Drove the 4 hours down to MoKan for last night's "fun runs" to get some more laps on the the Dragmaster. Huge thanks to Ryno, WrenchBender, and WZ Junk for their help. Finally resolved an issue with the shifter cable adjustment. Still having trouble throwing blower belts. Going to replace my homemade idler pulley with a store bought one. Then there is the issue of her puking oil on the top end. The past two times out I've had some oil leaking. Thought it was just the valley pan so I sealed it before this outing. The first pass it spit some oil out of the dipstick tube on the top end. We sealed the dipstick tube with some fuel line and a bolt. The next pass dumped significantly more when I hit the brakes, covering my helmet in oil. Looked like I had a hurt cylinder so I called it a night. Got her cleaned up this morning and did a leakdown this afternoon. #8 leakdown was ugly! Pulled the right head and it looks like it ate something. Several small divits in the top of the piston and seems like something imbedded but it should be reuseable. Whew! Cylinder wall doesn't look all that bad. I'll pull the piston after supper and look for broken rings. I've got some spare rings, a spare piston, and a good hone if it were to come to that. Heavy sigh. I saw a deal on facebook that said drag racers love work and hate money. I think that is spot on.
Any pics of the damage? or an idea what went throught it,, also do you run a screen gasket under the injector,, ,, Tim Jones
Don't you have a puke tank? It only took one pass with oil covering my goggles as passed through the lights. I assumed that I had burnt a piston, but there was no damage in the engine. I took my dragster home an immediately started to fabricate a puke tank. The C&A .040 stainless piston rings were not holding the cylinder pressure. I switched to Dyke rings and that almost eliminated the need for a puke tank. I say almost because the puke tank was not coming off period. I lived in McPherson when I started building my dragster. The old Skelly gas station building West of JDs burger joint was my shop. I have been working in McPherson for the last couple of weeks. After almost 40 years most of the buildings are still there, but I have only ran across one acquaintance. Gary Cooper was involved with dirt track cars back in the day. I was surprised to see that he is now building hot rods. I have always heard that you can't go back home. Now I understand why. McGurk
Took a break to look up some torque specs. The piston and even rings look ok but I'm putting some different rings on anyway. There were some scratches on the cylinder wall at the top that I think are the culprit. Got it honed and that took most of them out and smoothed out one ugly one. Sorry, no pics. I do have the screen between the injector and the blower. It looked like an electrode but I've not lost any. No idea what or where it came from. :-/ No puke tank but I'm seriously looking into it! Small world, I bought the 1959 KS plate I'm running on my Plymouth from Gary. In 87 & 88 I worked part time for a guy detailing cars in the place just south of the Chevy dealership. If you are still in town go check out the restoration program at McPherson College.
Hmm?? Wonder where the piece came from ,, Sorry the old fuel car diver (bottom end guy) in me says well if it didn't come through the blower it came from somewhere, X2 on the puke tank, oil on headers can make a very bad fire, Be safe Kerry,,,,, Tim Jones
As am I Kerry seemed to have a new look at the digger last time out, think he maybe getting comfortable! Glad you took it home and are getting things sorted out. See ya in a couple weeks.
The easy way to keep oil off your helmet is to put the engine in the rear.... (that's a joke...) See you in August, -Abone.
Puketank and blowdown tubes to it are important on a blower motor. Very important. You can easliy hole a piston and with a blower it'll pressurize the block and pump the oil out onto you. The puke tank gives the crap a place to go and is vented to the atmosphere to releave pressure when you hole a piston. Without looking i'd say they are in the rulebook, them and cast covers. I'm wrong a lot about rules but you get the idea. Sounds like you were closer disaster than you think.
One other thing nobody addressed is to get rid of the dipstick tube and install a small press in plug in it's place. I haven't had a dipstick in a hotrod engine in many years. You really don't need one. You know how much oil to put in and you'll be the first to know if you lose any. Good luck!
Yeah, I am getting more comfortable! I'm probably going to have a firewall mounted puke tank instead of the front breathers at the HAMB drags but I don't have it quite sorted out yet. I'll move my engine to the back when you do Abone. I got the bore honed, piston and rod back in, and bottom end buttoned up last night. I had planned on getting the head back on and firing her today but there are to many other things going on. Tomorrow night.
Kerry, please get a puke tank on that thing. The chassis in my avatar was destroyed when the altered in the other lane puked oil on the guys face shield. Looked like someone hit him with a chocolate shake. And he ended up in our lane. He actually had a tank, but it was not vented and it blew out of the valve cover instead. I will try to get a pic of the one I use, but here is a link to the site where it came from. I cannot build it for what they cost. Made as a stock tank float and I put a little breather on it and two one inch aluminum tubes welded in to attach the hoses from my burn down tubes. Also be careful what tube you use, make sure it is fire proof and not the clear crap from Home Depot. http://www.roswelllivestock.com/ind...nfo&cPath=556_570_571_581_597&products_id=550
It was a great way to spend a summer evening. A lot of fun for an old guy. I am glad we stopped when we did. One more pass would have been a big mistake. John
You da man John! I've got a tank I made for something else but didn't use. It's 11x4 but I hadn't drilled any holes in it yet. I found a couple of discarded small propane bottles camping and all I could think is what a cool tank it would make. Now I need to make/scare up the burndown breathers and an old aluminum breather for the tank. I really don't want to put the breather over ths script of the valve cover. I'll might buy a couple of Moon breathers, take off the tops, and make my own top that exits in a piece of tube.
Kerry, The tank needs to have a minimum capacity of a 2 gallon. If the tank is too small then the oil will blow right through the tank. Port the two blow down tubes straight down in the tank and place the two tank vents on the top of the tank. The vent tubes on my tank had a cup shaped (metal spray can lids) baffle on the bottom of tubes. That helped to prevent the discharged oil from exiting the tank while allowing the air to escape. On the top of the vent tubes I used the old style push on chrome breathers. There must be sufficient volume and space for the discharged oil and pressurized air to separate. Put the tank in front of the engine. The extra distance allows the oil to start separating from the air. McGurk
I will move my responses over to this thread, Again, Early Chry have the worst oil return and each head will fill up each with a 1 1/2 qt. of oil by the end of the run and with the breathers on the front of the covers,the oil goes foward and out the breather when you get off of it. For the most part doing a leakdown when it is cold will not give you true readings. Knock the porcline out of a plug and weld to a piece of tubing and the other end the same fitting your gauge set-up uses. Weld some short pieces to the top so that it looks like a cross. This is what you use to check cyl leak down those long tubes because you can get more torque on the plug end instead of the rubber hose. Besides the valve covers you shoud also ad a vent hose to the valley cover. In the 16 years I have been running my blown engine on alc I have yet to pull more than dixie cup worth of oil out of the tank(that amount over a 16 year period) and I also run clear HD hose.
Generally its 1 1/4 ID. Now heres the trick, you have to find it from the beginning of the roll, because it will be rounder and less curl. If you get it from the end, that vinyl is wrapped tight around the spindle and crushed flat. I stay away from the hose with the strands of cord in it, It may look cool but its thicker and the strings offer "0" benefit for what we are doing. I like using the clear hose because I have never puked anything and clear is normal. If I did see somthing it would alert me to a potential issue.
I was kind thinking 1.25. In an effort to keep it looking early sixties I'll probably use the old style black flex radiator hose. Definitely won't be closed up like the clear stuff can get. I'll just have to make a habit of draining the tank to see if I have an issue.
OK, Here's my 2 gallon puke tank that will sit in front of the engine and the start of a homemade burndown breather.
Kerry, EXCELLENT! It will keep your goggles clear and help to keep the front wheels on the ground. McGurk
That will look right at home in your chassis........I need to figure out my setup soon and make something up as well.......Dave
Kerry, Cool! You might want to consider fabricating a bracket to assure that the blower belt and the burn down tubes don't get friendly. It wouldn't take much and it could be fastened with the lower drive housing bolts. McGurk
good idea, especially the way it dislikes the blower belts anyway.. did you do anything with the pulley, try out the crowning? looking forward to see ya make some runs sat.
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