jasons86iroc

i have a million problems. i put a '75 350 into my car(it did run good). i replaced the cam and lifters.now the car seems like it is impossible to time correctly. the mark on the harmonic balancer is nowhere to be found with the timing light. it runs very nice in the garage, but as soon as i took it for a drive it messed up and could not stay ruuning and backfired when i turned the engine over.
it also sounds like the rockers on the left side are not getting any oil.
also now after i took it for a drive i opened the hood and the engine was covered in oil.
help.......

Vader

Jason,

I hope you're certain of the valve timing. If you have a dial indicator, you can check this fairly easily without removing the timing cover. After that, make sure the distributor is fully seated on the intake, so the gear is fully engaged in the cam gear and the oil pump is driven correctly.

As for the oil all over the engine, it sounds like you may have some high pressure in the crankcase. This can be caused by holed-out pistons, really bad timing, excessive ring blow-by, poor oil drainback, a stuck PCV valve, and high oil level causing foaming.

Get the timing issue settled first, then attack the oil problem - they may be related.

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Later,
Vader
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Damon

Geez, you DO have problems! Let's try to take them one at a time.

First nail down the oil leak if you can. Likley leak places are the intake manifold end seals, the vavle cover gaskets, the timing chain cover where it meets up with the oil pan rails or possibly you butchered the crak seal on the front of the timing cover reinstalling it. Also, the fuel pump can cause leaks if you didn't use new gaskets. Lastly, there is a bolt installed in the TOP hole on the front of the block just around the corner from the fuel pump. That hole goes all the way into the crank case/fuel pump area and will spew oil if the (short) bolt is not reinstalled or there never was one. I think nailing this down shouldn't be too difficult.

Let's assume for aminute that you installed the cam correctly. Lined up the timing marks on the new chain, installed it straight up- nothing fancy. If that's the case (and let's hope that it is!) then the rest of your problems might be easily fixable without tearing the engine down again.

I think its unlikely that the lifters aren't getting oil on one side. There was oil getting to the stock stuff before and you didn't mess with the cam bearings or oil passages so let's put this one aside for a minute.

First off, check for TDC. Pop off the driver's side valve cover and turn the engine over by hand until you can feel the piston arrive at TDC on the #1 cylinder. Use a screwdriver through the plug hole to help you feel it come to the top. Make sure you get it to TDC on the COMPRESSION stroke (both valves on #1 fully CLOSED at TDC). Now where is your timing mark? Is it near TDC? If so then you have the distributor (ignition) timing off. Pop off the dist. cap and see if the rotor is pointing roughly at #1. If its off by 180 then double check you are really at TDC on the COMPRESSION stroke again. If it is still off by 180 then you have the distributor installed out by 180* and need to yank it and reinstall correctly.

If the timing marks are NOT near TDC even though #1 is ACTUALLY at TDC then something is wrong with the balnacer- either it has failed and the outer ring is sliding around relative to the inner one OR the balancer has chewed up it's woodruff key that keys it to the crank. If either of these cases is true then you need to yank the balancer.

Now that you have that nailed all that down its time to readjust the valves. Since #1 is now at TDC and both of it's valves are closed you can adjust both of them. Loosen the adjusting nut until the rocker comes off. Take out each pushrod and make sure it isn't bent. If any are bent you may want to actually check your cam installation more carefully (not just this quick and dirty method- more on that later) Reinstall each pushrod and rocker and tighten down until you can just feel the pushrod get "pinched" between the rocker and the lifter (it won't spin between your fingers). This is "zero" lash. Tighten down another 1/2 to 1 turn from there. Now turn the engine 90 degrees CLOCKWISE as you face the front of the motor and adjust the valves on #8, 90 more degrees and then #4, 90 more degrees and then #3, and so on following the engine's firing order (1,8,4,3,6,5,7,2). Fire it up and set the initial timing again just to get it running.

It worries me that the engine ran OK for a while and then had a catastrophic failure. You may have bent some pushrods due to either incorrect cam timing or that your cam has jsut caused the rocker arm, springs, or something else in the valve train to run out of travel and bind up.

Good luck with it.



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jasons86iroc

what are the odds that the engine would run fairly well if i installed the cam 360 degrees out(not on compresion stroke). because it did run for a while. no backfires but lack of power.

and also now the tranny isn't shifting out of first. it used to but not any more and the linkage is correct. i do not have the vacume line hooked up to the tranny yet could this be the reason.

Damon

You can't install it out by 360 degrees. It's the cam that determines which TDC IS the compression stroke. I know what you are thinking but you can't make that kind of mistake. Assuming you lined up the timing marks correctly and that the timing chain isn't mis-marked then you did it right.