I figured some of the real experts would jump in by now but I'll take a shot with some suggestions.
First thing I would do is pull the valve cover, rotate the engine by hand and watch the rocker on the #1 intake lobe. It should "look" like the others as it cycles. If the cam lobe is going flat it is usually pretty obvious that the valve is not lifting all the way. If still not sure then you could run the engine with the valve cover off to see if the pushrod is spinning, but that makes a huge mess unless you have a spare valve cover cut or some sort of deflectors for the oil. Instead of doing that I would go ahead and pull the intake and valley pan, and take a look at the cam lobes and lifters to make sure all are OK.
Other than that one cylinder your numbers are actually a little lower than the readings on my engines. My guess is that your compression is somewhere in the 9.5 range which is right where you want to be. If you determine the existing cam is a problem there are a lot of cams that would work well with that C/R, from pretty mild to wild. So I wouldn't worry about the heads/pistons just yet.
__________________
1969 Lemans vert, matador red, 462 CI, 3.07 12-bolt posi
1974 455 TA, admiralty blue/red interior HPP "cover car" - sold
"The best way to show a car is to drive it"
|