Hot Rods The $75 283

Well I have the line off a compression tester and if I can find enough stuff to connect it to the air compressor I'll go out see if it's leaking really bad. Might actually have to make a run to the parts store..

 

Ok so #1 cylinder with 90 pounds of pressure could be pushed passed the compression stroke by hand. Tapped the valves and heard old irons click and now with only 60 pounds #1 cannot be pushed passed the compression stroke by hand. And I mean CANNOT.. It has some kind of compression in #1 now not sure if that's progress or not. Onto the next cylinder.

 

Sounds like progress to me, at least on #1. If you get good compression on four or five of them it will probably start and run enough to hammer the crap out of the other leaking valves.

 

Uh oh....is a piston hitting a valve stuck in the down or open position? Two head gaskets and unscrew 10 head bolts.....might save you a lot of trouble...

 

I don't believe so when turning over by hand get to the compression stroke and it feels exactly like an old go cart motor you spin the flywheel and you can 'bounce' it off the compression stroke and it will roll the flywheel back. By the way now all four drivers side cylinders can't be rolled passed the compression stroke by hand. Compressed air wack valves junk came flying out. I bet I do the other four and it'll be alot harder to roll the engine over by hand with the plugs in it like I could before.

 

Also side note unscrew the line from any of the driver side cylinders now with a good 80 pounds in the cylinder and it makes a nice little pop

 

Putting compressed air in the cyls doesn't hurt anything. Ive been using that method of cleaning crud out of Zombie engine cyls and valve seats for decades. I cant explain why and it isn't logical. However quite often if you break the seal by pulling the heads and mess with the valves. When you get it back together the engine suddenly starts smoking and burning oil.

 

Unscrew just 10 head bolts? What are you going to do with the other two dozen, break 'em off?

SBC has 17 bolts per head, and you're talking both heads by mentioning two head gaskets.

Also gonna need a pair of intake gaskets and the intake end seals.

 

My blistered hands have about took enough for a few days. It's getting fuel and i believe the valves are sealing much better then they were. It's on the ground and I have as much room as I need. With that in mind I have checked everything.. Bothered my neighbor he checked everything phone a friends been over it four times. We just get a couple kicks and that's it?

 

I have a set of head gaskets and it's getting dark.. Ive tried and it's just not firing over. I think I'm about to strip down what I can and pull the heads? Seems like I might have no choice

 

get two batterys hook one negative post to the engine ground. Then hook the positive post from that battery to the negative post on another battery . then from the second batterys positive connect to the starter. That will give you 24 volts to the starter. Be certain all battery connections are clean and tight. hook the coil directly to 12 volts without the resistor. Advance the dist to where it kicks back against the starter. then back it off till it don't kick back. You might spray some WD 40 down the carb when cranking. I wish was there I would have it running in 30 minutes.

 

Ok Im thinking of potential reasons why it will not come alive. how good is your fuel? Corn gas is sorry. find some ethanol free gas and add octaine booster. You need to give it as much help as you can.

 

We have a brand new battery cranking it over with an hei in it.. Whole new ignition system basically The spark on all plugs is great. It's new 93 octane out of a gascan. And advancing the dist did little when cranking. I have definitely gave it all the help it can get. It's not even trying.

 

I'm going along with what Old wolf mentioned earlier; it's probably the timing chain. Pull the dampener and front cover (you'll have to drop at least the front of the oil pan to pull the front cover), to make sure the chain has't jumped or shreaded the nylon teeth. You can always button it back up with RTV gasket material, rather than buy new gaskets. If it has a bunch of miles on it, the cam/lifters could be worn, even though the valves are moving "some". Crank the heck out of it to be sure the lifters are pumped up, and then readjust them. Starting fluid may help with it's ability to light off easier than gas. These kinds of scenarios can be frustrating, to say the least. There's a "reason" the engine was pulled in the first place. I am Butch/56sedandelivery.

 

do a compression test. If you have even a moderate amount of compression with gas and good spark at the correct time any engine will start if you spin it over fast enough.

 

It took me 20 mins to get the drivers head off.. Rats used all four cylinders as a bathroom. The crud must be 3 inches thick and it's so waterlogged.. I hit the top of the soaked piston with a lighter and nothing. I can't believe I even got a few pops no wonder..

 

after you get it cleaned up. check to be certain all those pistons come up pretty close to the deck. crud on pistons does not compress. It bends rods or breaks the top ring lands and damages the pistons and rods and possibly all three. I had wrongly assumed your engine had relatively clean cyls. a bore scope would have saved you a lot of unnecessary futile work.

 

when I first got it I assumed it would be clean enough but I had really only looked in a couple exhaust ports though. And I have the wire wheel on the compressor three pistons cleaned up very nice and appear to come super close to the deck. It was the top of the pistons that were terrible. Oddly the valves at first glance look fine also? Clean the rest and put it all back together.

 

Update pulled all the lifters one by one on the drivers side and they seemed flawless very shiny no indents or wear very free in the bore. I hope it's the same way on the other side. It's dark so I'm finished.

 

Disregard that whole last post if you read it I have brand new headgaskets

 

I am kinda terrified I was spinning it over to clean up the tops of the piston and the flywheel is flexing? Is the flywheel more likely to be bent then the crank itself? It spins so freely the crank wouldn't be bent right?

 

Every bolt is in a bag and all eight Piston tops are shiny again. This is probably a dumb question I'm not taking the pistons out but should I roll each piston to the bottom and cylinder hone on the tops of the cylinder? Or would that be bad? They have a glaze to them. The valves and heads cleaned up nice also.

 

Ok the whole top end is spotless and back together just small odds and ends and I will have it all buttoned back up by tonight.

 

That was fast! Good work. To check timing chain with the valve covers off, get a socket on that crank and turn it clockwise two full revolutions. Then turn it counter clockwise and see how far it can turn until the rockers start to move. Should not have a ton of slack before the rockers move. There's your amount of timing chain slack.

 

not having a car wrapped around it is the greatest! It's completely back together ready to see if it will start this time. The battery's been on charge sense this morning and I'll let it go all night. But like today I have tomorrow free to do whatever so it should run tomorrow. I'll try everything I know to get it running then if I fail I'll grab a compression tester. Kinda fun not knowing if what I'm working with is any good. I'm up for a gamble here and there.

 

Can someone verify my madness for setting timing so I know if I'm even close with this? Bring #1 to top dead by rolling the engine over by hand and watching the piston through the plug hole. Once at top dead the line on the balencer lines up with the line on the tab. Both valves on #1 are closed. Dropping the dist in and "walking" the oil pump shaft till the rotor points at #1 cylinder. Drop cap on and the post the rotor points at is the #1 wire? Then 8436572 check firing order 13 times

 

So many questions I figured out the timing. But still a burning question.. Where should I run the vacuum advance line? It's running off a port on the intake manifold right now? There is no where on the Rochester to run it as far as I can see?

 

Never seen a 7 cyl 283.

I had to, okay?

Just plug the vacuum advance for now.

The rotor should be a bit before #1 on the cap, but as long as you have room to rotate it, you should be fine.

Do you have a timing light?

 

I always watch #1 intake valve, roll crank until it closes, watch for TDC mark to line up, then back up about 1/4" BTDC, point rotor to #1 plug and wire it from there. usually puts it close enough to pop off or at least spit back.

 

This reminds me of when i was 16 or so,i had a 65 chevy pickup with a 283,it was running bad so my father said to put in some points,so i removed the distributor to do it,big mistake?. put the points in and tried to reinstall the distributor,no way would it start or even kick,my father said make sure the rotor is pointing to number 1 cylinder,i was pointing it to the cylinder in the block,not the terminal on the cap?took a while to live that one down,but still had to have a friend come over and set the timing and dwell,ran really good after that. Harvey