# New heads/cam



## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

I've been planning and working on a new heads/cam combo to get the most I can out of this little 383. I had problems show up on a dyno pull from my springs floating and whatever. I'v been happy with the street low RPM power and wanted to maximize the potential that remained and still keep it street friendly. My heads were CNCd 243 and knew that they were the weakest link compared to higher end heads. 

I decided to set my sights on Mamo MotorSports CNCd AFR 215s worked over to make his *Mamo 220*s. Tony Mamo worked for and designed AFR's LS heads and this year went out on his own. It's like falling down the rabbit hole though as new heads meant a new cam matched to them. My cam is going to be a 235/240 .620/.615 113+2. "As long as I was doing it" I opted for hollow valves and Ti retainers with the heads for valve train stability. Tony insisted that I needed to get roller rockers as the heads use bronze guides and with a high lift cam they would wear the guides quickly with stock rockers.

That lead me to getting Yella Terra rockers. Seeing as the damper/balancer is coming off it was time to get an ATI under-drive too. With the addition of new .036 thick head gaskets and other gaskets, sturdier push rods and fluids, etc the simple head upgrade has ballooned to around $5 grand in parts. I hope to get it torn down and assembled next week with tuning to follow. Last year I was chasing the end of nice weather and as long as "winter" doesn't come this year on Nov 1st again I should be rolling soon. I'll be posting up progress.


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## Rukee (Feb 8, 2007)

Sexy!! Can't wait to hear how everything works out. :cheers


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

Day three of tear-down. I was so sore last night I didn't know if I'd want to tackle anymore today but I did. Everything is out and ready to start the installs. I need to work on the rocker tip wipe pattern shimming. My experiment of using compressed air in the steam tube eliminated a lot of the antifreeze that spews out when you pull the heads but not all of it. It's nice having head studs as it doesn't fill up the holes with antifreeze at least.


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## Whiplash06Goat (Sep 23, 2015)

Are you planning on doing your own tuning and if so what do you use? I'm interested on seeing what your rwhp is when you get it put back together.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

Whiplash06Goat said:


> Are you planning on doing your own tuning and if so what do you use? I'm interested on seeing what your rwhp is when you get it put back together.


Yes I tune it myself using HP Tuners Pro and an Innovate LC-1 wideband O2 controller. Depending on when I get this thing done (winter can arrive overnight here in Michigan) I'd like to get it dynoed after I street tune it. Ran into an issue yesterday and I'm going to have to drop the oil pan down and try to get that #&^@! oil pickup tube bolt off and pull the oil pump. I have to access the crank gear to re-degree it to zero. I had it -2* from the last cam/heads to back off the timing and release some dynamic cylinder pressure. I'm on my way out to give it a try right now. Wish me luck. This is one of the top things I hate to do on the car for difficulty.


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## Whiplash06Goat (Sep 23, 2015)

Good luck getting that oil pickup tube bolt out and re-degreeing your crank, not a fun task with the engine in the car.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

Just a cautionary note. Despite my precautions I ended up dropping the $*#&@&! bolt down into the oil pan sump. :00/o:

I had put rags down in the pan and dropped the bolt. My mistake was not using enough rags and trying to retrieve it with my fingers. It ended up going *plunk* and disappeared down into the sump. If you've never seen what's in there there is a baffle up near the top of the pan with a ~5" hole in it where the pickup tube goes down into the sump and with a screened disk on the end to suck up the oil.

Because of the small area you have to get to it even with the oil pan dropped you don't have a very good shot at anything and the disk on the bottom of the tube blocks off most of the area. I had three options: pull the engine, leave it there to rattle around and buy a new bolt or try to retrieve it with a magnet.

I didn't like the first one so I put a magnet down and hoped it would find it. It didn't. I was frustrated and tired so I dropped it so I could look at the problem with new eyes the next day. Overnight I devised a solution. I got up and went to Harbor Freight and bought a 7" welding fixture magnet, a flex one and a telescoping pen one. Then I went to the Chevy dealer to buy a new bolt if that didn't work. No one in Michigan had one but he gave me the specs so I picked up a couple at Home Depot that would work (M6 x 20mm).

Back home I unbolted the engine mounts and jacked up the engine with a board under the oil pan to gain as much room to access as I could. I put blocks under the mounts to hold the engine up a ways and pulled the pan down as much as I could. I tried a couple of things and then worked the pen magnet down past the tube screen disk (it barely fit) and fished around. No luck. My ides then was to use the big 7" magnet to sweep the bottom of the pan and herd the bolt towards the pen magnet. First try yielded nothing but on the second try when I started to retrieve the pen I saw the bolt stuck on the end. 

I was sweating as I carefully pulled it out as the bolt had to turn to make it through the narrow gap. I had success! . Happy dance.

The lesson learned is to PACK the oil pan on top of the baffle with rags. If the bolt gets dropped use a magnet to retrieve it so you don't accidentally push it in. 

The crank gear is now reset correctly and the oil pump is bolted back up. Monday I'll work on getting the mating surfaces of the pan and gasket cleaned up and silicone applied to a couple of areas to get a good seal and then try to get the engine back onto the mounts. After that I can start on getting this thing back together.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

Had family yesterday plus R&R. Today I got the oil pan back on. I worry about leaks taking it off. There is not much room to work and I cleaned it with solvent as well as I could and used my fingers to wipe some sealant back by the rear cover before mounting it up.

To get the pan loose I had to jack up the motor and it took me an hour or more to jockey the engine back to line up on the mounts. A big pipe finally helped plus I loosened the bottom of them so I could move the top bolt around a little. If barely fits in the motor ears so it had to get lined up perfect.

I was short a bolt for the timing cover even though I bagged everything up as I went. I found an exact one in some junk bolts on the bench and then of course found the original one when I put that one in.

I put the ATI balancer in the oven at 200* for a while. With a little anti-seize on the crank it went on fairly easily. I had a nice tool for it that a friend made. I cleaned out the head bolt holes and put the lifters, gaskets and finally the head on. Felt good getting to a point of rebuild.

I took a picture of that and also the difference in a "normal" Cometic head gasket for a 5.7 and a larger 4.160". Mamo recommends 4.135 minimum and the Cometics I could find in a .036" thickness were 4.160". I took some pictures of that too. I've read the debate of size for the 5.7 bu I'll take the slight step and headroom for flow off the valve instead of a hot glowing edge.

*Magnificant Mounted Mamo Motorsports Modified Motor-heads*










*Cometic 3.91 gaskets overhang the combustion chamber.*










*Cometic 4.160"*


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## Whiplash06Goat (Sep 23, 2015)

Nice job getting the bolt out and your build is looking nice.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

Got the radiator installed today. I upgraded to a Cold Case radiator. Even though the old one was not leaking after 11 years I didn't want to push it and didn't want to take it off again. Easier to do it once (or three times, whatever it is  ). 

The radiator is all aluminum and stock size so there is no issue with modifying or not being able to easily run an OTRCAI. I only had to file a little groove in one aluminum tab to get it to fit better. Very nice looking piece. 

I ordered Manton 11/32" diameter, .120" walled push rods yesterday and they should be here the end of next week. That gives me a few days to tidy up a bunch of little things before the final button-up when they get here.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

While I have the FAST 102 manifold off I took a picture of my MAP sensor solution. Anyone that has a 102 knows that the back end sticks out a little further and so you must remove the rear engine hoist bracket. There is also a problem with the MAP sensor hitting the firewall. 

Most solve that by splicing the wires for the sensor and relocating it to the front in back of the throttle body. Besides the splicing it also further clutters up the engine bay. A solution is to turn in 90* counter-clockwise so the connector is pointing down. To secure the sensor in I drilled a small hole and used a sheet metal screw and fender washer to hold it in place. It can not be seen when installed in the car.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

Touch-up painted some brackets and the power steering reservoir, cleaned up my PCV super catch can tube routing, installed a new 180* stat and did an EVAP relocate. I've been wanting to do the relocate since I got my polished Holley valve covers a few years ago. Was a pretty easy mod. 5/16" gas line tubing and a short piece of two conductor wire, solder, soldering iron, heat shrink tubing and electrical tape. Looks a lot cleaner. Still waiting on the push rods.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

It's been a week now and Manton still hasn't shipped the rods. I got everything I needed to get done except what I need off for the rods/spark plugs. Just drumming my fingers. . . 










I've posted this before but while I had the front skin off I took a picture of my kidney grills' air ducting for my intake. It provides immediate ambient temp air.


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## meckeard (Jul 5, 2015)

Where is your overflow tank? I thought I saw it in older pics but don't see it in the new pics.

The red paint looks good. I have an 04 QSM and want to add some color under the hood. Silver/metal and black is what I have but I find it a little bland and like what you did with the red.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

meckeard said:


> Where is your overflow tank? I thought I saw it in older pics but don't see it in the new pics.
> 
> The red paint looks good. I have an 04 QSM and want to add some color under the hood. Silver/metal and black is what I have but I find it a little bland and like what you did with the red.


It's sitting on the bench. Seeing I had it off it's a little easier getting the spark plugs in. It will be installed back in when I do the final button-up.


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## svede1212 (Nov 1, 2005)

I got my pushrods Tuesday and about 3 1/2 hours later had everything buttoned back up. I was really nervous about the oil pump O-ring pinched or something with it as that d*mn pump was one of the hardest things I've done on this car. It is so easy with the engine out but a real pain in the car. I pulled the fuel pump relay and cranked it 3 times for about 20 seconds each before pressure jumped up. I breathed a huge sigh of relief. It fired right up after the installation of the relay and I took the wife out to 5 Guys for some burgers and fries. It needs tuning but my fueling was in the safe range. It's been raining the last two days so the only tuning I've been able do in the garage is idle and I have that close to nailed down. Can't wait to open up the throttle and then get to a dyno to see what I've gained. Happy for now to get my car back running and I have fingers crossed winter holds off for a few weeks.


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