276 stroker from 35 years of parts

[cas3]

All sounds good GB, thanks for the update.

[Mart]

A great result. Exactly as you wanted. It was fun to follow along,

[51504bat]

enlargement failed

[Mart]

[tubman]

With a 50 psi sending unit, your gauge should be pegged (except at idle). My old "Motors" manual specifies 57 psi at speed for an 8BA. It's the only place I have ever seen a figure for that.

Congratulations, it looks like you did a great job and everything turned out fine. I think I can understand what you mean about help from the guys on the forum. When I built my first real flathead (a 276" Merc) over thirty years ago I spent a lot of money and used what I thought were the right parts. The guy who did the machine work seemed to know what he was doing as well. I was never really satisfied with the way it performed, and looking back, I think I can say that it was because I just slapped a pair of Offenhauser heads and an MSD "Ready to Run" distributor on it with no specialized knowledge. The engine always had marginal over heating problems, which I now suspect was caused by the distributor having the wrong curve and lackluster performance which was caused by improper preparation of the cylinder heads. Things would have very different if I had had access to something like this forum. Sounds to me liked you have dodged that particular bullet.

[GB SISSON]

Sponsored Links (Register now to hide all advertisements)

Did a 2 day stint in the woodie on the mainland last week. It is certainly a joy and a pleasure to drive, both on island and 'over town'. I bought a 10.00 digital speedometer that I mount over the original speedometer with double stick tape. Yes it looks awful, but It's been interesting. I now have an estimated 1500 miles on this engine and have retorqued the heads at about 200 miles, but not since. Still no coolant loss, weeping headbolts or water in oil. I know it's due for third re-torque yet I'm a little gun shy. First of all, my chosen torque is at 67 ft/lbs, which was arrived at by suggestions here for between 65-70 ft/lbs. I'm using Best copper gaskets with copper coat spray. Head bolts sealed with #2 permatex (one headbolt had small weep for ten minutes at startup, then sealed). On the 200 mile retorque most bolts turned 1/8 of a turn, a few didn't turn, some a tad bit more than 1/8 turn. I have been considering leaving them as is with no further wrenching. With it doing so well, I don't want to disturb my permatex seal, or worse, snap off a headbolt. The headbolts are used, but in the end I had a lot to choose from and I picked out 48 beauties. I'm sitting on my couch pondering this and wondering 'Should I Stay or Should I Go?' (for the torque wrench)

[flatford8]

If it was me, I’d leave the torque wrench in the tool box and go for a ride !!!……nice job ‘Ol Boy!………Mark

[cadillac512]

Originally Posted by flatford8

If it was me, I’d leave the torque wrench in the tool box and go for a ride !!!……nice job ‘Ol Boy!………Mark

Me too. I'd leave it as-is.

[glennpm]

I'd leave it alone but I'm never good at doing that and sometimes making things worse.
If it is nagging at you, check them all but knock 5 ft-lb off say to 62 ft-lb.

[flatjack9]

I torque all my heads to 50 lb ft, so at 65 you should be more than good. I'd leave it alone.