Jump to content

Piazzanoob's chev 350 project


piazzanoob

Recommended Posts

So it all started with zebradude posting up his 350 chev up for sale as he had no use for it and me seeing it thinking I needed it in my life so with parents giving the okay with taking up more room in the shed I ended up with this

awagrivh.1lk.jpg

So all it come with was a Holley carb alternator and trans

fcuq4aow.hfm.jpg

Also come with a trans which is good.

Details are that its had water in the bores and is seized and been sitting for 4 years.

So straight after getting it and putting it in the shed I set about trying to turning the motor over and then realised it needed the heads off to inspect the bores.

Heads off

u4il4ct3.5u3.jpg

bmf2dd1k.pzt.jpg

4id4tquz.igk.jpg

Then saw this and thought ot ohh

lvslbgpa.xtm.jpg

clioumzk.3ap.jpg

So after I gave it a quick clean out i got my can of inox gave the bores a flooding then got my powerbar out and tried trying it over with some success

y3cvshlb.zd0.jpg

After about five minutes of turning the the engine in small movements I finally got the engine to turn over from top to bottom but not without hearing the noise of rust grinding off the bores.

qovm0vv2.qkc.jpg

rixz0qjg.b01.jpg

easrmpox.kpt.jpg

So now the plan is to give the motor a full rebuild maybe some Aliminium heads some cams but still unsure and get a electronic dizzy and starter motor and get her running and then with either sell the engine or find a rolling body to put it into.

  • Like 6
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Had a bit of a look around and found this http://m.summit racing.com/parts/sum-sbckit1-000 But when I talked to the guy at American parts service centre Ltd in Onehunga behind Firestone he said that kit will be made from rubbish metals and from China or somewhere and get you nowhere and he reckons most of sta parts for chev is rubbish also which I Think is true pay cheap get cheap as he knows his stuff and been doing it for years So yeah I don't really have any budget as such to how much I wanna spend but I don't want to be putting rubbish parts in as well.

So does anyone know of any good engine part brands or any local shops who sell good parts ?

Cheers

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Don't listen to people trying to suck you into big dollar rebuilds, work slowly and work cheaply.

It's a bit bad but not too bad, get the slugs out, there doesnt appear to be a lip on the bores, so thats a good thing, and check out if you can get away with a hone and new rings.

if you can, thats a nice easy cheap start, the 350 sbc has been around for a million years and there are loads of cheap performance parts for it.

I'm in the USA in Sept and If you give me a parts list I'll throw a rebuild kit in the back of the Caddy for you and bring it home :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Dude at my work did rings bearings and 30 over pistons in his holden 308 including machine work big cam regrind too for under 1500 bucks.

 

Holden V8s (253, 304 and 308) are much more expensive to rebuild than the smallblock Chevrolet V8.

Strip it down completely until you have a bare block, get it measured, dipped and then re-measured. Then you have a good clean starting point. The measuring will determine the size of pistons/rings etc you will need to buy. You can then start shopping for the rotating assembly and internals but until you have it stripped down to just a bare clean block there is not point shopping.

As Ben says, the best place to get parts for these is the USA. Once you know which parts you need, we can probably bring them back for you.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sounds like the typical spiel of some over-priced local "hotrod" shop who has been cranking some serious markup for years, they're generally the same fuck-wits with yanktanks on the 'tard for $20k above what they're worth.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

every engine part I've brought from summit has been very good,i agree with the above about speed shop owners, biggest rip off art its out there! buyer beware. they also don't like Japanese speed parts in my dealings with them.

just my opinion. 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Update have spend the afternoon stripping the rest of the motor down.

It all started off with draining the oil so I pulled the sump bung off and for about 5 seconds all that came out was water then big clumps of oil and water that had mixed together into lumps would pop out every minute or so with the black oil that also came out.

url=http://www.iforce.co.nz/View.aspx?i=xjdfjqsh.fyi.jpg]xjdfjqsh.fyi.jpg[/url]

So then I pulled the sump off which had been modified to fit in a bmw as to what Zebradude told me but the worse thing with the modified sump is that it has no dip stick.

Then I came across this

url=http://www.iforce.co.nz/View.aspx?i=knaut24j.rjz.jpg]knaut24j.rjz.jpg[/url]

1wvmf0cq.a3j.jpg

So that white stuff you can see on the pickup and bottom of sump is what I had coming out when I was draining the oil.

Then while I was on the job of removing the rod end caps and crank caps I noticed that each cap and also the rods had been hit with a dot punch to say what cylinder they were off so now I know that some has rebuild this motor once before.

url=http://www.iforce.co.nz/View.aspx?i=rwb3arpy.s24.jpg]rwb3arpy.s24.jpg[/url]

So after removal of the Pistons&rods crank cam and timing chain I found the block still seems to be okay and that the bearings still have plenty of life left in them all the rings seem to be intact and look alright crank has no marks or wear and also the cam still looks good but I'm also assuming it's standard as it has no numbers or brand stamped onto it.

The bores however have some rust on them I think I may get away with just a good hone but will take all the parts and get them measured to see what I need and what's still good.

Then the last thing I had to get off was the oil filter but with doing the engine at home I have limited tools but I tried polygrips and that was a no go so screwdriver is was

url=http://www.iforce.co.nz/View.aspx?i=i4enoo1f.a2h.jpg]i4enoo1f.a2h.jpg[/url]

If you have a look at the photo above ^ this one notice on the left hand bottom corner that when I tried undoing the filter with a screwdriver that it had torn quite abit before it started undoing.

So with now the engine stripped i just need some time to go take it down to the engine shop to get everything measured.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

you should be able to see if its had a crank grind or bore before- pistons will usually have a number stamped into them if they are oversize (030,040,060 etc) same with the bearings, on  the back of them.

 

sump and a new pickup will be cheap for a SB chebby

 

also agree with summit stuff being good and reasonably priced.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...