SyntheticPro

You guys have probably seen my last thread of my cam install. Well I have now ran into the issue of the car smoking some mornings when first starting it up, but after a few light revs the smoke clears up. It also seems like it smokes at times when I'm pulling out from red lights and what not. This all leads to believe the valve seals were installed incorrectly. But I'm all most positive I installed them all right. I tap them all down with a deep well socket until they all seated. Will the seals seat in over time by chance? Also I've put probably around 500 miles on the car since the cam swap and it has used about a quart of oil since then.

99Bluz28

iTrader: (35)

Did you put thread sealant on the rocker bolts..?

Cwarta

iTrader: (12)

What size and point was the so socket? Did it fit snugly around the valve stem or around the seal outer housing

SyntheticPro

No I did not, I thought there wasn't any need to unless you had ported heads? I used deep 6 point 12mm socket if memory serves me right.

BennyB

iTrader: (12)

I went through this same thing and took me a few years to figure it out. I thought all along maybe I just had a couple valve seals that weren't seated properly, but in all reality ended up being oil sucked through the intake via the fresh air hose coming off the pass. side valve cover. I didn't think this was possible and was baffled bc I had a rev xtreme catch can in the pcv system to keep oil from getting in the intake. I assume you have a catch can or something in place rather than just the stock pcv setup? If not do it and if so then pull the fresh air/ vent tube and run a q-tip inside of it to see if you find oil.

Long story short that fresh air/ vent tube on the pass. valve cover is for fresh air when under vacuum like at idle, but at wot it becomes a vent to release crank case pressure and this is when it ingests the oil.

SyntheticPro

Ok I will try that. But the thing is that the engine barely used a quart of oil every 3000 miles before the cam swap. This has a believing that the valve seals are the only possible culprit. Or maybe the rocker bolts?

99Bluz28

iTrader: (35)

Take a look at all of your spark plugs, that should point you towards the leaking rocker bolts and/or valve seals.
FYI, if you're 100% sure none of your rocker bolt holes open up into the intake port runners, then just focus on the valve seals.

SyntheticPro

Alright I will do. I ordered some Fel-pro valve seals from Napa today, hopefully they will work good. I believe I realized where I went wrong with installing them; I didn't even put any oil on the seals when installing them. That's what I get for starting to get in a hurry nearing the end of the swap. Does anyone know where a good write up is with the GM procedure for installing them?

SyntheticPro

Went ahead and opened up the valve covers again today to find out that the valve seals were not longer even seated on the valve guides I'd imagine that was definitely the issue . So I went ahead and replaced the valve seals and installed a set of TR55 plugs. We will see if that will stop the oil consumption.

LilJayV10

iTrader: (39)

Did you change valve springs when you did your cam swap? If so what springs and did you check your install height?

SyntheticPro

Yes I replaced the springs with BTR double springs. I did not check install height, I don't know how to check it. Do I need to? If so how?

LilJayV10

iTrader: (39)

I had the same problem after my cam swap. The machine shop set up my heads wrong and I had valve float. The inner spring spins as it floats and pulls the seals off the head. I'm not saying that's it just something to check.

I'll post here in a bit about how to check it.

LilJayV10

iTrader: (39)

Install height is just that, its how tall the spring is when it's installed. Valve springs typically have a linear rate of pressure increase. Valve springs are measured by at X amount of lift the spring has Y amount of pressure.

For example a valve spring that is installed at 1.80 inches has 150lbs of closed pressure and 300lbs of open pressure at 1.20 (Cam has .600 lift)

That same spring that is installed at a height of 1.70 has 175lbs of closed pressure and 350lbs of open pressure.

Basically you are preloading the spring buy making it shorter to start with which means you start out at a higher pressure. You can go too far and make the install height to short. That will make your spring pressure too high which is hard on lifters and can cause coil bind.

The machine set my heads up wrong by setting the install height at 1.81 instead of the 1.72 they were suppose to be at. That's a .090 difference, that's a lot. I did not have enough open pressure(at max lift)to control the valve train. So when things start bouncing around the valve springs spin and act like a cork screw pulling the valve seals off.

IMO this is more common than people think because it seems few people check this and very few know about it.

Again I'm not saying this is your problem, I don't want you to pull you off in the wrong direction. But if all of your seals are off it might be something to check.

I hope at least some of this made sense. Here's a page showing what I'm talking about, hopefully seeing a picture will help you understand what I'm talking about.

SyntheticPro

Oh, dang I really wish I would have checked that while I was installing the new valve seals. Hopefully everything is good, but see the thing is that not all of the valve seals were off the valve guides just maybe 4 cylinders. I actually ended up not even replacing the valve seals on 2 cylinders because they didn't show any oil on the spark plugs. But the cars not used any oil or smoked that I've seen since I changed the seals so hopefully all is good! While this thread is still up I have a quick question; I'm taking my car and dropping it off for a dyno tune next week any suggestions on what I should check or do to the car before dropping her off? I already plan on putting in a new air and fuel filter as well as changing the oil with some 10W-30 Valvoline VR1 Conventional and a new longer style oil filter before I take it out there. Anything else?

99Bluz28

iTrader: (35)

Good to hear you fixed your oil consumption issue.

When's the last time check or changed the trans ATF fluid, and rear-end gear oil..?

SyntheticPro

Checked the rear end oil today it was full. I put in a new slave cylinder in about 6000 miles ago and changed the trans fluid then.

dr_whigham

iTrader: (49)

I made a simar mistake when I first swapped springs, but I caught it thankfully before I buttoned everything up-

I had the brown (exhaust valve seals) and black (intake valve seals) ALL mixed up. Had to take off almost half and swap them. I know this is t your issue, glad you got it sorted, but had to throw it in here in case someone else has a similar situation.

99Bluz28

iTrader: (35)

How the car drive now, after the dyno tune..?

SyntheticPro

I'm not sure yet, they just called awhile ago telling me that is was finished up. Due to work and what not it'll be monday before I can pick it up. They said it put down 370 RWHP. Does that sound about right? Kinda seemed low to me and they even said that. But maybe my expectations were too high. Yet again I am still running the stock intake manifold.

99Bluz28

iTrader: (35)

Yeah your LS1 intake manifold is holding you back. With a LS6 you'd net around another 10rwhp, and a FAST92/92 another 10rwhp on top of that.

No, 370 doesn't sound out of place, anyway the Dyno's just a tool to get the tune dialed-in for max performance, so I wouldn't dwell on the numbers.