427 s/o engine melt down??????

[Mark Husar]

You are an absolute engine rat!!
I really appreciate the way you hung in there and fixed the problem. It has been a thrill to read all the helpful advice from so many of our cobra brothers.

Mark

[HSSS427]

Got home and took it for a short ride....too short. Noticed smoke coming from the left / driver side header and it just didn't sound quite right - kind of like it was missing. So did a U-turn and took it home. Checked the carb and noticed the primary bowl was full - dirt stuck in the needle - and so removed needle and the chunk of gasket maker in it and back to try it again.

Still smoke coming out - it appears to be blue or oil colored more than white colored but hard to tell and there's not a lot of it per se, but more than there should be. So it's back in the garage.

Here's what I'm planning right now:

- Do a leak down test on the driver side cylinders
- Maybe try some of that block sealer stuff

Any ideas on possible sources of smoke and these symptoms besides a leaking head gasket? Could all the rich fuel flow from the stuck needle be causing this and I'm seeing after effects ie fouled plug, etc?
Thanks!

[Clois Harlan]

Glad to hear you worked through it! Have you re-torqued your heads again?

[HSSS427]

Have not re-torqued the heads. Didn't think I had to with these gaskets - Victor Reinz Nitroseal? I will do that tomorrow when I'm doing the leak down test.

[Keithc8]

Scott
I would take out all of the plugs and spin the engine over to get all of the extra fuel out of the engine if there is any left. I would then look at the plugs as you may have very well fouled one on the drivers side and not be firing that cylinder or cylinders and still getting raw fuel in the exhaust. Clean all plugs and then run the engine again. It may very well take a little while to burn all of the fuel out of the exhaust system. Good luck, Keith

[HSSS427]

Looks like it was the valve lash setting again. I pulled the plugs and #6 was fouled with gas and still wet. I ran a leak down test on all the cylinders and found that the lash was still too tight and the valves weren't seating. When I loosened them the leak down on all cylinders was in the "low" range on all 8 - great news. Cleaned the plugs and reinstalled. Now waiting for the battery to charge back up. Will start it up and run it hopefully this afternoon.
Thanks!
Scott

[HSSS427]

Ran it today just a bit. Still some problems so did the valves one more time. Now appears I'm getting dirt and debris in the needle assembly as a by product of replacing everything from the tank to the carb inlet. I pull the needle, clean it out with compressed air, reinstall, and set float level. Take it out for a short test run, and start getting a little smoke from driver side pipes and what sounds like a miss fire. Get back, and the float bowl is flooding again. So back to pulling the needle and cleaning it. I am now working on the assumption that the needle is getting stuck open while I'm driving and that's dumping fuel which is fouling the plugs and running very rich thus creating smoke and mis-fire. Is this a logical assumption or should I be looking at something else?

Also, need to run it long enough to get the lifters really pumped up and then set the lash. Sometimes it sounds like my old solid lifter cam when the lash was off - wild sewing machines under my valve covers!

[Brent Mills]

Are you running a fuel filter near the carb?

[What'saCobra?]

Just a thought.

If the 'smoke' is black, it is likely fuel. If the smoke is blue, it is likely oil.

If black, you are on the right track chasing down the fuel system/carb. But, it should have excess fuel visible and smellable on both the pipes (small smells, please.)

If blue and one sided (ex: left side), you may have either a left intake gasket leak or a left head gasket leak. And visa versa.

If the blue smoke increases in hard right turns, you most likely have an left intake gasket leak. If the smoke is minimum and the plugs clean-up and run better all by themselves, in left turns, you definitely have a left intake gasket oil leak, probably from the oil galley under the intake manifold.

If it is not at all sensitive to left or right turns, it could still be the left intake gasket, but a leak near the bottom of the gasket. And visa versa.

You have earned my Annual Woe-is-me Award in the Extreme Trials & Tribulations Category, Not Including Wives or Ex-wives, Engines. Give your friend Cracker this info and tell him next time i come up there (in a couple of weeks), you get a free beer.

Mucho lucko.

[HSSS427]

Whatsacobra? - I need all the beer I can get these days!

One question though - if I had a leaky gasket, head or intake, wouldn't that show up on the leak down test? My leak down tests looked good. I'll try to drive it more today where I can make some of the observations you mention.

Brent - closest filter is coming out of the pump. Ordered some carb inlets with the screen filters in them and will install ASAP. Hopefully this will catch anything coming out of the regulator and connections going to the carb. Also ordered new needle assemblies so I can replace the current one.

Thanks!

[HSSS427]

Cleaned out the fuel connections and think I've got that licked for now.

But, appears I have oil in #6 cylinder. Based on the plugs the rest appear dry at least. Any ideas? Sure hate to go through that intake exercise again. Any magic goo I can add to the oil that would help this ie like block sealer for the water side?

[HSSS427]

Called Keith Craft and talked to Jeff. Checked the valve seals visually and they looked ok. Did another leak down on #6 and all ok. Torqued the intake again and put a new plug in #6. Will run it a bit and probably then be resigned to pulling the intake and re-installing.

[What'saCobra?]

Of course, the intake gasket is not going to be tested with a leak down test, which tests the rings, valve seat sealing and head gasket. And the plug hole gasket of the test device.

It does not test the valve guide seals, intake gasket, exhaust gasket, etc.

#6 sure is ugly. i suspect the intake gasket. But, you have got more than one thing going on, it seems. Looks like oil from here. Excess gas very rarely prefers to destroy just one plug. Ignition can have an effect, of course. But, that's kind of rare, also. That is, it looks oily, not gasy. You're there, you can tell.

You've got to learn how to adjust the valves, rather more precisely, if i might suggest. There is simply no way they could be so far off it they are done correctly. Get a book.

That #6 sure doesn't look like gas, but oil. Did it pump blue smoke out the pipe? Did it attempt to clean-up in either a steady but aggressive right or left turn? (Be careful here. If it clears in the turn and the torque pops up, you are going to light the tires and then... understand?) There is no simple way to test the intake gasket seal i can think of at the moment.

i don't want to get all esoteric here, but have you measured the variation in the fit from the top of the intake manifold surface distance to the head surface, vs. the bottom of the intake manifold's surface distance to the head. That is, is there a different angle between the head and the manifold from the top of the manifold surface to the bottom? It is possible you have a wedge and a more open space on the bottom and less gasket crush, which will easily suck oil from the galley. Particularly on a corner when galley oil sloshes to that side...

The intake gasket is pretty good and easy to install correctly. i don't think you screwed that up. i just am suspicious of the potential wedge angle between the intake manifold surface and the head surface.

By the way, they might be different on the left than on the right side. It could be the manifold surface. It could be the head surface. It could be both.
--------
i wouldn't even consider any sealant goop in the water system...no way. Get it correct. Some might disagree. Good for them.

At the race track, and you simply have to make the run, that is another story. But not on a new engine on the street, unless you are going to dump it and you don't mind screwing somebody. i have used it twice, only on old ratty cars that i don't want to really spend the money to fix and i am going to run to ground. Not on anything nice, except for a money race. Not even for sport trophys. i would rather sit the trophy-only event out than use that stuff.

[Brent Mills]

I agree with What'saCobra....I'll go one further step and suggest you have a pro do it and get that puppy on the road once and for all. I'm sure you're learning a lot, which is good, but at some point you have to ask, "do I continue learning at the expense of a new engine?". I think you're going to look back at this after a year or so and realize/understand the little things that have caused the problems. I sure know I do that from time to time!

[HSSS427]

Ordered an Edelbrock Performer RPM from keith Craft yesterday. It's port and gasket matched. Should be here end of day tomorrow.

Hated to give up on the old 1966 Police Interceptor, but time to move on. Wish I could have landed a sidewinder for originality sake, but I think this is the smarter move.

[era427tp]

I think you're on the right track with the intake.I had a #6 plug that looked like that.I changed the gasket and that cleared it up.I made sure to use lots of the Permatex,black silicone,oil resistant, around each port.

[HSSS427]

OK, lets see......

Got the Edelbrock Performer RPM intake from Keith Craft. Cut out the rear breather port for my goose neck breather, and then hmmmmmm......where do I add oil to the engine? Guess I will have to get install a removable breather into one of my valve covers.

Keith also provided custom intake gaskets that are gasket matched, and the intake is also port matched to my heads. What a concept, the intake port, head port and gasket opening are all the same size!

Intalled the intake, with a thin layer of Permatex Blue around each port and gobs of it on the rails. Had to cut the 7, 8, 9, 10 bolts off by 1/2" as they are too long for the Edelbrock. The bosses in the intake are not as high for these bolts as on the PI. Anyway, got it torqued down to 34 lbs each.

Installed the push rods, and rocker arm assemblies - no obvious clearance problems with the push rods and intake. Torqued down to 42 lbs.

Now for the lash adjusting. I tried something a bit different. Turned the crank over till the relevant cylinder had both valves closed ie both rocker arms were level and springs were unloaded. Installed the leak down tester in that cylinder and ran a leak down test. Then lashed the valves and ran the leak down again to make sure I hadn't overdone it.

Now the problems: leak down results problems on #1 and #6. All other cylinders were showing 20-25% leak down - in the good range.

#1 showed 45% leak down - in the moderate range
#6 showed no compression. I also tried the compression tester and got a 50 lb reading.

I loosened the rocker arm studs until I could move the rocker arm up and down and there was play between the rocker arm and valve stem. Still no compression to speak of. Turned the engine over a couple of times with the starter motor (Note - remember to take the breaker bar off the harmonic balancer before using the starter - ughhh). Still no joy.

So, I'm at a loss. I guess I could have a stuck valve? The rings are shot? But I got a good reading previously with the old intake on, and I haven't touched the heads since then.

I haven't put any coolant back in yet, do couldn't test to see if I was blowing air back into the cooling system, but I did a leak down before with coolant in and didn't have a problem. I think it's got to be a valve seating issue.

Any ideas?
Thanks!

[HSSS427]

Did a little research after the previous post on leak down testing. Tried the tip of whacking the valve end of the rocker arm with a rubber mallet and sure enough on #6 that did it. Appeared to be the exhaust valve was sticking a little bit.

Tried same on #1 without as much success. Then started moving the crank back & forth while under pressure and the results improved a into the "green" zone on the gauge. At least good enough in my mind to move forward and try running it and then do another test.

Waiting on some Holley blue non stick gaskets for the carb re-assembly and then should be able to try it out.

Wondering about hood clearance. Looks like this intake when mounted is a bit higher.

Will post some pics tomorrow.......

[Excaliber]

I was surprised to find on my 427 side oiler with only a few thousand miles on it the valves were sticking in the bronze\brass valve guides. When I rebuilt the engine I had the guides reamed to correct size.

I CERTAINLY wouldn't expect the valves to be sticking in the guides with such a fresh set of heads like you have. But I'm not all together surprised, I suspect it's a more common problem than many of us realize.

WHAT is the root cause of this problem? Surely the guides were 'correct' when they left the machine shop? Do they 'shrink' or what???

[undy]

Now that the valve's at the right "install height" don't forget to readjust the valve to rocker clearance..