Total seal rings. They pretty much all look like this. A line of wear thru the middle of the top ring, and a thin line on the 2nd ring.

1 piece stainless top ring.



Napier 2nd ring




Bores have a dull appearance, but hone marks are quite visible. The left bank cylinders ( 1357 ) have some light piston marks on the bore. No scores as such.
Ive only cleaned one piston, No2 which had the lowest CR. It looks fine, as does its bore.. Although the pistons crowns and top ring land are covered in dirt ( All pistons ). Just carbon crap. I think this is also what was in the inlet tract....not quite sure how it makes its way back up there though.

 

Hone it and use regular moly rings

While you have yours apart, someone mentioned n the head gasket thread about the dowel holes in the 5 layer 6.0/6.2 gasket being larger than the old 6.0 MLS. See if you can look at that.

The stuff in your intake is most likely carbon from reversion, happens with bigger cams..

 

like he needs it but i agree with KP on the reversion. When i broke some ringlands, pieces ended up BACK in the intake. KP is also correct on the moly rings....no need to spend money on anything else for a street/track car.

 

I didnt measure the dowel holes. But when removing ( those gaskets were stuck ! ) they did feel tight around the dowel holes in my LS6 block.

I'll measure them tomorrow on the 6.0 and 6.2 gaskets.

Moly rings sounds like a plan. These stainless ones dont like me !!!


I was also shocked to find that one of the 2nd rings also managed to flip itself over and was in the wrong way up when I removed it oops lol
Compression was good on that cylinder lol

 

Could be a couple of things.
1- the Cam looks small to pull cleanly to 7000rpm on a 383ci. I use that Cam in 402's to peak at 6000rpm then they fall off quick.
2- too much timing could cause the rings to flutter,At 19psi I would think 14-16 degree's of timing.
3- by adding meth/water it misfired tells me the plugs were shot or the coils/wires aren't strong enough.-which could also cause that power drop,could be loosing firing on 1 cylinder which will screw with the boost gauge..

 

You wont be the first guy to put a second ring on upside down, sometimes the markings could get pretty cryptic on rings and I may have known someone who put a set of 2nd rings on upside down - on a 1500hp 632 lol. Still ran OK for a season but was a bit of a smoker.

You know the old saying, only way not to screw things up once in a while is not do anything at all

 

What cam would I need to pull hard to 7000 ( say peak at 6800 or so. Basically, 7000rpm will be 150mph in 4th, so I want to be able to pull more than 7000 if need be, but only for 4th gear. )

And more importantly, can I achieve it, and still have a decent idle. Im quite happy with how the EPP cam idles...but wouldnt want to push things further in that respect. I will suffer the top end to retain idle.

Plugs had only 250 miles easy driving before hitting the dyno. They only missfired when the water/meth was on. I'll be going back to 100% meth when I get it together again.
I'll look into better coils too though. It might make sense to switch to LS coils again...as i think I can get my ecu to fire them easily now. Although I think Bosch do make a much better version of the coils I am using too which would be a direct swap.

Leads are Moroso spiral wound 8mm DIY jobbies.


Thanks for all the input so far.

 

Given the Napier 2nd has the L section on the outer face of the ring. It really does make me an idiot for doing it lol.

 

I would check plugs/wires first. But your problem on the meth sounds like the problems I had a few times with MSD coils. Couldn't burn the fuel at higher loads.

 

Slow update on this....( if anyone is interested lol )


Ive had it running again for 2-3 weeks now, although havent got too many miles on it.
Still 383, EPP cam etc.

After it breathing so heavily, I stripped and fitted with new Totalseal gapless top Moly ring, conventional 2nd ring. I used a Ball Flex hone used to give the rings something to bed into..So far it feels good. I do have quite a few breathers, but it doesnt appear to put any oil or mist out at all now.

I shimmed the intake springs by 45thou, taking them to about 160lbs. I also fitted a set of LS1 coils, checked, and re-checked lifter pre-load until I was happy with it. Ive ended up with 50thou shorter PR's this time, leaving me with only 25-30thou pre-load. Runs quiet though, so Im not concerned about that.

I also got rid of my 2 Greddy BOV's in favour of a single Mondo. New fuel setup is basically 16 x 60lb injectors, staged, on an Edelbrock intkae and one or Aarons elbows, same as before. 85mm TB.

I also added a strut brace between blower, and crank. So hopefully I can tighten the belt plenty, without fear of wrecking the blower bearings again.


After a little driving, Ive managed a few short blasts on the road to try and setup the fuelling.

Once happy, I tried to see how it would rev. Previously anything past about 6300rpm was a struggle.

Now.....a clean rev in 3rd gear, saw my shift light at 7100rpm with ease, and I logged a clean run of 4000rpm to 7300rpm as a max ( Also my initial rev limit ), making 22psi at 7000rpm..
AFR's low 11's for the most part, and EGT's in no 5 port seen a max of about 1450degF at the end of the blast.

Boost log is also almost totally linear with rpm. It NEVER did that before. There were always fluctuations, and a dip around 64/6500rpm.

So it revs far smoother, and easier than it has ever done, with any combo I have had. So things are finally looking good. Based on that 3rd gear log, I reckon it should have no problem matching or beating my best time...on pump fuel only.


I think switching to the LS coils has been a massive help, and also fitment of the Vortech Mondo BOV. The Greddy's ones I was using, must have been leaking at times.

I dont think any of the other changes Ive made in the last 2 months, would have made such a contribution to solving the problems.

Roll on June...Im heading to Denmark to meet up with some guys from Norway who have cars similar to mine, so that will be the first time I get to race this year. I just hope nothing breaks !
I'll also be trying some ET Streets this time around, and have a rear ARB fitted. So I should have a lot more traction than ever before.

If everything goes to plan, I dont see a sub 10 run being a problem at all if nothing breaks !!