How To Teardown, Rebuild, & Dyno A Small Block Chevy Engine

today on engine power we're revisiting a little stroker small block that was plucked out of one of our most recent project cars it's the mouse that powered project Pro Street or no Street for quite some time before we started the wicked transformation clear Pat and I guesstimate this engine makes between 450 and 480 horsepower we're gonna find out back on the dyno then we're going to upgrade the valve train and massage it in a few other areas to show you that there's always room for improvement let's go ahead and name this project 383 rear EV inside the factory block is an Eagle forge rotating assembly that is neutral balanced the heads are 215 CC dart Pro once it's got a hydraulic roller valve train and dart single plane manifold the engine sounded awesome and ran great in the car listen up your responsiveness of it's pretty sporty we need to get it docked to the dyno so the fun can begin here's a quick rundown of what is about to happen now I'm going to go ahead and install all the sensors then hook up the water hoses fill the engine with oil install the headers that were in the car then top it off with a carburetor let's get to it I will monitor the obvious on this engine the water temperature is a must now this probe is placed in the fitting on the intake manifold and tells the dyno what the coolant temperature is now the water hoses are hooked up to the intake and the water pump this tank is what holds the water that passes through the engine as it runs now down here is an adjustable thermostat that's used to set and maintain a specific temperature there's a 2,000 gallon water tank outside of the building that supplies this tank with the cool water it needs to maintain the set temperature now with this type of setup a thermostat is not used in the engine the oil pressure line is as simple and straightforward as it gets it's a dash six line that runs to a sensor in the sensor box and is converted to a digital signal for readout on the dyno screen for lube juice royal purple HPS 5w30 is going in it's designed for performance Street engines seeking uncompromised levels of performance and protection for exhaust the same fender well headers that were in the car are going back on they have inch and 3/4 primaries and three-inch collectors to supply fuel will use our 750 CFM dyno carb it's a perfect match for this 383 now an o2 sensor is placed in the bank one pipe this allows our Daytona sensors wideband to measure the air fuel ratio it's already warmed up and ready to go I'll make a couple of pulls from three to 6,500 rpm that will let us know if we are in the rain of our power guesstimate good ol pressure good vitals here we go [Music] see what she did all right 443 451 we're seven horse off of our guesstimate which was in the 450 to 480 range graph looks good I've got time and set up at 33 degrees peak power 5500 and peak torque is 47 a bad little engine all right let's back that up here we go 4:42 with 4:48 just over half a horsepower now let's see what we can upgrade to stay with us we're back in a quick spray off is in order it had a small oil leak when it was in the car now this makes it easier on you by having a clean bullet to start tearing down picking up some power on this little stroker shouldn't be too hard and the parts that we're putting in are relatively inexpensive and easy to swap out we already know what the major components are like the rotating assembly the cylinder head and the intake manifold other than that you're gonna find out what's in this bullet at the same time we are removing the cast aluminum valve cover it reveals an old-school stud girdle system I haven't seen in years simple but effective the distributor is set up with mechanical advance now that will change here's why you pay attention during disassembly the teeth on this bronze distributor gear are worn almost to a razor's edge and that's pretty common when running a high volume oil pump it has a lot of miles on it and even though this is a Ford gear this is what a new tooth is supposed to look like nice and thick we're gonna have to change this out the intake manifold is an out-of-the-box Dart single plane high rise brand is unknown but we do know they are a 1.5 ratio and we're not reusing them and it's a good thing because it looks like they've been doing some serious rubbing the heads are pulled next and reveal a 41,000 compress thickness head gasket the Pistons are a moly flat top with 5 cc valve reliefs yeah not nice and clean the front cover goes to show off a stretch timing chain whoa check this out it's got variable cam timing the cam is the final part to be removed it's a hydraulic roller duration at 50 thousandths is 242 on the intake to 48 on the exhaust now it's on 110 degrees low preparation and gross valve lift is 540 and 562 the cam that's taking its place is from a past project of ours now this thing is set up on a nine hundred thousand space circle for stroker applications now here's a look at the differences in the two cam specs it has 252 degrees or duration on the intake 260 on the exhaust lift increases to 650 mm on the intake 660 on the exhaust and it's still on a hundred 10 degrees of lobe separation but this solid roller has an additional 10 degrees on the intake and 12 degrees on the exhaust of duration at 50 and lift really increases by a hundred twelve thousand on the intake and ninety-eight thousands on the exhaust now just because it's a nine hundred base circle doesn't mean there's anything different with the journals themselves they are still the stock size so they'll work just fine oil is used on the journals for pre lube be careful not to Nick the bearings when you're installing it just take your time due to the slack on the old timing chain this new setup is taking its place it's a double row just like before with the increase in lift and duration degreeing is a must with the timing chain in a straight up position the cam came in at 109 degrees which is 1 degree advanced this cam is significantly bigger than the old one so we're gonna have to check piston to valve clearance and we also have to establish a new push rod length so here's how to kill two birds with one stone first we'll put an intake and exhaust valve in the number one cylinder secure them with checker springs retainers and locks now a pair of lifters are dropped in and they use 27,000 compress gasket is laid on the deck the head is dropped in place and five plates can Snug it down now a couple of rocker studs are screwed in two adjustable length push rods are put in and new 1.5 ratio Summit Racing gold rockers slip on the first order of business is to adjust the push rod so the center of the rockers roller tip is centered on the valve stem remove the rocker arm and mark the end of the valve with DICOM or a magic marker replace the rocker and turn the engine over several revolutions which leaves a signature on the end of the valve remove the rocker and verify the rollers tip sweep is centered you want the thinnest line you can get once you are happy with the mark remove the push rod and get an exact length measurement using a pair of calipers not a wooden ruler at this point we can order our push rods which is actually good timing because we have to take a little trip and we'll finish this little stroker in the near future with final assembly and a dyno session welcome back we have some old company back in the spotlight this is the small-block stroker that came out of our Nova project we named it 383 re rip now we're not trying to set the world on fire with this engine we're just trying to show you a little bit of tech with some parts we had laying around the shop here's a look at what got us to this point the engine was docked up to the dyno we ran the same headers it had in the car and our 750 CFM dyno car we pulled it to 6,500 rpm and the dyno reported 443 horsepower a quick pressure washer the engine was necessary it had quite a few years of dirt and oil buildup on the outside once dry the teardown began and we discovered what parts the engine had the same time you did the cylinder heads were removed which showed us a short block that was in good shape the camshaft was the last part to come out it was replaced with a cam we used in a previous small-block build and a new timing set was installed the new solid roller camshaft is bigger in all respects and has a 900 base circle for stroker applications now since it's bigger on the intake and exhaust piston to valve clearance has to be checked our new push rods measuring 8 200 have come in from Trent performance and I've gone ahead and set up everything up top to complete the process we're not using clay because we have the right measuring equipment with true TDC setup will turn our degree wheel until both rockers are moving which indicates split overlap the intake clearance is checked 10 degrees after top dead center and 0 lash on the rockers this is the point where the valve is physically closest to the top of the piston with this particular camshaft setup now 0 the dial indicator on the intakes valve retainer and press down on the rocker till the valve contacts the top of the piston we have a generous 165,000 clearance the minimum we need here is only 60,000 the exhaust clearance is measured at 10 degrees before TDC on split overlap on the exhaust we have 156 thousands which are minimum here is 120 thousands so we are way in the good now the heads will be fitted with new valve springs retainers and locks the springs are brand new inspect for the cam we've installed more items that were on our park shelf also out of a used engine are these tie bar style solid roller lifters Co meta-chem LS head gaskets will seal the heads to the block's deck these have a 27,000 compress thickness and will increase the compression ratio from ten point one zero to one with the old 41,000 gasket to ten point four six with these these ARP head bolts have a tensile strength of a hundred and eighty thousand psi making them way stronger than OEM type bolts now the guide plates can be torqued in place with new rocker studs the new pushrods can drop in and they get topped off with Summit Racing gold rocker arms with a 1.5 ratio cold lash is ten thousands on the intake fourteen thousands on the exhaust keeping valvetrain stability and check our Summit Racing rocker girdles make sure you recheck your lash the girdle can alter your setting now the original valve covers go back on the right stuff from Permatex is a one-minute gasket maker and is blowout resistant with that bead laid the dark single plane intake is back at home we improved on the oil pan with a why annoyin kit this one has a 7 quart capacity when we come back it'll be on the dyno ready to fire up we're back and it's time to see how well project 383 rear every spa bars are it up it's running the headers from the Nova again and the same carb as before we did add a two inch spacer for a little more plenum volume alright we have 33 degrees total timing in it and we have fresh 93 octane in the cell we're gonna make our sweeps just like we did before we torn apart from 3,000 to 6,500 letter burg [Music] [Music] oh wow that's not a bad improvement right there 481 horse 454 pound-feet of torque at 6,500 before it was 420 horsepower now we're at 481 the same numbers with torque at 6,500 339 before 388 now that is incredible there's still a little left in it we're we got a bump the timing up by adding two degrees for a total of 35 pressure stabilized you ready [Music] yeah snuck a little more in it 484 horse 462 pound-feet of torque we stepped up one more degree 236 total and this is going to be our grand finale so watch it go ahead and step it up another 300 rpm 6800 see what she does [Music] on the limits right there what you didn't drop any 484 460 1.7 pound-feet of torque so I interesting it thing is it didn't fall off a whole bunch up top nice engine nice we didn't even have to do it this one's a it's a take-off that we just kind of swapping some parts on and uh it only dropped one pound feet of pound foot of torque with one degree yeah back it down to 35 it's in there it's episode whatever this thing gets put in it's gonna be it's gonna be a rocker good job this project goes to show that identifying some small problems and changing out some easy parts can yield big results now next time you have a take out engine don't assume it's useless a little work goes a long way

Channel: POWERNATION

Views: 487,025

Rating: 4.8464913 out of 5

Keywords: Automotive;, small block, engine rebuild, 383 chevy, Cars;, Vehicles;, How-To;, Auto, News;, Howto;, How, DIY;, Car, engine, rebuild, carburetor, dyno, chevy, chevrolet, big block, sbc, powernation, automotive, automobile, do it yourself

Id: kZPdbEZkW1g

Length: 15min 55sec (955 seconds)

Published: Fri May 10 2019