CamarosRUS

I just recently finished my 383. While the old motor was out I did a lot of work to the bay (smoothed fenders, smoothed battery trays, smoothed framerails, new paint etc) and built my first and totally different motor than the 305 that came out.

Well, since this was my first (and other things involved) I had a TON of little and bigger problems that I thought I'd share...some are kinda funny and I want to hear your most recent motors problems, your first motors problems, or the most problematic swap you've ever done as well.

Cut extra holes in car for unneeded grommets
Brake fluid on oil pan, ruined paint
Ditto on firewall (clutch reservior)
Messed up new battery tray cutting CAI hole
Hammered through smoothed fender; drivers side
Water pump leak
Upper radiator hose leak
Temp probe leak for new fan switch
Temp probe wires snapped when fixing leak
Valve Lash Cap came off (nicked rocker and retainer)
Drain Plug and oil pan stripped!!
Excess metal shavings on plug magnet
Ugly coolant
Excess metal sheen in oil
Oil pressure gauge screwy (sender or gauge bad)
OR
Metal stuck in oil passage
Tachometer FUBAR
Horrible voltage (kill switch causing this?)
AFPR screwed
Fuel pump check valve broken (possibly injectors bad too)
Y pipe doesn’t fit
Cut off fuel pump relay thinking it was a fan relay
Forgot to connect ECM to prime pump after fuel pump relay was soldered back on
AND the car is running like JUNK! Extremly rich and I hope I didn't wash down the walls...

What do you all have?

GlenYappa

I took out a blown L69 engine and built a 350 4-bolt from the block up for a roots blower. It is my first build as well and it has to pass emmisions. I left the A.I.R. pump and the CC Qjet with an updated ECM. I probably should have rebuilt something simpler for my first engine like one for my 72 Blazer.

Mistakes I made during the build:

Used studs instead of head bolts for no good reason and I just could not get them to seal. I finally got them to seal with a tip from an old engine builder and used Loktite high strength thread locker. I probably tried 5 or 6 other solutions before that though which meant taking the heads off and cleaning the block every time and resetting all the valves.

-I had the valves too tight and backfired through the carb
-Leaky water neck because I used too short a bolt and eventually stripped the bolt hole. I had it helicoiled.
-stripped the top thread off an intake bolt hole. Again too short a bolt when I added a bracket for the AC under the bolt. Luckily there was still plenty of threads when I used the correct bolt and didn't need a helicoil.
-I have brain farts every time I try and install a distrib. and get the timing off too much
-Defintitely got it too hot a couple of times
- I thought it seized up on me and ended up taking it down to short block just to put it back together once it freed up. Long story
-dropped a bolt down one of the oil passages
-dropped a long flathead screwdriver down the distrib hole while trying to turn the oil-pump shaft

MOST IDIOTIC thing I did: I was taking a head off and I missed the 2 end nuts which were covered in pools of oil. I convinced myself the head was just fused to the gasket and the block (which is really dumb by the way...all new parts with hardly any runtime). I actually tried to pry it off with a really long bar. These are AFR190 heads. I didn't hurt anything except myself. Thank God.

BEST THING I did: I chose to weld up a frame with some gauges so I could start the engine and debug all the little things I knew would happen without the engine in the car. I bolted the bellhousing to the engine and built the frame to mount to the bellhousing and the 2 engine mounts and the radiator. Works great.

Second best thing I did: I initially built the engine with a vacuum advance distrib. and a regular old carb so I was able to break the engine in and know it was correct before I tried the ECM and CC QJet.

Would I do it all again? HELL YES!

Glen

Scorpner

iTrader: (4)

I'll list most of the things that happened with mine, but I'm a little too embarrased that I fell for some of the common things I already knew about. Sorry.

This is my first time doing this myself and I went through the entire drive train. I found out how much I didn't know.

Oil pan was twisted.
New oil pan- needed different pick up. Was told the wrong part number for the pick up. Ended up with hi and low volume pumps and pick ups. Pickup I chose didn't fit the pump. Had to enlarge bolt hole size.
Wrong oil pan gaskets
Didn't know when prelubing, that the sending unit should be installed. Shoots up pretty high.

Almost used plugged valve covers, I posted and found out the crankcase needs to breathe!
I had to ask where the temp sending unit is.

Shorty headers - Neither Y-pipe would fit. Manufacturer refused to help.
Long tube headers didn't fit. Manufacturer refused to help.Had to rerout brake lines again.
Local shop saved the project.

Temp sending unit leak
Brake lines leak, Oops. rear ones on the wrong way.
Speed bleeders leak, back to old ones.
When bleeding, I hit the brake pedal a little too fast with low fluid, then missed a spot in the back till the next day.
One man bleeder started to leak once in a while, so I couldn't figure out why it wasn't going well. I took it off and it worked, then it would start leaking again. Ended up having the ex over so we could argue while I got the job done. -wouldn't even accept dinner.

Fuel leak, the duel feed lines didn't fit the carb from the same manufacturer. Got a fuel line with a guage from someone parting out theirs for $10 that worked.

Fitment issue with carburater and Air Gap manifold, needed spacer and the special vacuum take off from the OLD ENGINE manifold.

Don't know how many times I put things on the wrong way. Or forgot something and had to redo it.
Learned how to fabricate many things, route brake and fuel lines.
Ran new brake lines in the front and had to redo them after installing the first set of headers.

Battery drain, not looked into yet.
Forgot that I borrowed a fuse from this car. Oh, it was the one for the brake lights!

I did save the old engine for reference and it saved me many times. Used a lot of the parts from it.
I managed to get all new rad hoses, water pump, etc. because I didn't want to do it again.

I have a few boxs of parts to send back now.

I am on the road now though.

1985WS6transam

iTrader: (4)

I like this thread, when i do my engine swap this summer i will be sure to reference back to this and try and learn from some of your mistakes, then i will post mine.

Sonix

iTrader: (1)

- distributor out of time, 2 times in a row
- home made hard line from mechanical fuel pump on block to carb, leaked like a sieve. 3 times
- mystery coolant leak causing pools of coolant at front passenger side intake manifold bolt. Replaced intake gasket, then waterneck o-ring with RTV, got a seal.
- too much cam to stay running. Needed to drill throttle plates, and idle mixture screw holes (non-cc q-jet)
- burned a handful of plug wires on first start up. I think it runs hottest on first start up.
-brake fluid leak at back left disc, due to new hard lines, and not tightening down on copper washers hard enough.
-pumpkin leaking fluid (tiny bit)
-power steering hardline leaking
-top rad hose slipped off of waterneck while driving first 20 miles.
-lug nuts loose during first test drive. Easy to find out why my car was shimmying funny. Terrifying when I found out why.... (smiling peeing his pants right here..)

that's all so far...

84z28350

Well i had a few wacky things happen on my build last week.


First off i managed to have an intake bolt on the drivers side center-rear be just long enough to contact the pushrod and jam it. Couldnt figure out WTF was going on when i tried to lash the valves (thank god i put the intake on before i lashed!) so i got the vise grips out and yanked it out. put a flashlight down the hole and immediately noticed the bolt sticking down there...

So watch your intake bolt length!


Other than that its been the usual BS oil leak from valve covers. I waited to goop them until i knew my lashes were good.

For once i managed to drop in the dizzy exactly where i wanted it. it fired right up!

sofakingdom

iTrader: (1)

Oh man.... some of the things I've had happen at new motor startup time....

• A rear cam bearing plug popped out
• Too-long bolt that jammed the fuel pump rod
• Bent oil pan made a knocking noise you could hear half a mile away (crank hitting it)
• Took several tries to learn how to stab a distributor
• Carb problems of all sorts; blown power valves, stuck floats, etc.
• Several cars with rotten gas and stopped-up fuel lines
• One BBC with 454 pistons in a 427 (approx. 6½:1 compression)
• One BBC with closed chamber pistons and open chamber heads; pistons hit the heads
• No telling how many dead batteries, coolant leaks, oil leaks, vacuum leaks, and on and on

Just to name a few....

Trust me, after you do a few of these, you first kind of get used to the idea that you'll have trouble; then after you've had lots of different kinds of trouble you learn how to prevent it, and you quit trying to rig stuff up "just so you can hear it run"; and then it gets better. I've got it down now to where I can literally build a motor, put it in, fill the car full of fluids, SHUT THE HOOD, reach in the window and hit the key and crank it up, re-open the hood and check the timing, back it out and go for a test drive. I DO NOT try to hurry to get to the "first run" any more. That just causes more trouble than it's worth.

Vader

Poor timing, overheating, incorrect timing chain installation, more overheating, oil leaks at rear intake China Wall, overheating again, fuel bowl level problems (mostly Holley), overlooked vacuum connections, blown heater core, cork oil pan gasket seepage, did I mention overheating?

I once got a free "bad" 350 because a rod was hitting a pan baffle and the assembler though it was a lube/crank/bearing problem.

Oh, and sometimes they overheat on cam break-in.

I've twisted oil pump drive shafts on SBFs from having debris sucked up into the lobe pumps. Lock them right up. At least they shut right down.

Nixon1

I got lucky...my first motor started and ran within 5 minutes...but wouldn't idle. Ended up with major vacuum leaks which I fixed, then the water pump leaked (anybody who's built a 302 can tell you about the water pump and timing cover....nightmares to seal) and flung coolant everywhere.....then the engine had no power, had to adjust timing....still nothing....fuel pressure....BAM power back.....must've done 3 complete sets of plugs in this motor trying to get it running right.

Here's the best part, it still randomly goes into fits of misfiring at cruise and backfires and stumbles on acceleration....completely intermittent and the car has ALL new or aftermarket parts. Im starting to think my $500 MAF is bad or something....ohh but guess what, the company is out of business!

John 89 Formula

Had a couple problems myself, First, more of an accident really, My old man put the motor on the engine stand top heavy, I tried to turn the motor upside down to take the oil pan off. The whole engine stand fell over, landed on the p/s pulley and dented it. On the way down it clipped the front bumper on the car, knocked a half dollar size chunk of paint off.
Then the new engine would not start right away, we played with it for an hour before realizing we had forgotten to plug in the plugs on distributer. this was my Firebird
Another time I was lowering a new engine into my 87 LaSaber, when the chain broke and the engine fell the last 6 inches into the engine bay. I got lucky, it landed dead on the mounts. Scared the crap outta me just the same.

88 350 tpi formula

iTrader: (9)

first one I over tightened the rockers just enough to take alot of time trying to figure out why it would not start which it did (did not know right away) if you kept the throttle open. (must have checked the dizzy 20 times) left the rad hose clamp loose too but nothing happened and was noticed by some one else I guess I was lucky for my first one but, I kept it simple and only did a 305 tpi to 350 tpi swap with a mild cam and headers (real little changes) so it bassically was a copy of what came out and I did my homework befor I even started it.

jbenge

iTrader: (2)

I've had the distributer 180 degrees out once or twice on new motor start ups. Also had a leaking oil pan before too...which really sucks fixing on these cars..especially with a deep pan.

CamarosRUS

Keep them coming!

CamarosRUS

...

Chadster86S10

Still going through all of this right now. Here is my list-

- Learned about the 2 different fittings between the old and new style P/S pumps the hard way (using newer steering box with the 1972 pump)
- Bought a smaller flywheel because I thought my larger one wouldn't work with the new mini-starter.
- Learned about used electronic distributors the hard way. $100 later there is a new one on the motor. Blew a day timing and retiming it when the old dizzy was junk and wouldn't keep time.
- Had one heck of a time getting my injectors to fire. Ordered new ones, rewired everything, tested everything. Turns out that even though I drove it in the garage when I pulled the old motor, it apparently ran out of gas just when I turned the key off. There was NO GAS left in the tank. Blew $30 and 1 day on a TBI rebuild kit, luckily the injectors were on order and I cancelled them.
- Dinged a hole in the brand new radiator while fighting to get the 16" electric fan in. Never did get the fan in, had to buy 2 smaller ones.
- Learned the difference between coolant temp senders, between idiot light sensors and guage sensors.
- Spent a week learning all about ECM's, VE tables, RTTuner, Ostrich, etc.
- Learned the hard way that installing custom exhaust on an S10 with a V8 is probably best left to an exhaust shop. Still leaking, much like my eyeball is after getting hit with oil or a chunk of dirt!
- Right now I'm in he11, the motor is pouring oil everywhere, even though we put it together with expensive gaskets, etc.