I Deleted The AFM And VVT From My 5.3L LS V8! - First Startup - 5.3L LC9 Gen IV LS V8 Build Part 4

welcome back to the jamzee online youtube channel we're jumping right into the video here with polishing the crankshaft out of my personal 5.3 liter lc9 engine which experienced the common failure of an afm lifter pluck was on my side however as the crankshaft had virtually nowhere and in fact the main bearings and the rod bearings looked nearly perfect upon tear down meaning a quick polish after the balancing was all the crankshaft needed to be ready to run with everything clean and ready for assembly it was time to verify that our main bearing oil clearances were acceptable for this application so we mic'd all the main journals of the crankshaft and transferred the measurement to a bore gauge in order to measure the clearances which came out around just over 2 thousands on all journals satisfied with the main bearing clearances i went forward to double check the rod bearing clearances in a similar manner running a set of 1 000 undersized rod bearings put me between 1.7 and 2.1 thousands clearance on all eight rods which is on the border of the tight side of where i wanted to be but standard bearings opened it up farther than i wanted to see knowing that all of our crankshaft bearing clearances were within our determined tolerance for this application it was time to move forward with getting the crankshaft installed in the block as you can see we're running a set of arp main studs and giving the bearings a quick coat of clevite bearing guard before setting the crankshaft in place and also giving the lower bearings in the caps a quick coat before setting them in place and tapping them gently until they have seated in the block it's recommended to use a small dab of silicone sealer under the head of the side main bolts to avoid future oil leaks and after lightly snugging down all the fasteners we bump the crankshaft back and forth a few times ending with bumping the crankshaft forward in order to align the thrust bearing at this point we're free to go ahead and tighten down all of the main caps being sure to follow the recommended torque procedure from arp bolts with all the main caps seated and torqued it's always satisfying to give the crankshaft that first spin by hand and make sure everything is feeling okay finally we'll go ahead and double check the crankshaft end plate which came in just over three thousands which i'm satisfied with so i'll take a quick break to give you guys a little bit of an update this is the new shop that we're working on we just pretty much have to finish the interior and some of the electrical i also have my pickup here and the engine is almost installed i'm almost ready to do the first fire so that's what you guys can stay tuned for i also want to take a minute to talk about our sponsor for this video skull skull bliss offers ethically sourced animal skulls in a decorative fashion their process takes authentic skulls which are a byproduct of local balinese agricultural industries and transforms them into detailed works of art that offer an impressive touch to any home or office their unique process and attention to detail yields a work of art that someone like myself can truly appreciate knowing that in a way it's similar to the attention to detail required in the work i do here in the shop day in and day out and while this longhorn skull looks absolutely amazing mounted to the front of my dad's little ford courier i think it's going to make a great housewarming gift for my father-in-law who recently moved to texas we want to say a huge thank you to skullbliss for recognizing the hard work we do here in the shop and reaching out to share their work with us and our audience if you or someone you know has been looking for the perfect finishing touch to their home or office be sure to check out the links in the description and let them know that we really appreciate their support of our channel thank you for staying patient for the quick sponsor break but jumping back into it here we're installing the new camshaft that i chose for this build being a daily driver i didn't want to sacrifice too much drivability so i decided to go with the elgin 1838p otherwise known as the sloppy stage one can this cam does away with not only the afm system but the vvt system as well with the cam thrust plate installed i installed the crankshaft sprocket and i opted to go with cloye's three-way adjustable timing set allowing me some adjustability to advance or the cam if needed to start with i'm installing it straight up or dot to dot in order to degree the camshaft for a quick run down on degreeing the cam first step is to get the degree wheel installed at true top dead center using a positive stop on the piston we rotate the crank until the piston hits the stop noting the degree of the wheel before rotating the opposite direction until the piston stops again and adjusting our pointer to make the two numbers match which gives us an accurate top dead center it might take a try or two if you're dumb like me and move the pointer the wrong way the first time at this point we'll have a lifter and an indicator installed on the intake lobe of the cam so right there we're 50 000 intake open at 2 after top dead center and the spec on the cam is 50 000's timing intake opening at -2 before top dead center so we're on the money there so there's 50 thousands on the way closed should be 39 after bottom dead pretty pretty close well we had a piston installed for checking i decided to go ahead and double check our piston of valve clearance even though i have a pretty mild cam but it's better to check than wish you had if you follow our short-form content on shorts reels or tok you probably already saw this video in depth long story short we had plenty of clearance moving forward with getting the rest of the rotating assembly installed we went ahead and checked our ring end gap out of the box the hastings rings i'm using had 20 000 end gap on the top ring and 19 000 gap on the second ring which is acceptable based on the recommendations from the piston manufacturer for our desired application of this engine knowing that our rings were ready to go it was time to go ahead and get the pistons mounted to the connecting rods the forged icon pistons that i'm using in this build are a full floating design and as such use circlips to retain the wrist pin and keep the assembly together we start by working one of the clips into place following the recommended orientation from the manufacturer it's always necessary to lubricate the moving components like this so as we're building the assembly i like to use a bit of assembly lubricant in the bores of the piston as well as on the rod once the wrist pin is in place it's as simple as installing the circlip on the opposite side of the pin and double checking that they're both fully seated ending with a bit of oil worked into the moving parts installing the rings is a pretty simple process when you get the hang of it starting with the lower oil control ring and then installing the second and first compression rings being sure not to spiral on this compression rings and risk damage the orientation of the ring end gap seems to be a controversial topic among the industry but i simply follow the recommendation of the orientation from hastings as my rule of thumb is to trust the people who engineered the parts that i'm using when you have a ring compressor that works well and the top of the cylinders has been properly chamfered installing the pistons is really a breeze generally we run a thick bead of assembly lubricant around the cylinder wall before installing the piston and then tap the piston into place carefully to avoid breaking any rings i typically install both piston assemblies for one rod journal of the crankshaft before rolling the engine over on the stand and pushing the pistons down the cylinder until the connecting rod seats against the crankshaft i should also note that the rod bearing has been lubricated with assembly lube prior to the installation as well as always a note on that not so common common sense is to keep an eye on everything and avoid dinging the crankshaft or damaging the bearing as you're pushing it into place these are the stock gen 4 cracked cap connecting rods original to this engine but as you may remember we did go with a set of arp rod bolts after lubing the crankshaft the caps are installed being sure to correctly align them and seat them before tightening them down completely previously we've determined a torque spec that gives us the five and a half thousandths to six thousandths bolt stretch recommended by arp and at this point we'll go through and double check that all of the bolts are torqued to that spec and our rotating assembly is fully installed everything seems to be rotating nicely and we do have connecting rod side place so we're good to move forward at this point we're installing the oil pump since i've done away with the afm and vvt systems i simply went with a melling standard volume standard pressure oil pump following melling's recommendation to align the pump we bring the mounting bolts up just snug and rotate the crankshaft at least one full revolution before torquing down the bolts with the arp main studs i did have to grind a couple of larger holes in the windage tray before installation but it was only a minor modification and a quick and easy install saying goodbye to our view of the crankshaft once and for all at this point we headed back to the top side of the engine to get some of our valve train installed starting with lubricating the lifter guide trays and installing our new ls7 valve lifters on all eight cylinders doing away with those pesky afm lifters that causes failure in the first place before installing the heads it's important to remember to tighten up the bolts on those guide trays for our head gaskets we're using the oem style multi-layer steel head gaskets paying attention to install them in the correct orientation with the front label towards the front of the engine we will set our freshly built heads in place on top of the engine and install the arp head bolts that we ordered being sure to follow the recommended torque procedure and pattern from arp as well as using the provided ultra torque fastener lubricant as a quick reminder you can find thousands of parts like the ones in this video for sale on our website www.jamzyonline.com with the heads bolted on the engine is really starting to look closer to being ready to go back in my pickup but first we need to finish up installing the valve train to test out one of the products we saw on our website i decided to go with the yellow terra ultra light rocker system which are an aluminum body roller tip shaft and pedestal rocker arm setup with cylinder one on the base circle of the camshaft for both intake and exhaust we install our push rods and slowly tighten the intake and exhaust rocker arms down evenly until we achieve what is effectively zero lash at this point we tighten down the rocker arm bolts evenly in quarter turn increments taking note of the number of turns required until the bolt is completely tight against the pedestal as per the instructions each quarter turn of the bolt seems to equate to roughly 10 to 12 thousandths lift or preload in addition the instructions indicate you may need to use a shim under each pedestal as i am here with the number of quarter turns counted our intake side will have around 25 to 30 thousands preload which may be a tad light but the exhaust is right where i want it at around 35 thousandths to 40 000 preload knowing that we're happy with our preload and our geometry looks good it's time to go through and do the final assembly of the valve train each end of the push rod gets a dab of assembly lubricant as well as the tip of the valve stem and in addition the roller components of the rocker arm receive a bit of oil to ensure they have lubrication upon initial startup again given that the intake and exhaust rocker arms are mounted to the same shaft it's important to tighten their bolts down evenly before the final torque while the instructions say you only need to check the preload on one cylinder it's a habit to roll through the firing order and check each setup with the lifters on the base circle of the cam for that cylinder just for peace of mind finally we're ready to cover some of this stuff up but these rocker arms do require a bit more space so we have an extra thick valve cover gasket and nuts on the valve cover bolts which act as a spacer to keep the valve cover from interfering with any of the rocker arms throughout their travel now we're going to give the valve train hopefully one last look for a long long time and get it covered up so that we can move on to wrapping up the final touches of the engine the rear cover is reused but our new rear crank seal will be installed which is done by simply pressing the seal carefully into the cover using a bit of lacquer thinner as a lubricant to make it go smoothly the rear cover is carefully installed to avoid damaging the seal and the bolts are brought up just snug similarly the new timing cover which replaces my vvt timing cover is installed and again brought up snug not tight yet using a harmonic damper install tool the damper is carefully installed onto the snout of the crankshaft using the old crankshaft bolt which i should note is torque to yield and should not be reused we torque the bolt to ensure that the damper is fully seated at that point we remove the bolt and install a new arp crankshaft bolt and torque it to the proper specification the damper being installed helps align the timing cover at which point you can final torque the bolts as long as you're sure to keep the bottom face aligned with the pan rails of the block as goes for the rear cover as well all four corners where the block meets the cover should get a light bead of silicone sealer to prevent any leaks before our oil pan gasket is installed by the way i also installed the oil pickup tube somewhere along the way with the proper new o-ring and i also replaced the oil relief valve in the pan with a plug since i have eliminated the vvt and afm with the pan in place the bolts can be evenly snugged up and this engine build is nearing completion and ready for installation my pickup was waiting over in the other shop so with the ports taped off to prevent any unwanted debris we loaded it into the back of my dad's pickup and brought it out to the new shop at this point we hooked on to it with the loader and it was time to drop the engine in this time we wised up and took the hood off to give us a bit more room and my mom offered to help guide it into place unfortunately we were almost up to the transmission when we realized our low leveler would interfere with the firewall so we had to come back out and hook on with a single chain now i'm not gonna lie this was pretty late one evening and we were all pretty tired and cranky so as soon as we had it up to the transmission with a bolt in on either side we called it a knife fast forward a couple days later i figured i was making good progress and it would be a good time to prime the engine with oil on amazon i found a plug that adapts to a 1 8 pipe thread perfect to run a fitting for our pressurized engine oiler basically we take the weight of the container empty and put a few quarts of our driven breaking oil in and pressurize the cylinder once we open the valve the pressure pushes the oil through the engine as my dad rotates the crank and i continuously weigh the canister because we want to avoid running out of oil and blowing a ton of air into the system again sure enough oil was making it to the top so we topped it off full and put in a 1 8 pipe plug all right i got the engine all installed i didn't film a lot of that because i'm not a mechanic and i honestly didn't know what i was doing so it was enough of a project for me to get this in without recording it i've done a little bit of the tune on here so i went in and disabled the variable valve timing and disabled the dod afm whatever you want to call it so it should be good for the first start i don't know that's a little bit out of my wheelhouse honestly but we're gonna give it a go ready ah and she runs at this point i'm working on learning myself to tune so i can get my emissions test and get back to some further upgrades on this truck talk about satisfying thank you for watching everyone be sure to like and subscribe and we'll see you in the next one you

Channel: Jim's Automotive Machine Shop, Inc.

Views: 601,817

Keywords: skull bliss review, skull bliss unboxing, carved skull, skullbliss, skull decor, LS v8 Engine, Engine Build, LC9 Engine, Yella Terra, Cloyes, Fel Pro, Icon, ARP Bolts, Icon Forged Pistons, Engines, Engine Machine Shop, Machine Shop, Engine Shop, Machining, Automotive Machine Shop, Automotive, Gas, Performance, rebuild, high performance, jim’s, jim's automotive, jamsi, jamsi online, Blueprinting, rebuilding, engine building, engine block, engine rebuilding, jim's automotive machine shop

Id: hGuLr1U0rb4

Length: 14min 28sec (868 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 14 2022