[Half-Inch Stud]

....Case Reopened by DCI:

[scott70]

Originally Posted by dci

Sorry guys, This is definately not a bearing clearance issue. I have a customer engine that is currently doing the exact same thing as this one. We have rebuilt this engine twice now with the same results. The last time we ran the engine on our test stand with no load and never over 4500 rpm. Toar it down after running it only 30 minutes without a drop in oil pressure not even a flicker. All the rod bearings looked exactly like these ones. First time mains had worn to the copper like the rods. This time only the rods worn,but mains were starting to show signs of wear. I currently do not know why this is happening, but suspect the block. I am currently machining another block and will reassemble it in a couple of weaks and will post my findings. The bearing clearances on this engine which is a 455 +.030 stock crank stock block are .0025 rods and .0028 mains. The block had also been line honed, and we have eagle stock length rods in it. This engine was built by us in 2003 origanally and was drag raced and street driven for 3 years before he brought it back to have freshened. I might ad this guy is not easy on his stuff and abuses this thing like he stole it. That is why I suspect the block even though I see no signs of a problem. ( no cracks,warpage,or alignment issues etc.)
If someone has had this problem or knows an answer to it. I would certainly appreciate a call Thanks Don DCI MOTORSPORTS 330-628-3354

I was told by some well known pontiac guys(I know you guys are well known too) that .0024 -.0025 is too tight for an engine thats going to be raced from the get go and we all know that even if its a street engine,it wont be long before its being flogged well before a good break in period..0028-.003 for the rods,,,,,,at least .003 for the mains.What do you think?

[TnVTX]

Originally Posted by WDCreech

TnVTX, oil pressure taken at the filter housing won't tell you the pressure in the engine. It's better to take it at the port near the distributor.

I've already instructed the machine shop to do what it takes to remove the severly rusted plug that is there, and retap if needed.
(I didn't do it the first time, because it was froze in there, and rusted away..., but, now I know how important it is to NOT read oil pressure at the pump housing.)

[TnVTX]

Originally Posted by cerino2000

Welcome to my world, brother. I too had 600 miles and the beyotch is still sitting back on the engine stand with no definate explanation. Were all of them down to copper like the pic shows?

Here's what my number 7 looked like when I took it apart:

Most of the bearing were down into the copper, however, none of them had any blackening from extreme overheating.

[TnVTX]

Originally Posted by Half-Inch Stud

Did the Oil filter get changed after the successful cam-break-in ?

Yes, with another WIX...

[TnVTX]

Originally Posted by SergeF

What bearings are you using with eagle rods? My machinest told me not to use bearings supplied with the kit. He told me to get H serries bearing to match cut on the eagle big end. Here is a pic of a bearing

The machine shop did use the bearings that came with the kit, however, those bearings were cut for the radius too. (They may have already been the series you are talking about).

[TnVTX]

Originally Posted by Will

I don't think the problem was oil starvation. If it was, that bearing looks burned and galled/smeared. Those bearings look polished down to the copper, leading me to believe there was plenty of oil present to keep things cool while the wear was taking place.

I'd be looking at clearances and surface finish on the crank.

I'm thinking the same thing, another (possible) clue is when I first ever fired the motor, I quickly got it up to 2k rpm to break-in the cam. During this first run up, the mechanical gauge I had "T'd" in the engine compartment slammed the needle on the 100psi pin, and only after some heat got into the motor, did it ever back down 80psi. This >100psi event even blew out my stock sending unit for the dash gauge.

So, on a brand new motor, w/ RAIV 80lb pump, would it have been normal to slam >100psi on cold startup?

[TnVTX]

Originally Posted by Probird

Show us a pic of the crank. If there was some oil strarvation there should be some discoloring on the crank and rods. My guess is that the machine shop didn't do it's job very well. The journals are probably out of round or tapered along with the big end of the rods. With that much of the bearings gone and no loss of oil pressure I'll bet the clearances were way too tight.

Unfortunately, the motor is already at the machine shop, so I can't take more pics.
Neither the crank or rods showed no signs of discoloration, in fact I was amazed that the crank bearing surfaces were still smooth.

Would a brand new Eagle crank have out-of-round and/or taper problems?

[TnVTX]

Originally Posted by Stuckinda60s

... How long did it take for the oil pressure to come up when you started the engine?
...Do you have the oil filter bypass plugged?
Rich

I primed the pump with drill, while my buddy hand turned the motor 360 degrees, dropped in the distributer, and fired it. It was building oil pressure while cranking, and full pressure as soon as it fired.

No, I don't have the bypass plugged,,,, should I???

[Probird]

Originally Posted by TnVTX

Would a brand new Eagle crank have out-of-round and/or taper problems?

Yep, Eagle cranks are notorious for problems with being out of round and taper problems along with thrust surface roughness. Mine had all of the problems along with being slightly bent. It had to have the mains turned .010 to straighten it. Never put an Eagle crank in an engine without having it checked over thoroughly. Did the machine shop in question check it over? That also goes for a new Melling oil pump. Take it apart and clean out any metal shavings that are present. My 80lb. pump also will peg a 100lb guage even when the oil is hot. That's why I now run a 200lb guage. Never have had a problem with bearings due to the high oil pressure.

[Jack Gifford]

Originally Posted by uneasyrider

... GM overhead valve engines. Chevy came out with there OHV engine several years after Caddy, Olds, and Poncho did ...

Olds & Caddy - 1949
Chevy & Pontiac - 1955

[chetv10]

sorry to hear, i know i dont have the money in mine you have,but it hurtz all the same. never trust the machine shop, they have bad days too!did a motor for my buddys 66 gto 25 years ago,just a 389 rebuild,they tanked and installed brgs. but left a gally plug out.i didnt catch it. did the same thing.learn the hard way,20 lbs at idle 0 at 2000.sorry bud.

[screamingchief]

Well,sounds like pics wont be fourth-coming if it all got shipped off to the machine shop.

Here's my thoughts,I always prefer to break an engine/cam in with a straight weight oil (I saw you used multi vis???),in temps warm enough to ensure good oil flow naturally,of course prime the engine (you did this,good)etc.,etc.

My advice now is this,if one is experiencing odd oil/bearing problems:Take some oil samples!

And send them off to a lab to see what they can find.

It's a waste of time trying to guess what may be wrong.

Ask me samples should be kept for/from the first 5 or so oil changes,then if problems arise you can go back and check those samples and see if the problem was sudden,or cumulative,after that,periodic testing is still a good idea to follow the engines health.

From the sounds of this,ie. all the babbit gone,no rod/crank discoloring I would venture to say something (a corrosive condition or such) caused the bearings to "delaminate" or such and loose the top layer,but trying to discern that from one pic of a rod bearing and some debris in an oil pan is almost a laughable prospect.

You stated the engine never got over 160 degrees,well,that's not exactly the best thing,this leaves a significant amount of moisture in the crankcase often as the engine does'nt get nearly warm enough to fully evaporate the moisture in the crankcase,this often leads to the possibillity of corrosives forming in the oil,this is often a common problem with alcohol burning cars.

This often requires close monitoring of the oil and it's condition to watch for excess moisture buildup.

And certain oils can react differently than other oils,especially when additives come into the picture,care must be taken so as not to create a "toxic cocktail" for your engine by playing with the oil make-up and engine operating conditions to the point where there is no way to know what might be going on with it's vital fluids.

But this is just some WA speculation,same as the rest of these comments.

And in the future,if anybody reading this wants us to give some advice,please provide better pictures if you expect us to have even a remote chance at being able to have some idea what may have went wrong.


Bret.

[formulabird428]

thinking about sending my oil to the lab...especially since a similar thing happened with my last engine.

where might one find such a lab that would be able to analyze one's oil? What would be the best way to ship, and how much is needed for testing?

after all, you'd think that if I got the oil directly out of the pan, the oil that first came out would have the most sediment in it...as it has already settled near the bottom.

[Jack Gifford]

Originally Posted by formulabird428

...where might one find such a lab that would be able to analyze one's oil?

If you have an AmsOil salesman near you, tell him what you need. Otherwise, look at AmsOil's website for instructions.
Kendall dealers once provided the oil testing service, free to their customers. I doubt they still do, but you might ask. Or maybe Brad-Penn offers it, since they took over the old Kendall facilities in Bradford PA.

[Will]

Around here it's very difficult to find a shop that can competently grind a crankshaft. I certainly wouldn't trust ANY aftermarket crank right out of the box. Due to the experiences I've had in the past I look for a few things when checking a crank before putting it into the engine.

First is surface finish and radius on the journals. They better be shiny. The more polished the better. They shouldn't have a "satin" look to them at all, you should feel no roughness with your fingernail going across the grain of the polishing. They should have adequate, full radii where the journal meets the counterweight.

Mic the rod journals, checking for taper and roundness.

Mic the mains, checking for taper and roundness.

If everything checks out, set the crank in the block with only the upper halves of the end bearings in place (make sure they're well lubed as are the journals). Put a dial indicator on each journal and rotate the crank by hand. That needle better not move.

There is a shop around here that can't seem to grind the mains all on the same centerline and their polish job looks like it was done with 100 grit. The journals are round, but the dial indicator test shows them to be all on different centerlines. Their crank grinder must be wore out. I don't understand how any engine they build survives. It took two bad cranks from them before I learned my lesson.

There seems to be only one good large shop in this area. I've heard of small shops where some guy bought a crank grinding machine and does really good work for only a few customers, but so far I have yet to get hooked up with one of these guys. For now I rely on a large commercial shop that so far hasn't screwed me over, but I still double check all their work.

[uneasyrider]

The oil clearance spec's people are talking about above appear to be stock RAIV spec's:

1970 RAIV

Rod: 0.0015-0.0031
Main (1-4): 0.0012-0.0028
Main (5): 0.007-0.0022

Is that what we need to run, RAIV clearanses?

P.S. Just a side note, I was talking to my boss who used to drag race Pontiac's many years ago and he said that the oil clearances was more than likely ont the problem in my case because he ran his engines on the tight side and never had a problem spinning his destroked 400's to 8,000rpms BUT he drag raced NOT road raced. From what he could tell my issue was because of oil starvation from braking and cornering.

[Mr. P-Body]

FWIW,

The "true" Eagle "kit" comes with Clevite CB743H bearings. These are considered the best bearing for the job. If your "kit" had "P" series or other brand than Clevite, it wasn't an Eagle kit, it merely had some Eagle parts in it.

We deviate from the kit by deleting the main bearings (full-grooved Clevites) and adding Federal Mogul 3/4 groove. Aside from that, we let it alone...

Jim

[DPlum]

Did you all that have had failures all run std bearings if so the crank was never fixed from china and did you pay to have align bore did you ck clearance yourself and not with plastigage were your charged to recon. the con rods if not they are usually to tight on the low side of tolerance I found it's better to buy the tools needed and ck behind everyone Go to the shop measure your crank housings and crank and bearings that will tell you what the clearance was [same brand bearing this matters] My ohio kit was even off balance they allow as much as 7-8 grams for oil weight

[TnVTX]

Originally Posted by Mr. P-Body

FWIW,

The "true" Eagle "kit" comes with Clevite CB743H bearings. These are considered the best bearing for the job. If your "kit" had "P" series or other brand than Clevite, it wasn't an Eagle kit, it merely had some Eagle parts in it.

We deviate from the kit by deleting the main bearings (full-grooved Clevites) and adding Federal Mogul 3/4 groove. Aside from that, we let it alone...

Jim

Mine came with the H-series bearings, and was the the full "Eagle" kit.
The machine shop had to rebalance the crank, repolish the thrust surface, and polish the rear mail seal sweeper grooves. However, after alot of talk time with him today, we are begining to think the bearing clearances were not checked. I assumed he did it, especially since I told him to check thrust clearance, rod side clearances, and make adjustments as needed.
I thought with all the prep work I paid him to do, that checking the bearing clearances was included... (like line honing on his Sunnen machine, boring & honing cyl w/torque plate, short fill Hard Block, decking block to .005 in the hole, hot tanking, magnafluxing, pressure testing, balancing the entire rotating assy, install cam bearing, light porting E-Heads, port matching intake, and so on... so with all the work I had them do, I assumed the simple act of checking the bearing clearances was done by them.
HUGE LESSON LEARNED!! NEVER ASSUME ANYTHING!!
So, this time, I will recheck anything that I can check!