Well, instead of a problem or question, I thought I'd share some good news for a change. She's just about ready to drop back in the Jeep. Maybe even tomorrow evening if the weather cooperates.
https://home.comcast.net/~rwsr50/Com...nd_Rebuild.jpg
Printable View
Well, instead of a problem or question, I thought I'd share some good news for a change. She's just about ready to drop back in the Jeep. Maybe even tomorrow evening if the weather cooperates.
https://home.comcast.net/~rwsr50/Com...nd_Rebuild.jpg
Ground Poundin' 401 :shock:
Just got mine out and partially disassembled today :smile:
Nice!
Gives me a warm fuzzy thinking about the sound that things gonna make.
Congradulations :t:
Jeff
Thanks guys. THE 401 IS BACK IN THE JEEP AND THE EXHAUST IS CONNECTED UP AS OF 8:30 TONITE!
We'll start buttoning up all the cables, hoses, wires, etc. and put the radiator and grille back in tomorrow afternoon. Since it was in before, and everything is was hooked up before, the rest should go back together pretty quickly. All the mods we had to do to go from the 258 to the 401 have already been done.
wwwhhhhrrrrrrrrrrrr vrooooom
buba - buba - buba - buba - buba - buba - buba - buba
:?:
All that's left to do tomorrow after work is drop in the distributor and hook up the spark plug wires, fill the radiator, and put the battery back in that's charging as I sleep, then we're ready to turn the key and see what happens.
Geez, turning that key for the first time is a nerve wracking, scary experience!
Well we turned the key tonite...and nothing
bad happened! It started right up and purred like a...LION! Broke in the cam again for good measure. All vital signs looked good. Sounds SUPER!!!
Took 'er for a short spin then, but it got dark on us and we didn't want to do too much in the dark. Tomorrow after work, we'll change oil, check all fluids again, then take 'er for real ride . Feels really good to hear her finally running again!
And I finally found something that works on exhaust manifolds...POR Cast Iron Gray high-temperature exhaust paint. First thing I ever tried that didn't burn off right away. Still looks as good as in the pic on the engine stand above.
https://home.comcast.net/~rwsr50/Com...ebuild_004.jpg
That sure looks nice, just out of curiousity, do you remember what type of throttle cable assy you are running, in the picture it looks like a braided stainless steel line. A Cj with a 401, what a hot rod. :t:
Thanks for the compliement. My son and I are both very proud of our "joint venture".
Yes, I do remember. It is a Lokar setup that has both the throttle and automatic transmission throttle pressure cables. Got it from Summit. They are braided stainless steel, in fact, everything is stainless. It wasn't cheap, but it is a top notch piece of equipment. And, it adds 23 extra horse power!
PS-the braided stainless cable sheaths are long so you can cut them to the length you need, but can be a PITA to cut.
Great ! :t:
much better this time I guess ?
no funny spark timimg issues ?
Now the hard part, be easy on it for a few hundred miles,
before ya really wrap on it :shock:
Wheels in the Air ! :!:
Nope, no timing issues whatsoever. We set it at TDC and pointed the rotor at No. 1, and it tried to start right away, but wouldn't quite catch. Turned the distributor counter clockwise a hair to give a little advance, and she fired right up. After the 20 minute break in, put the timing light on it and set it at 10 advanced. She cranks real easy now, not that strained barely-able-to-turn-over thing we were experiencing last time around. Seems to be doing better temperature wise this time too, and running much cooler, but we really haven't had it out on the road yet either.
I've heard you should do a few half throttle hard acceleratons to seat the rings. I've also heard not to baby it and to just run the crap out of it from the get go.
All I know is so far so good. We do still have some racing fuel mixed in with the gas currently in the tank from when she was pinging last time around, so we won't really know how the pump gas works til we use that up, which shouldn't take long if it goes thru gas like it did last time it was running.
Now, I just hope it lasts A LOT longer than the 300 miles we got out of the last rebuild!
That's good to hear.
300 miles aint too bad, I only got 30 :smile:
but I was the one who put it together #-o
This is the first thing found when I went looking
then from there found the bad #4 ex lobe & lifter.
Keep an eye on your rocker adj and lifters for a while and
maybe after awhile, pull the dizzy and check the gear.
:idea:
http://home.fuse.net/ckthomas/AMX-367-PushRod-Tweak.jpg
http://home.fuse.net/ckthomas/AMC-367-BAD-CAM-Pics.jpg
Fuzz, post up a picture of your "pretzel connecting rod", ha, ha. Maybe we could put that and AMX69PGHATTY's pieces together and make some kind of 401 sculpture, ha, ha.
I had forgotten just how loud and vicious our 401 sounds until we terrorized the neighborhood last night on "maiden voyage II". And right at "quiet time", of course. Even had one neighbor come out of their house and stare. It was a different neighbor than the one who read Fuzz and I the riot act when Fuzz came to visit and made some noise. We're becoming more and more popular, ha, ha.
Fuzz was the first one besides us to hear the beast roar last night, long distance, courtesy of "can you hear it now". After all, he had a big part in our successful rebuild. Wish I had a way to make a good recording to share it with all of you here who helped us out. Tried recording on the cell phone, but that really comes out crappy-sounding.
I try to imagine what it was like way back when in the day
when a whole lotta folks had loud jeeps or cars.
Nowadays they've gotten so quite, a loud one sticks out.
So to keep "reputations", did you terrorize ...... er .... drive
it around the nieghbirhood again yet tonight ???
Gotta hear that buba-buba-buba-buba-buba sound man :wink:
:shock:
Well, as high as I was last night, I'm just as disappointed tonite. We changed oil and filter, checked all the fluids, then took her for a ride. We didn't go very far last night, but went about maybe 5 miles tonite.
Well, first off, the temperature is climbing again. It hit about 220, and I think it would have gone higher, but we stopped driving it. It's funny, it will sit and idle all day and not go over 180, but as soon as you take it on the road, it starts to heat up. Same thing is was doing 1st rebuild. Once we stopped driving, we let it sit and idle and the temp came right down. The 2 speed Taurus fan is pulling plenty of air, much more that the stock belt driven fan. It will suck a rag right up against the radiator from about a foot away.
The other thing is it doesn't have much power. Again, about the same as last time around. Hard to believe with all the problems it had last time.
WHAT A BUMMER!!! It sure does sound good though.
sound clips?
It can't be the fan, my fan is really crappy for my 360 and it does the job, is your thermostat opening, there should be like a peak in temperture then a drop you know...
I'm trying to remember what thermostat we have in it. I just looked on the shelf and found a 180, a 195, and an empty box. The empty box doesn't have a temp on it. The two t-stats are Stant's, but the empty box is a CST, made in Israel.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rhinolined360
If memory serves me, we started out with the 180, then went to a 160. I just looked up the CST part number and that empty box is from a 160, so I'm betting that's what's in the engine.
I'll have to watch carefully next time we start it up and see if it does momentarily drop back after it initially hits 160. We have a real good Autometer gauges in it so we can monitor it a lot better than with the crappy OEM "cold/warmer/hot/uh-oh" gauge. I'd say the t-stat is opening because I was watching in the radiator the other night on the first start up and at one point I could really see the coolant start to circulate.
Wonder what would happen if we ran it without any thermostat? Fuzz, what temp t-stat are you running?
one with the center knocked out but I have not done much road driving but when I did it was around 200 - 210
And for everybody who wants to hear it, I was thinking, I do have a mike hooked to the computer, and I could pull the Jeep over to the window right beside the computer and reach the mike out the window as far as it will reach.
The neighbors are REALLY gonna think I've lost it now! Good thing there aren't any too close. Still have a little bit of elbow room out here.
I thought I saw one with the center knocked out somewhere. Don't think I ever saw your t-stat exposed though. Just remembered, the t-stat in the OEM intake that was originally on this engine was gutted. Hmmm....Quote:
Originally Posted by fuzz401
Why do you need to keep any of it? Couldn't you just remove the whole thing, or do you need it to hold the gasket or something?
keep some restriction in the water
Just for the heck of it try a short run with the hood off, there is a small chance that even with a good fan, you aren,t getting enough airflow to allow to cooling system to do its job. A friend has a 54 Willys truck with a 350 Chev motor and we took it to S Dak a few years ago and on the highway it ran real hot. He had put a huge heater in it from the back of a cube van [it gets to 30 and 40 below here in winter] and made a duct leading out the passenger vent window and it was enough to bring the temp back down on the highway to the 200 range. Its just an opinion but I believe you need a thermostat in the system to allow the cooling system to maintain an even temp for the engine.
Yes, we've been talking about making some blocks for under the hood hinges to raise the back end up and let a gap for some air to escape. Might have to try running it with the hood off. Good idea. I was thinking that when it is sitting idling, the hood has been open.
Yeah ya gotta have a T-Stat, or at the minimum a restrictor plate.
I would change your T-Stat to the 195 degree and see what it does.
Pretty sure 195 was stock.
A too cold T-Stat can actually make it run hot cause the T-Stat nevers closes down,
which slows water flow through the radiator and lets it loose heat.
Have had good results with Mr. Gasket Hi-Perf Balanced T-stat's.
Mr. Gasket
Hi-Perf Balanced Thermostats
AMC V8
#4365 = 195*f
#4364 = 180*f
#4363 = 160*f
:-|
OK, got a recording for y'all.
https://home.comcast.net/~rwsr50/Com..._recording.mp3
Ya know what, think I just bought the SAME CAM that you're using :-|
Labeled as an Elgin Cam under part #E-1041-P
it has same specs as the Clevite Cam #229-1972
.488/.488 - 218/218 - 284/284
In - Op 4 BTC - CL 34 ABC - 105 CL
Ex - Op 44 BBC - CL 6 BTC - 115 CL
So has anyone else used, or is using this cam ?
Any good for 6000-6500 in a 10.2:1 360 ?
Kinda worried about effective CR and detonation though
due to early 34 deg Intake closing Angle and 10.2:1 Static CR.
When I degreed it, I had to retard it 2* to hit the straight up specs on the cam. After I did that, both centerlines were right on, and both valves were opening 1* earlier and closing 1* later than the specs. In other words, I ended up with 220*/220*. The intake was opening and the exhaust was closing at the same spot, 5* BTC. No overlap at all. That is supposed to be good for idle and vacuum, but I don't know if has any bad effects. I thought the cam specs sounded real good, that's why I went with that one. But then, what do I know about chickens???
I ran the KB calculator with the actual numbers from degreeing, and ended up with 8.531 dynamic compression ratio. That was with KB354 9.5:1 pistons, .045 piston to head clearance, and .040 over on the bores.
KB's web page says pump gas should be good to 8.5 to 1 on a stock cast iron head engine, and 9 to 1 on a quench engine. The KB354's are supposed to be designed for quench, so I figure we should be alright. I also had sent all our specs to KB and asked them if it would run on pump gas, and they replied yes, but we may have to use high test.
Blocked the hood hinges up and now have about a 1/2 crack across the back of the hood. We're taking it in for State Inspection at 2:30, so we'll see if that helps any. If so, the next step will be getting some hood louvers or something. Gotta remember to turn the heater on too if it starts getting hot, that always helps some.
Well, we took back roads and babied it over to the inspection station, but still hit 230*. At that point we stopped and cooled it down. Stopped to eat halfway home so it got chance to cool down and never got that hot on the way home.
Put bigger jets and metering rods in the carb to get it to its richest setting, and advanced the timing. That seemed to help a lot. Drove it about 50 miles tonite, half of which were cruising down the interstate at 60mph. It never got above 215*. I'd still like it to run even cooler than that, but at least we moving in the right direction.
We set the timing with the vacuum gauge. Advanced it until we reached the highest vacuum, 15", then backed down to 13". Was hard to do though because the vacuum gauge was jumping around quite a bit. Ran a lot better, and cooler, but we're worried about detonation, after what happened last build.
It's really hard to hear if it's pinging as loud as it is and as many rattles and vibrations as the Jeep has. Is there any other way to tell if we're getting detonation other than by ear?
Cool, so it's "legal" now :t:
You did mean bigger Jets and smaller metering rods ?
Vacuum gauge attached to the intake manifold at like the brake booster port,
should be relatively solid and steady, no bouncing, maybe a little vibrating, but not much.
What, about 12 - 14 inches vacuum at idle ?
If the Vacuum gauge is bouncing a lot, may consider to re-ckeck Valve Adjustment.
Or maybe things just need to seat-in and settle.
Are ya still running the 165* T-stat ? tried the 195* ?
Glad to hear you got to take a ride.
Can't think of anyway to detect detonation except hearing it.
Not sure if it shows up on plugs somehow or not, it might.
If real bad I think it blows the ceramic off from around the center electrode.
Soundclip sounds good, made me laugh, poor nieghbors #-o
Could it be possible that a small vacuum leak could cause the gauge to jump around, and also maybe to make the motor to run lean/hot. One of the guys at 4x4 wire said to try propane ie open the valve to let a small amt of propane from one of those small bottles around the carb and manifold and if the idle increases you have found a leak.
Yeah, a vacuum leak could possibly be the culprit. :idea:
Yes, smaller metering rods.
We're running hydroboost and mechanical advance, so we have no vacuum lines. The only ports we have are on the base of the carb.
Why are you asking about the vacuum readings? Is that high, low, ??? We got up to around 15, then backed down to 13. While driving we "thought" we could hear some pinging, so we pulled over and retarded a little. Going to check with the light again today, but it's really hard to see the marks with the compressor and all. We have an adjustable timing light, so as long as we can see any mark on the timing cover, we can compensate.
The vacuum gauge smoothes out some as we increase the engine speed.
Still have the 160* stat in. Have had the heater running on high though, and we have the Blazer fan motor upgrade. It is tolerable with the top off. Trying to figure out how to change the stat without making a big mess all over the top of the engine. Guess we could take the hose off the radiator and suck it out with the shop vac. Got the fan switch probe going in the radiator end of the hose and sealed with silicone, so I kinda hate to mess with that.
We'll check for a vacuum leak.
You could just open the drain at the bottom of the rad and let the water level lower a bit to minimize the mess and drain it into a clean container and then reuse it.
Ok, I haven't used the carb base ports before for a vac gauge, so I don't know eggxactly how one would act attached there. Just curious, vaccum is another "tool" used to get some idea of what the motor is doing. I'd say 13-15" of vac is good.
When setting timing, as I'm sure you know, what really matters is TOTAL Timing and at what RPM.
Has the Distrib been re-curved to give total mechanical advance by about 3000 rpm or so ?
If you can, I'd set my timing using the dial back timing light set to 37 degrees, and carefully rev the motor until there is no more mechanical advance, it is all in, and line up the dampener 0 mark with the timing cover 0 mark, with dial back light set to the 37 degrees. This sets the total timimg to 37. Initial is whatever it comes out to be. This is hard to do if there is a LOT of Mechaincal advance available in the Distributoris and it is slow coming in, like not until 5000 rpm motor. Do you know how much Mech advance is available and what rpm it's all in by ?
Yeah, changin' T-stats can be messy, especially on a clean new motor. I use only water at first in a new motor, no anti-freeze, just in case. As said, can ya drain some out some how ? Petcock in bottom of radiator ? Shop Vac in top might work. And it seems like it's harder to get the T'stat housing to seal when changing it in the vehichle for some reason.
Oh, do you have a PCV Valve with hose attached to bottom of carb in the back, a sheet metal baffle on the bottom of intake, and a filtered breather on the oil fill tube ? A non-functioning PCV can act like "Vaccum problems" and if it's not attached to the back bottom of the carb it's like aHUGE vacuum leak. I've mistakingly left my PVC hose disconnected before.
Just an FYI but KB recommends 34degrees total advance with their pistons and good quench. 37 degrees total advance may be a bit much. I'd curve the dizzy to bring it all in at about 2500-3000rpm. I would think 10 degrees base timing (vac off) would be plenty (maybe 12degmax). Vac adv will add more and should help cooling at idle and lean cruise conditions.
From there you may have to play with it (limit vac advance, or base, or total, or all) to prevent detonation.
Regarding cam timing; if you think it is not as spirited off the line as it should be, you may want to advance the cam 2-4deg.
Yep, got all the PCV stuff hooked up just like described above.
I'm reading that too much advance causes hard starter cranking, running hot, and detonation. Maybe we had too much advance at 10* initial. Didn't get to checking the total advance yet. It has a Mallory Unilite distributor we got from Blown7 with mechanical advance. Don't know if he had it recurved or anything. I think he was running it in a 360. When we set the timing with the vacuum gauge last nite, it ran much cooler. We didn't check the timing with the light to see where it ended up, but thought we heard pinging and pulled over and retarded it a little. When we got home and checked it with the light, it was at TDC. So, either we turned it further than we thought, or it was not advanced that much with the vacuum gauge.
Oh, and it's plenty spirited off the line. "Somebody" just put the 4:1 t-case in low and jumped on it...and snapped a Dana 60 rear axle shaft in half! Well, it was back on the road for all of a day, now it's sitting again!!!