Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

I would take that ANY day, over my daughter oiling down her own tires and red-hot exhaust in the top end lights at a buck-fifteen.

None of the important stuff (heads, intake, etc.) were damaged- you'll come out of this okay.

Did it wipe the cam?

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

Sean, thanks. I leaked it down before the dyno and it was 4%. I don't think it will be too bad, either way it's gotta be fixed. I'll know more early next week.

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

I agree Tim, it was caught early for sure. We're leaving for the D2 banquet tomorrow morning so nothing will get sorted out this weekend. Plan is to get going on it Monday so we can order parts and get moving forward.

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

My thoughts exactly, nobody hurt so it's all good. All the important stuff is good to go. The cam looks good from what I saw, pulled some lifters and they looked perfect, should get it pulled apart Monday.

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

Checked some stuff and pulled everything apart today. I honestly have more questions than answers at this point with some of the weird stocker stuff but oh well. The reason for the tear down was low oil pressure, well the two rear main bearings were the culprits as you will see. The reason? Well I'm guessing it was the valve springs, or more so how they were set up, a stack of shims and no locator, the damper (with no locator) was bashing the shims and sending metal through the engine. I'm guessing some got through the filter. Also has the wrong retainers for the springs. Springs were pretty soft but hell maybe they are setup this way to loft the valve open or something with this square cam. One thing I didn't count on were the janky cylinders in the block, almost look rusted near the top of a few of them, we'll clean them up as good as we can... we gotta race.
https://i.imgur.com/hggrNKd.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/HbwD7b7.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/8dLpkoE.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/IIwBb6K.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/yRsbY5t.jpg

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

Todd,
Were you able to get any power numbers out of the engine before the "discoveries" ?
Glenn

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

I believe comp cams has locators,might have to be machined to fit heads. Look at short height valve locks too.What spring pressure are springs at? What fuel are you using?

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

No Glenn we weren't.

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

Glenn, I think the springs were 350# open, I'll have to look at the notes tomorrow. I should stick a pic of the cam info on here and see if anyone knows who did it so I can call them to figure these springs out. I think the standard is about 200# and 400#. Fuel is VP C12.

Re: H-I-J '76 Nova re-fit.
 

Todd,
I used to use VP C-11 and had to do major repairs to heads and cylinder walls after the motor set for some time.
I was told that the problem was from the VP fuel.
Luckily I had changed over to Sunoco before NHRA had made their switch. Never had any troubles with my motors during the down time with Sunoco.

VP is great fuel, I just had not been told to foam the motor after races.

Good luck sir.