together
Although Chrysler uses RTV on all diff covers and FWD trans oil pan.
PCV is something I’ve thought about as well, for my 394, but needs to be engineered properly. They make an adjustable one. $$$
JT

 

I wonder if I could get away with taking the intake off, using RTV w/o gasket on valley pan maybe put some washers under the bolts to compensate for the long bolts. and reuse the intake gaskets, because this motor with 160k is not far away from needing a rebuild although I do have about 40 psi oil pressure.

My down draft pipe is in the passenger valve cover. My oil fill cap has wire mesh but no place for a return breather hose.

 

Never tried the RTV method. Do a test fit and see if bolts will tighten all the way down, without gasket
Tony at Ross Racing or Best Gasket can sell you both for cheap and separately from entire kit
Rocker arms, shafts and cam seem to be weak spots, from my 35 yrs exp
Make sure you are using good oil with zinc additive in flat tappet cam applications
JT

 

I had a 394 Starfire engine the problem I had was that it had no register for a manual transmission, So which high compression 394 should I look for that I could install a manual transmission behind?

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easiest would be to have the crankshaft drilled to accept a pilot bushing and use an aftermarket adapter,
like so:

 

That's if I find a motor that has to be torn down, I'm in the market for a runner, most of them I find have automatic transmission behind them and I'm pretty sure the owners won't be willing to remove the transmission for me to look. So I'm hoping there's other options

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If your going to run a manual trans, you will have to have the crank drilled . You will have to tear the engine down so the pilot bushing hole can be bored in a lathe. You cannot sucessfully drill the pilot bushing hole by hand, don't even try it, you will really screw up the crank! Almost none of the cranks made after 56 were drilled as very few of those cars were stick shift cars.

 

I don't have that 394 anymore I was thinking of purchasing another one. My question was wich 394 high comp offered a manual transmission

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I would presume few if any "ultra high compression" engines available to the public came with standard transmissions and that the standard transmissions came in the lower performance cars.

 

They may have offered them but in my 68 years I have never seen a 394 Olds passenger car with a factory stick!

 

I'm gonna be that guy... we have the 303 from the '31 Cabriolet on a stand for some new seals and a bit of top end work. I figure while its apart it would be a good time for a cam swap. Anybody holding or have any leads on a good bump stick for an old hot rod?

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Maybe not appropriate, but back in '66 just out of high school, I went to a local machine shop here in Corpus Christi, Tx and took my cam and the guy asked me if I wanted it 3/4 or full. I was just a kid and didn't know about specs. He "fixed" it and charged me $20. '56 olds in my Chevy roadster.

 

A cool time to be a young hot rodder! There was speed equipment for just about anything, there were lots of small shops that could & would do almost everything you asked, and there were older guys with real experience that enjoyed helping out a "kid".