From a previous post:
"Positive stop – obtain an old spark plug for the Ford engine – most of us have at least one laying around. Put it in your vice, and with a tool of destruction you deem appropriate – cut off the ground tip and bust up the ceramic around the center electrode. Keep pounding to get the ceramic and center electrode removed so you’ve got a good ¾” or so of hollow space inside what used to be the ‘business’ end of the spark plug. If you happen to break the ceramic on the other end of the spark plug, don’t worry about it. Once you’ve got a nice hollow space in the tip of the plug, take a 5/16” tap, and cut threads inside that end of the plug. I found that diameter to go right in without any drilling required. Once you’ve cut threads, screw in a 5/16" bolt about 1.5” to 2” long. Then take your hack saw and cut the head off the bolt. Wouldn’t hurt to take your file/grinder and dress up the freshly cut surface so no sharp edges or shrapnel enter the combustion chamber. Also clean up the threads on the plug so that it easily screws into and out of the plug hole.
Determining TDC – remove the passenger side valve cover. Remove rockers from the intake and exhaust valves on the #1 cylinder. Rotate the engine (socket on crank bolt) until the #1 piston is down the cylinder on the intake stroke. Unscrew the spark plug in that cylinder, and replace it with the positive stop you just made. Only screw the positive stop in hand tight. Install your cam degree wheel and pointer (no easy task in some cases as harmonic balancer and other accessories will have to be removed). You may want to remove all spark plugs at this point because it will make it easier to smoothly turn the engine over in small increments. GENTLY rotate the engine clockwise until the piston comes to rest against the stop. Note the degree wheel reading. GENTLY rotate the engine in the opposite direction until the piston comes to rest against the stop. Note the degree wheel reading. TDC is exactly half way between these readings. Calculate where that position is on the degree wheel, remove the piston stop from the cylinder, and rotate the engine to TDC as you calculated it.
Degreeing the cam – install the camshaft in the straight up or dot to dot position to start with. Set your dial indicator up over the #1 intake valve lifter or pushrod. Rotate the engine clockwise until the intake lifter/pushrod just begins to rise. Follow the dial indicator and stop the rotation when the lifter is at .050” lift. Take a reading on the degree wheel. It should match your cam card information for the number of degrees at .050” lift on intake valve opening. For example, the cam card on an E303 cam says that the intake should be open .050” right at top dead zero – 0 degrees TDC. So if you rotate the engine until your dial indicator shows .050” lift on the intake opening, the your degree wheel should be pointing right at tdc. If you’re within a degree or two, then you can go ahead and check the .050” closing timing, as well as the opening and closing events for the exhaust valve. They should all match up with the cam card info within a degree or two. If, for example, at .050” you’re supposed to be at 0 degrees TDC (from the cam card), and after your dot to dot install you’re reading 4 degrees after TDC at .050”, then the intake valve is opening too late (4 degrees later than it should). To adjust this, you need to make the intake open 4 degrees earlier (right at tdc), so you’ll have to advance the cam by 4 degrees. To do this you slide your indexed timing set off, you select the “4A” slot on the crank gear (instead of the straight up position), align it with the dot on the cam gear and reinstall. Remeasure as described above – you should now read .050” lift right at TDC. Many contemporary cams have assymetrical lobes – so I wouldn’t install the cam using the lobe centerline method – the centerline can be difficult to find. I recommend using the .050” lift timing events for the install – check all 4 of them to be sure the cam is doing what the cam card says it should be doing.
Drop valve measurement – now that the piston is at TDC (be sure you're at TDC during overlap - between exhaust and intake strokes) you can safely remove the valve springs on the intake and exhaust valves. I used an inexpensive KD tool for a small block Chevrolet (Blasphemy!). It bolts into the pedestal and has a crow’s foot that sits over the spring retainer. It’s nothing more than a pry bar. Be sure to screw the rocker bolt far enough into the pedestal to hold the tool. You (or your big friend Bubba) are going to apply significant force on the lever to compress the spring. A small magnet is invaluable for grabbing the keepers once the spring is compressed. Also, a couple of taps (lightly – careful here) with a hammer on the retainer can help free up the keepers. The valves may or may not drop down and touch the piston – be sure it’s at TDC to limit the valve movement. Set up your dial indicator over each valve. Rotate the engine to about 20 degrees BTDC. Now, in 5 degree increments, until you reach 20 degrees ATDC measure the distance between valve closed and valve touching the piston. You can move the valve up and down with your fingers, or if the seals are loose, up with your fingers, gravity will take care of down. You’ll have maps of closed valve to piston contact distances every 5 degrees from 20 BTDC to 20 ATDC for intake and exhaust. Rotate the engine back to 20 BTDC (back the way you just came – if you rotate the other way, the piston will drop all the way to the bottom and you’ve got valves dropping down into the cylinders – DON’T DO THAT!!) and set the dial indicator up over the intake and exhaust lifters (or pushrods if you don't have a dial indicator extension). Make the same measurements on both lobes – a map of lift on intake and exhaust lift at 5 degree increments from 20 BTDC to 20 ATDC. Multiply the lift times the rocker ratio. That is valve lift. At each 5 degree point, subtract valve lift from the valve closed to piston contact measurement. That is your piston to valve clearance. It should be more than .080” on intake and .100” on exhaust for engines revving less than 6500 rpm. As your rpm increases, your clearance should increase. If you’re revving to 8500 rpm, you probably want on the order of .125” to 150” on intake/exhaust to be safe."
no wonder why it was smoking and leaking compression back into the crankcase! :damnit: ...for the time being im putting my stock bottom end back in...how much valve lift can i run without hitting the pistons...im running a trick flow stage 1 cam with 1.72 rockers which puts me at approximately .536 lift on the intake and .548 on the exhaust...duration @ .50 is 221 intake and 225 exhaust...i clay tested the motor but could not tell if i was hitting...would i be smart just to run my stock rockers? 
(are those 1.5s or 1.6s?) to all of you much more experienced with the five liters, any suggestion would help greatly! thanks! later! 
