formula31

Rods HAVE to be reconditioned after the bolts are changed, and yes, the entire rotating assemblyt should be balanced. This includes the crank, pistons and pins, rods, rings, bearings, flywheel and harmonic balancer

Lee-way

Wow, you guys got me so convinced I think I am going to start putting cast cranks in all of my custom motors. NOT! Sounds great. I guess I should of took the stock 330 merc motor bottom end apart before making more power out of the air pump side. Maybe mine was a friday motor. However, I still would never go as far as to remove the motor and rebalance and machine a cast crank to make it work. To me that is like having a 10 year old bilge pump in a boat that you are pulling the motor, for whatever reason, and you decide not to replace the bilge pump eventhough it is a pain in the ass to do with your motor in the boat.

tomas_wallin

Is there any common reliable place to put a oiltemp sensor on the engine? Someone told me the bottom plug in the oilpan...

KAAMA

iTrader: (1)

Lee-way,

Concerning the cast cranks, we had to draw the line somewhere I guess. I always remember some guy from Detroit back then telling me that the cast cranks are fine up to about 5500rpm or so and that they used them all the time in marine engines with good success. I remember being shocked at what he told us regarding the use of cast cranks in an engine, but we decided to give it a go. I also remember thinking that we needed the large rectangle port GM cylinder heads in order to make good power, but this same guy told us the GM oval port "049" castings that we already had were excellent for application we were using them for in a marine 454cid engine, but just to do some bowl work and short side radius work. So, we thought we were way ahead of ourselves already. Also, we kept thinking that we needed to use 4-bolt main blocks was another "wive's tale" we thought for sure that we needed. And these were done in a 2-bolt main block which is another thing he said would work fine and said if we wanted to make them a little stronger to just use studs even thought he said it wasn't necessary---so we used studs when the main saddles were align honed. I sometimes refer to it as "the poor man's hi-performance 454". Everyone who was into offshore performance boats back then told us that we nuts and that we would only make it out of the jetty/pier heads for about 2 minutes before it broke----dang if we didn't keep going! That boat (my friends) ran year after year for hundreds of hours without any failures right up until the time he sold it in 1992.

Whiteknuckle

I've told this story before, but us 57 year olds tend to repeat ourselves. My son(my engine builder) is an engine builder for GM's premier racing devolpment company. During the time we were working on "version II" of the engine his employer was doing develpment work on the Chevy Indy engine which my son was working on that project. After work hours my son was working on my BB when the head of the GM Indy program started looking at my engine and shooting the sh*t with my son. My son said his dad could not make up his mind on whether he wanted to go to a forged crank or reuse the cast crank. The GM Racing Guru said ' you know what I would do? I'd put that cast crank right back in there.

Now again I'm not saying that cast cranks are as good as forged. I'm just saying that they are underestimated. When the bottom end of my engine was assmebled the ease at which the crank spun was incredible. Good machine work and assembly as Formula31 says buys you alot. If you have the money to spare get the forged crank, if you are on a budget you can get away with the cast up to a certain power level.

tomas_wallin

That was kind of what I wanted to hear!


Thanks!

tomas_wallin

What heads are frequently used to hot up a std 454? Are the #049 casting something to look for? I Would rather go with the L-29 Vortec's but I'm having "slight" difficulties finding any...

It would be nice to spend around $300 on the heads and have some $'s left to fine tune them instead.

formula31

049 and 781. They are pretty close. But, as stock, they have small valves and should be upgraded to 1.88 exhaust (inconel)and 2.19 intake (severe duty) and then some bowl work. Also hardened exhaust seats should be installed. Bronze quides are also a good idea. Its typical to end up with $500-$1000 or more in making a pair of these work well and be reliable.

Pat McPherson

A good set of valves will cost $400+ alone.
I would not recommend putting alot of $$$ in an old set of heads. Been there done that...
You can buy new World Products iron or Edelbrock aluminum heads for around $1500 complete.

The L-29 Vortecs will be the least expensive upgrade as they will up the compression with your flat top pistons and flow a little better than the peanut port heads. But keep in mind, they have the small valves too...

blue thunder

I think the edelbrocks still need the valve springs, retainers and keepers to complete. They do come with good valve though. I agree with all the talk about cast cranks being sufficient as well. I ran two engines in the low to mid 400hp range with cast cranks turned 20/20 and spun up to and over 5000rpm. Broke everything but the cranks. I replaced those cranks with scat nodular steel cast cranks. I am running close to 500hp and plan to spin them this year up around 5400rpm. Last year I spun them to 5100. Had them magnufluxed last week and they are in perfect shape. I don't really understand all the hype around forged cranks for our low rpm, relatively low hp applications. I do run forged rods with 7/16 arp bolts.

BT