Well the 350 is in te car and everything is hooked up accordingly. The only problem is that it wont start. I believe it is the timing. Someone had mentioned to me that Gm had changed the firing order for their motors throughout the 70's but i checked and it is the same. The motor was at TDC when i put the distributor in and it is aligned with number 1 cylinder. The car seems like it wants to fire but wont. I checked the plugs and wires and they are both good. I am getting spark to the cylinder but it wont start.....any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

if ur getting spark its prolly fuel related

 

The firing order for a SBC has never changed. The LS1 is different, but that's a whole different engine.

More than likely you've got the dist in 180 degrees out; i.e. it's trying to fire #1 when #1 and #6 are both at TDC, but it's #6 firing instead of #1. You can find #1 firing by taking out the #1 plug, sticking a piece of hose or something in the hole, and bumping the motor over with the starter until you hear compression coming out of the hose. #1 firing is a few degrees before the next time the piston comes up to TDC.

 

Yep, that was it, when the long block was assembled at the factory, they lined up the timing marks on the crank and cam, but it was 180 out. We got it running and now it overheats while were trying to break in the cam. It got really hot, like 250-260 a couple times, will the cam break in not be complete? We ran oit for about 20 minutes. Also, how can i get it to run cooler? Everything is new, rad, thermostat, water pump...I'm Stumped.

 

I just finished installing a 350 in my Berlinetta. During the cam breakin, the temp got up to about 240 before an oil leak caught fire. To fix the oil leak, I replaced the thermostat with a highflow one (180 degree) from stewart components. I also replaced the radiator cap. My lower radiator hose didn't have the support spring that keeps it from collapsing, so I got a new lower radiator hose. I'm happy to say that the engine stays around 208-210 now.

Good luck,
Dave

 

ell the electric fan didint draw wnough air through the rad so i went to a flex fan set up and now the car wont ruyn above 190 so i'm very happy. The cam wasnt hurt at all and the car runs great.

 

omg 240-250?!? why does cam breaking in a cam raise temps ?

 

Everything is tight in there, it shouldnt run 240-250. This is because my fan was shot, bvut they run hot, maybe 220-230 normally, of course this is running the car at 2000 RPM's for 20 minutes too so its gonna build heat fast. The heat in the cam and the oil combined with it harden the cam, making it less likely to round a lobe off.

 

Did someone tell you that, or is that what you assumed?

Having spent many an hour in metallurgy classes, I can tell you for a fact that is NOT why you "run in" a cam.

 

No thats not why you break in the cam like that but adding heat with oil hardens metal. I'm a machinest, we do these kinds of things at work...To harden bolts you get them red hot and throiugh them in a tub of oil and they harden, the heat opens up the pores on the metal.

 

Right... but let's hope your cam doesn't get red hot.

The reason you do it, is to force the lifters to begin to rotate in their bores IMMEDIATELY on startup. If they are allowed to sit still, the cam will wear a little bar-shaped dent in them, and then they will never turn no matter what you do, and it will eat tha tcam lobe. That's also why you use dino juice oil in a flta-tappet motor at startup, in fact it's the ONLY technical cause-and-effect reason for doing that, other than just personal preference; you can use synthetic in a motor equipped with roller lifters from the get-go, but you should never do that in a flat-tappet motor.

 

Not exactly...

 

Maybe you should have paid attention in metalurgy classes then, and not taken it as a blow off class