What a weekend. So I decide on saturday to put in the GT-40 heads and Trick flow cam. I've put this off for a couple months and due to different constraints never got around to it.
This weekend, I got all the parts together, and decided to hit with my little brother. We got it tore down really fast, but decided to really take our time putting it back together, and make sure it was done right. The whole job took 11 hours, with an hour for lunch, and some BSing time when buddies stopped by.
Which got me in trouble.
A few buddies swung by to chit chat and some even pitched in to help for an hour or two. One of those buddies put in the pushrods, lifters and keepers in while I bolted up the exhaust.
We ended up wrapping it up about 11pm at night saturday, and My old spark plugs didnt fit, so we called it a night without firing it.
After a (hellish) time trying to find spark plugs for the new heads. (which ended up being Autolite 764s from a 95 lightning) I called Bryan (the guy I bought the heads from), Jeff, my dad, everyone trying to narrow it down.
After more than a few tries, buying one plug at a time and trying it, we found a plug that fit.
Then I had to run some errands, and I came back tonight to put the plugs in and fire it up for the first time. The first time cranking it, it wouldnt fire and made a weird sound. I stopped, and called Jeff (again) and asked for some advice, and then we checked everything and fired it again.
After a few cranks, and twisting the distributor around, we cranked it and the starter bogged down really hard and I heard a really loud pop and crunching and snapping. I got out of the car and slowly walked around. Sounded like a timing chain. I turned the crank by hand and the rotor didnt move.
So we figured time to pull it apart and see what went wrong. While we were fishing for wrenches, we found one of the guides for the lifters. We didnt think to double check Tony's work, because it was such a simple task. Lesson: There is no detail too small in a motor
It really sucks. What I think happened here is one or both of the lifters with no guide turned sideways and bound up the cam, snapping my timing chain, or breaking the cam itself. We decided to call it a night again, and tear it down later. There could be minimal damage from this (new cam, lifters) but I wont know till I pull it apart. There could be some serious damage and chunks in the oil pan.
Lessons from this experience so far:
Parts store databases really vary on plugs for 80s-90s fords (explorers, stangs etc)
Lots of knowledge gained about GT40s (spending a couple hours on the internet searching about plugs for them)
If you have JBA shorties, you cant get to the lower head bolts on the passenger side without removing the header. If you dont want to remove the header, you can pull the nut off your motor mount and jack the motor up enough to get to the bolts.
Marking everything and taking photos really helped with reassembly.
There is no such thing as too small of a detail.
Lifter guides are really important. Turns out you need all 8 of them.
I'll keep you guys posted on and post pics if I really chewed up something. I was thinking of going with a new motor this year anyway, so I may end up getting a short block and just putting all my parts on that and doing a full autopsy on the old block.
This weekend, I got all the parts together, and decided to hit with my little brother. We got it tore down really fast, but decided to really take our time putting it back together, and make sure it was done right. The whole job took 11 hours, with an hour for lunch, and some BSing time when buddies stopped by.
Which got me in trouble.
A few buddies swung by to chit chat and some even pitched in to help for an hour or two. One of those buddies put in the pushrods, lifters and keepers in while I bolted up the exhaust.
We ended up wrapping it up about 11pm at night saturday, and My old spark plugs didnt fit, so we called it a night without firing it.
After a (hellish) time trying to find spark plugs for the new heads. (which ended up being Autolite 764s from a 95 lightning) I called Bryan (the guy I bought the heads from), Jeff, my dad, everyone trying to narrow it down.
After more than a few tries, buying one plug at a time and trying it, we found a plug that fit.
Then I had to run some errands, and I came back tonight to put the plugs in and fire it up for the first time. The first time cranking it, it wouldnt fire and made a weird sound. I stopped, and called Jeff (again) and asked for some advice, and then we checked everything and fired it again.
After a few cranks, and twisting the distributor around, we cranked it and the starter bogged down really hard and I heard a really loud pop and crunching and snapping. I got out of the car and slowly walked around. Sounded like a timing chain. I turned the crank by hand and the rotor didnt move.
So we figured time to pull it apart and see what went wrong. While we were fishing for wrenches, we found one of the guides for the lifters. We didnt think to double check Tony's work, because it was such a simple task. Lesson: There is no detail too small in a motor
It really sucks. What I think happened here is one or both of the lifters with no guide turned sideways and bound up the cam, snapping my timing chain, or breaking the cam itself. We decided to call it a night again, and tear it down later. There could be minimal damage from this (new cam, lifters) but I wont know till I pull it apart. There could be some serious damage and chunks in the oil pan.
Lessons from this experience so far:
Parts store databases really vary on plugs for 80s-90s fords (explorers, stangs etc)
Lots of knowledge gained about GT40s (spending a couple hours on the internet searching about plugs for them)
If you have JBA shorties, you cant get to the lower head bolts on the passenger side without removing the header. If you dont want to remove the header, you can pull the nut off your motor mount and jack the motor up enough to get to the bolts.
Marking everything and taking photos really helped with reassembly.
There is no such thing as too small of a detail.
Lifter guides are really important. Turns out you need all 8 of them.
I'll keep you guys posted on and post pics if I really chewed up something. I was thinking of going with a new motor this year anyway, so I may end up getting a short block and just putting all my parts on that and doing a full autopsy on the old block.
for some reason i had filled it with oil already too on the stand, dont ask me why. after another hour or so though, the pan was back on with the driveshaft installed.
