Here is my situation. The LB9 in my bird threw a rod last week. I am looking for a quick fix so my 97 Z28 can undergo heads and cam.

Here is what i have in line possibly. A guy i know has a L69 long block in good shape. Valve stems need redone, but that is a quick fix with the motor out.

I was thinking i could just buy the L69 long block, put my LB9 heads and intake on it, but what will need to be done regarding my valvetrain. The motor is a flat tappet setup, and my valvetrain is roller style.

What would you guys do

 

is it a roller block? as in does it have the mounting points for the spyder?
If not just use his cam and lifters and put your heads and intake on it. thats the easiest if you just want to be up and running and don't care about speed.

 

Take the heads and intake off yours, use his pushrods and shortblock. That should do it.

I hope you didnt bend any valves after that broken rod. Its possible (ask me how I know).

 

Thanks for the input. So i have to use his pushrods, but i can use my heads? Thats what i was hoping.

I have had the valve covers off, and the valves seem to be opening and closing properly.

Thanks again.

 

I don't think he threw a rod. We have though that it may be a wrist pin on one of the driver side pistons making the nose. The car still has all of the power it had, but that terrible noise.

In any case, a rod isn't flopping around dead in there. I have a feeling this is more of a worn or bad bearing than anything else.

But its good to know that we only need to swap the heads an intake onto the older block. I suppose we should regasket it while we are doing that. The oilpan gasket and timing cover would be easy to do.

 

Okay, i was trying to search on this topic, very hard to do.

Here are my questions.

1. I assume i need to use the lifters from the L69.

2. Do the pushrods matter?

3. What about springs and rocker arms.

 

Well, here's the deal.

The pushrod difference is related to the lifter difference (roller vs flat tappet). Thats why you gotta use the pushrods from the L69, since you are using the block, cam, lifters, etc. Your lifters arent gonna work in that block, there is no way to prevent them from turning and the cam isnt made for them anyway.

Springs and rockers, use yours. Your heads use self aligning rockers and should have the large holes rather than just slots where the pushrod goes through the head. That means you have to use your rockers with your heads, or his rockers with his heads. I wouldnt worry too much about the springs, they are going to be practically the same aside of wear from use. As long as they arent broken, dont worry about it. You arent building up a race car.

If you had access to a different intake base, you could just run the entire L69 engine and your intake, but the holes are a little different. Fixable, but maybe you dont wanna go through that. I wouldnt blame ya.

 

Thank you for explaining that to me. I really needed someone to clear that up for me.

Wish me luck

 

TTT just in case anyone else wants to chime in