427 engine (part 2) - RHS block

[Rich Z]

I also bought new ignition wires and went with the Granatelli sold core wires again. I wanted to use heat shields on the wires as well as the metal shields at the spark plug end of the wires, but I just could not get the tell tale click that the wire was securely attached to the spark plug. So rather than wrestling with them trying to make them work, I just took all that off and running the bare wires as is. They are supposedly high temp resistant anyway, so we'll see. I found it a lot easier to attach the coil side of the wires to the coils, and then attach the coil to the valve cover. Allowed me to get a lot more leverage to get them to click into place.

I'll double check everything tomorrow, but I think all the underhood stuff is now put back together.






I went over to the garage after dinner, and just prepped the exhaust pipes so I can put them together tomorrow. Also move the clamp to cover that exhaust leak I found when I took it all apart. I'm going to try to get my tail pipes aligned properly because they never have been right since all this work was done. Not sure if the tips are welded on correctly to the tail pipes or not, but for some reason they've been resistant to lining up exactly in line for me. Might just have to be "one of those things", however. Not going to spend a whole lot of time on it if it appears to need more than a few tugs and curse words.

[Rich Z]

First thing I decided to do today was to disconnect the electrical going to the fuel pumps and just make sure the new starter wasn't DOA. Engine turned over fine, with no odd noises, so that was a relief. Figured it would be better to check now rather than having to pull the exhaust off again if I was sent a bum starter. I know it came in an AC Delco box, and LOOKS just like an AC Delco starter, but it sure doesn't SAY AC Delco anywhere on that starter.

So on that note, I put the exhaust pipes back together. The tailpipes looked pretty good concerning alignment, so I just tightened all the clamps. Then I went around double checking all the bolts, nuts, wiring, etc., that I had touched to make sure everything seemed properly tightened. Hooked the fuel pumps back up and decided it was time for the smoke test.

A friend of mine had stopped over, so I pointed out where I had the fire extinguisher stored, just in case. Turned the key and the engine fired right up. I mean RIGHT UP. Within about a second of turning the key. I'll be honest, I was astonished. It's never fired up that quickly before, and I guess I was expecting it to take a while for fuel pressure to build enough to start up. But heck, I guess a PLEASANT surprise is due every now and again.

Put the front wheels on, cleaned and put all the tools away, and will likely take the car out for a spin tomorrow. All nuts and bolts are accounted for, so I don't think anything will fall off during the ride.

[85vette]

Hope it all holds together for you Rich. How many miles have you got on that new engine now?

[Rich Z]

Originally Posted by 85vette

Hope it all holds together for you Rich. How many miles have you got on that new engine now?

Well, that's an interesting question, so let me look it up.

Hmm, since driving the car home from South Georgia Corvette on 11/18/2011, I've put 5,544 miles on the car with the new engine in place. I don't think Aaron Scott put all that many miles on it while he had it at his shop.

[navy2kcoupe]

Just make sure that you've bought about a dozen tickets to the local Policeman's
Ball before you go out and start having some "fun" with the C5Z!
Andy

[Rich Z]

Originally Posted by navy2kcoupe

Just make sure that you've bought about a dozen tickets to the local Policeman's
Ball before you go out and start having some "fun" with the C5Z!
Andy

Yeah man. That seemed to work pretty well for Chris Harwood to keep him out of jail, now didn't it?

Anyway, I decided to raise the car back up on the lift and check the exhaust for any leaks before going on a drive. And good thing I did. Had leaks where the headers connect to the rest of the exhaust, and the two connections where the exhaust mates up to the cat back pipes.

I had taken some pics of the headers before installing the rest of the exhaust, so I went back and looked at the pics to see if the ends had become deformed. Seems to me that when I got the car back from South Georgia Corvette, I had to buy some tools to make all the header joints round again, as they had become deformed and had gaps that were causing exhaust leaks. When I took the exhaust apart for this project, I was real careful to make sure I didn't cause any damage I would have to fix later. Matter of fact, the exhaust came apart pretty easily.

Anyway, looking at the pics, I sure didn't see anything obvious that needed attention.



So for the front joints I just put some sealant around the edges of the pipes, and then moved the clamps forward a bit to cover the covering slip on joint ends and to clamp down more on the edges.

Then for the rear sections, as best I can figure out the flanges are probably bent slightly, because even though the bolts were as tight as I could get them, there are still gaps above and below. There are two bolts holding the joints together, so I'm thinking one or both sides may be bowed slightly. The actual first signs I saw when I started up the car and raised the lift was condensation leaking out of both places I mentioned that were leaking. Then I could actually feel exhaust pressure when I would put my hand near the joints.

You can actually see the gaps here:






Seems to me the gaskets I used before were much thicker right around the pipe opening, so thinking that perhaps I just needed more gasket material (obviously the sealant I used didn't help any), I removed the bolts and slid a second gasket onto each of those joints.

Then after tightening everything down again, I started the car and raised it on the lift again. Hallelujah! No leaks this time. Didn't see any condensation dripping from the joints, and putting my hand around the joints I didn't feel any exhaust pressure at all. But I think the next time I take the exhaust apart, I may have to look at those rear flanges more carefully. I may have to try to make those surfaces flat and flush again somehow. Maybe grinding a bit of the surface where the bolt holes are might work. Hopefully I won't just make things worse, otherwise I'll be ordering new exhaust pipes.

So I think I'm good to go for a ride tomorrow. Unless I can think of something else I need to triple check first and find a reason why I need to do something else prior to going out on the road. Connie has the cell phone as she is up in Delaware visiting her family. So if the car dies on me, I'm pretty much screwed for calling for help. I doubt anything will happen, as I've done several startups and the starter seems OK so far.

[Rich Z]

Took a short test drive yesterday, and then a longer one (50 miles or so) today. Startups with the new starter were just fine, and everything seems to be working like it is supposed to. But I still do hear some drivetrain squeal intermittently. So I don't believe the bad motor mount was the issue with this problem. Perhaps it was making it's own noise that was similar enough for me to think it was all from one source, but I'll get a better feel for frequency of the occurrences after I've driven it more. The noise didn't happen more than a couple of times, but it's gone through periods where it didn't happen at all for stretches.

While I was driving today, I just had the general feeling that the car just felt better. Smoother, perhaps. I think what I am feeling is that there was a subtle vibration all through the car, especially the steering wheel, that was coming from that metal to metal contact from the engine to the frame through that bad driver's side Pfadt motor mount. It just took a while for me to realize that this vibration that had always been there since I brought the car home from South Georgia Corvette is no longer there. I noticed all along that trying to take video with my camcorder mounted to the inside of the windshield just did not produce very satisfactory results because the image blurred from some obvious vibration. So I think I may go ahead and mount the camcorder again in the same manner, and see what the video looks like now. I have looked back at other videos I took the same way before the car went into Chris Harwood's place (and then subsequently into South Georgia Corvette) and there is no such problem with those videos before that time. So apparently the problem was introduced between the time the car went into Chris Harwood's shop, and the day I drove it back home from Aaron Scott's shop. I know Aaron wanted to put stock motor mounts on my car, as he seemed to insist that the Pfadt mounts were all metal, apparently not realizing that there was a urethane bushing in them. If he noticed that the one mount was bad on the driver's side, he never mentioned it to me. I wasn't at all keen on going back to stock motor mounts, as they have their own issues with fluid leaking out of them when they fail. Which I presume then allows them to collapse, and possibly you have metal to metal contact.

I'll put the car back up on the lift and check to make sure the exhaust leaks haven't reappeared after driving the car. I did a quick check on a couple of the header bolts that I could easily get to and they are still tight. I used those Nord-Lock washers on them, so hopefully they won't ever loosen up.

BTW, I had purchased header studs for the engine, because when the vette tech at the local Chevy dealership last worked on my car he mentioned that one or more bolt holes for the headers got "boogered up" as he put it. He figured from someone (he didn't mention any names, but it had to be Aaron Scott) having trouble getting the bolts to line up putting the headers back on. And I have to admit it's not the easiest thing in the world to do by yourself. The only one I had any trouble with was the far back one on the driver's side. It just feels pretty tight going in, like there is some resistance to the threading but it tightens down just fine.

But back to the studs. After buying them and looking over what is needed to do to get those headers on, I just don't think there is any way studs would work. You would have to pull the header flange away from the block enough distance to be able to push the header flange straight onto the studs, and I just don't believe you have that kind of room there to do that. So you would be fighting with the headers to try to get the flange on those studs at an awkward angle, and quite frankly, I just don't think you could do it. It was all I could do to slide the header flanges up the face of the head to get the bolt holes to line up to get the bolts into them and still have the gasket stay in place.

Header studs do sound like a real good idea, but I just don't think they would work in a C5 Corvette. So I didn't even take them out of the packaging, and sent them back to Summit Racing too.

[Rich Z]

Well damn!

This starter I just installed has died. Turn the key and there is nothing more than just a single click coming from the solenoid. Started up a couple of times just fine prior to that. Actually have the car on the lift, so that is lucky. I found that I could recreate that drivetrain noise with the car off of the tires and the emergency brake engaged, so I was going to have Connie help me with this. I showed her how to feather the clutch while in gear to make the noise happen (which even now was still intermittent), and then raised the lift so I could get underneath with the camcorder to try to identify exactly where the noise is coming from.

So while Connie was getting used to the clutch engagement, she stalled the engine. When she tried to start the car again, nothing but the solenoid click mentioned above. So I got into the cockpit and tried myself. Took the emergency brake off, made sure the rear wheels would turn when the transmission is out of gear, etc., and it appears to definitely be the starter.

I contacted RockAuto to see if they will do anything about this. I was gone on vacation the entire month of May, so that starter doesn't have any more than maybe a dozen or so startups on it. But their 30 day guarantee is long gone, of course. So we'll see what they say.

I have to admit I was a bit concerned that the starter I got did NOT say "ACDELCO" on it like the one I removed. I think if I have to buy another one, I'm going to insist on seeing that on the one I get.

Well, at least this didn't happen while the car was out somewhere meaning I would have to get it towed. But still............ So much for buying what is supposed to be a good brand name item.

[85vette]

I got my starter from the dealer. It's AC Delco but even from the dealer it's a reman from Mexico.....

[Rich Z]

I guess all "manufacturers" these days are simply buying from Mexico or China and just slapping their label on the crap.

I got a response from RockAuto and the starter is under manufacturer's warranty. So once I pull it out and box it up, once they get a notice that the shipment is on it's way, they will ship out a replacement.

I just hope the replacement last longer than this one did. Of course, I'm just assuming it's a starter problem. I'll know more when I pull it out, I guess.