Resurrecting the Rambler

[Tom Goldman]

Originally Posted by Pinballer

The dead hole turned out to be a pushrod that somehow got out from under it's rocker arm on cylinder 2. Nothing was immediately found to cause this, I pulled the lifter out for a look too and it was all right, so I'll have to watch for this a little closer in the future.

Everything is buttoned back up and we'll go try again soon. Presently making some changes to the fuel system before I go, the pressure was too high. New regulator on the way to replace my ancient used one as it won't adjust down any more.

258's with the bridge style rockers will do this with a Stocker type cam and lifters. ...Especially if the rockers are the newer replacements ,not the OEM's. .... The stock length pushrods are too long due to the amount of material removal on the deck and head to get to the minimums.

....At max lift the pushrod is very near to popping out with a Stocker type lifter with little bleed down .
on Ed Fernandez's Gremlin I used much shorter pushrods with 210 degree tips
The 258 will pull thru 5800-6000 rpm with a Stocker cam and springs
BBD carbs take a little care on adjustment of the metering rod tree and acc. pump but should have very sharp throttle response.
unfortunately the AMX package adds a lot of extra weight on a car that has precious little to remove ,save the seats and factory wiring harness. ....
You can save 15# on the front by using the 4 cyl disc brakes ,but they are hard to find . ......I'm assuming aftermarket brakes are not in the budget .

[Pinballer]

Thanks Tom. Besides adding a new regulator in and getting the fuel pressure back down to 5.5 lbs, I checked into the carb in the areas you mentioned and changed a couple things, and doing that improved the throttle response a lot and allowed me to bring the idle down quite a bit.
As far as the pushrod pop-out issue, I haven't changed any of the block or head geometry from stock yet, pushrods are still the stock length and nothing has been shaved down any on the head or block. I will on the next motor I do though so your advice will work wonders then. The rockers are still the OEM bridged pieces, so I'll just have to watch things and solve it one problem at a time from there. Valve springs might be a touch weak, I didn't go all out on those.

As of right now, the over-weight of the car is somewhat insignificant to me as I'm more interested in getting it to launch and run hard all the way down the track first. Baby steps.