Ok, I am not "quite" there yet, but I am starting to look in to rebuilding my engine and need as much info/pricing as possible.

Its a 289 V8 2v engine and I have upgraded it to a duel exhaust and a aluminum intake and 600cfm 4 barrel edelbrock carb. (I have had to step down the jets on both of the primary and secondaries) now as the engine goes, Its a fairly smooth running engine, some minor problems and I have no idea if its been bored out or not or when the last time its been rebuilt was, but when I did the intake it looked very clean with no sludge and carbon build up.

now as far as what I want out of my engine... as far as power goes I would like it to do somewhere around 325hp. Stock is 200hp so I think 325hp isn't asking for to much, I am going to do a cam and if possible do something with the head (new, port and polish, or 351 Windsor heads). I hope this is enough info, I will give more info if needed but now is the time for questions....

I found a rebuild kit on summit ( http://store.summitracing.com/partde...5&autoview=sku )
and I have been told that moly rings are not good for the desert and that they ware out faster then other rings or is that wrong and should I get this kit? (once I find out which one I will need/if the engine can even be rebuilt)

now I don't know much about machine shops so how much would it cost to have them bore it out? would they clean the engine as well and also clean the colling area and install the new core plugs for the same cost or would I be better off doing it my self? Except for the boring and inspecting the engine because I don't have the equipment to tell if there are any cracks in the block or anything.

As far as the heads go, how much could I get out of my stock heads if I ported and polished them and how much would it roughly cost?
I don't want to go to extreme with the engine so I don't see the need of some new aluminum heads because then I would need higher compression and higher octane gas (I would probably do prem with the new engine anyway). I wouldn't mind doing the 351W head idea if I could find some for cheep (I have been wanting to go that rout anyway).

I defiantly don't have the cash to do the rebuild immediately so I can look in to other ideas and routs so anything can help...

I am looking to try and keep it around 1000-1500 and do everything that has to do with the engine out first and I can do the other stuff later if needed.

One last thing, the engine is (out of what I have been told) the original engine that came with the car so I would "like" to keep it that way if possible but if it cant be reused or is cracked then I cant do much about it and will probably go to a 351 (they fit right?) but ill cross that street later.

Thanks for all the help and sorry for such a long post.
Brian

 

just get a rotating assembly from summit that is the 326 or w/e displacemnt and reassemble with a good cam and either get some heads from the boneyard or gets your worked real good and it should definently give good results

 

Yes, but I would rather spend a little more money and do a better quality job and know that its going to last longer...

 

Just because you spend more money doesnt mean the quality is any better im with Brandon on this 1.

 

i would spend the money on a good rotating assembly because thats what is the heart of your motor and i would also get a windage tray and girdle for your main caps and then get some good heads and and a whole roller assembly for you valve train put all that together and that will be way better than blowng a ton of money on machine work or having someone else do it cause guess what building it your self is a whole lot more rewarding and really haelps you when you have to make a repair or you can have the satisfaction of sayng you built it

 

Do you want to make real power for a long time with a durable engine? Or do you want to get by untill you can build another next year that will make the power? Because there are two ways to do this, the cheap right now way, and the much less expensive doing it right to last a long time way.

You can have the block tanked, that will clean out the cooling jacket and all the oil galleys. They pull all the plugs before it goes in and it comes out looking like it was just cast. I highly recomend doing that over you thinking you can clean the block up good. You will spend a bunch of time and you will need some very long rifle brushes to clean the oil passages, that is if you find all the plugs and remove them correctly.

While in the shop they can check all the critical dimensions, such as the line bore, deck flatness and square, and bore wear and or taper. I highly doubt that the cylinders are still in spec unless you have a later 5.0 block, and even they wear pretty fast. Still if they check out okay you can have it honed, rering it, add some pistons and go. It all depends on the wear in the cylinders.

IMHO if you skimp on machine work and prep but put good parts in it you are wasting your time and money. I have done that before and the engines just never last. Find a reputable machine shop and have them do the machine work, ask around and see who does quality work in your area. Just putting in new pistons and rings without a fresh bore with the right crosshatch hone pattern is only going to make an engine that smokes and has so much blowby you will have to shut it off to put oil in.

325hp with stock heads is a tall order, but easily achievable with aftermarket heads, especially like the AFR or TFS heads. Edelbrock has a head that can do it too, and you culd squeeze that much from some GT40s without alot of effort. Heads are one place you dont want to just slap thing together. Often they need new guides, and if the seats and valves are not machined, you may not have any compression. If you dont have the right springs installed at the correct height for your cam, you could have coil bind and waste the cam, bend a valve, and destroy the engine.

As for building it yourself, I have assembled each engine I have done. I have always had a shop do the machine work, but I put the parts together, and I decide what parts go into it. Then I drop off the block, crank, rods, pistons, and balancer/flexplate to get it all machined and balanced. I usually have them do a valve job on the heads and check the guides, I tell them replace what is needed and often I ask to see what they spec out at before any work was done. I do that because I too am a machinist but I dont have the equipment to do engines, but I know what all the dimensions and clearances are suppose to be. I also have the tools and equipment to check all critical dimensions on an engine, micrometers dont come cheap.

Its perfectly good to have someone machine it and you assemble it, or even to have the shop assemble your combination. If its non stock they know what to check, such as vavle to piston clearance, coil bind, valve train geometry, and other things you may have not thought of. So if you want to assemble it, thats fine, just please dont halfa** it, do it right or just dont bother, because you will just be doing it again.

About the stroker kits, you cant just slap one in a stock block. You have to be sure the rods will clear the pan rails and bottoms of the cylinders, for instance if you get a 347 kit, that requires an overbore over a stock 302/289. The pistons wont fit.

I still cant figure out why on earth moly rings wont work in the desert. It just doesnt make any sense. Apparently the people who are telling you that have no clue as to what moly is, does, or why its used on piston rings. Sure they wear faster than hard chrome plated rings, but they have much better oil control. The engine doesnt care what environment its in, if you keep the dust out, keep the temperature under 230F, and feed it the right amount of fuel and air, it will run just fine anywhere on earth.

Engines are a mechanical device with precision tolerances, they are not a magical thing and everything has to be machined correctly for them to live.

 

well ya the hot tanking and most of the stuff you said is a given i don't mean to say that machine shops are bad but for the money that he would spend in head work with stock heads to get them that way it would be cheaper to buy some nice aluminum heads and what you said was a given but a stock motor making that with just some machined heads i find it a very large task

 

Aftermarket heads are the better buy if you dont have to worry about originality, and arent looking for a bunch of power. For a driver they are still usually somewhat cheaper than aftermarket, unless you go with GT40 heads. Tough to rebuild a set for the price of them, and they are pretty much a stock head, just a good one.

The difference in price between rebuilt and new is often just a few hundred if any at all. its better to upgrade imo..

 

Ok, that was basically what I was asking, what about 351W 2v Heads? would they be worth getting or are they in the same boat as my stock heads? at which point if I am going to have to drop that much for heads regardless of which rout I go I wont be able to afford that right now...

Does anyone know the average price for a machine shop to do the cleaning and boring on my block and would I be able to get away with reusing my heads (just cleaning them up a little) and just rebuilding the bottom end of the engine? or would that be a waste to rebuild the bottom without doing anything to the heads?

 

my 351s machine work this spring ran right at $1000, that was a complete rework of the heads, grind the crank, resize rods, bore the block, tank all of it, and balancing. A shortblock will run between $450 and $800 depending on what needs to be done to it. ou could put the old heads back on, but if the valves seals come apart or the cam is too big, you will have issues with the new shortblock.

the only 351W head worth puttin on a 302 is the early 69-70 heads, the rest are all pretty much stock smog heads..Just more expense imo.. look into the GT40 heads..they are a good head and they are cheap.