Decided to leave the power that came with gun in the boat, many good parts there, supposed to be low hour done in 1999, Had a issue back in July that broke a valve and went through a piston, due to sloppy guide slowed valve to beat itselfntill it broke.. fixed that and keep doubting till mid October, no other issues besides have some milkshake in oil I could not shake...
kept looking for that issue the rest of the season with lots of oil changes lol

so so I knew heads needed done and yanked them... what I found was disturbing and again makes me not trust others...

heads on starboard had dual springs and 2.30 intake valences
heads on port had single springs with 2.25 intake calves
canes are flat tappet starboard heads springs were 130/360 and port tested at 100/280!! The port heads with weak springs wore springs into head casting, beat the hell out of the seats, floating bad... as expected with Toyota spring pressures. popped a head gasket on starboard engine that led to some water in oil, some lobes on cam, so replacing that too and more... fun times!!!

Mismatched retainers, sloppy guides, one set of heads had cleaned up chambers the other did not...

so so we are redoing the merlin 345 grumpys and going to clean up throt and chambers some thinking a easy 30 cfm gain while in there, plan down the road is to get new heads and go solid rollers, can’t do that now $$ wise so fixing what I got, boat went 73 with issues maybe I will see 74! I honestly don’t care much about the number I am more concerned with turn key, the mistress hurt me bad for speed wants, this boats fun in the 70’s and going every weekend is the goal.

Fix water tank that spring a leak over summer, a little more stereo and some cleaning is all I plan for, I love this old bucket it’s a great boat!!

Was nice to see my liner tabbed into hull, a few friends with guns have a huge shake in cabin when running due to liner not tabbed, mine being a super early build does not have the liner extended into closet which is nice I didn’t have to destroy half my boat to get the water tank out for repair, need to weld a seam that split on that.

Working with the dinosaur heads a little...