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I'm not one to tell anyone what to do to their own car.
But what's the reasoning behind going shaft rockers? Especially ones from ProComp?
It doesn't seem you are building anything exotic. It seems you wouldn't have any of these problems, cost, etc if you went with a stock rocker.
Longevity...
I started with a gold set that were bigger than the biggest ones I've seen in my big block blower motors in my boat so summit returned them and upgraded me to these shaft rockers and it is the heads that are the problem not the rockers. These perimeter style heads just do not have any room for anything other than the stock rocker arms because the bolt bosses inside the outer walls of rhe head just take up way too much space leaving no room for any stronger types of rockers with roller tips and adjustable push rod cups etc.
also the engine issue/ the blocķ...... they told me it was the original 5.7l aluminum ls1 when I bought it and as It turns out it's not. It's some iron truck engine..... with the stock 1998 perimeter style ls1 heads.
I don't know anything about this 5.3l block someone shoved in this car and I am replacing damn near everything I can to make the car last a long time. I just never knew the stock 5.7 aluminum block was gone until i started cleaning water pump gasket surfaces and saw sparks then a magnet stuck to the block so i then got advice from members here how to determine what engine this is. It could have a billion miles on it for all i know so there is the reason. Since i am into both form and function I went ahead and bought all polished and chrome parts to add some jazz and bling while it was getting all redone..... I added a new cam /springs seals...rockers..pushrods..oil pump and girdle...and a slew of about 2000...2500 bucks worth of parts and accessories to refresh everything i could along with the intake with a 102mm and 4 inch MAF and had the frost tune done to get this engine to work properly with all these new items and removal of EGR and A. I.R. systems and some other tuning issues like only 2 oxygen sensors and skip shift disabled etc. And make the car more user friendly. I just hope the tuner got everything correct.
Wade...heads were delivered a few minutes ago...thank you again sir.... they look awesome... I'll get the dirt off no biggie.
Thanks
Jay
I purchased the high lift ASA HOT CAM with .600 lift on a 110LSA version from Texas Speed who custom grinds these exclusively for the WS6 Store. I purchased this cam when I thought it was going into a 5.7 liter aluminum block LS1.
if I know then what I know now I probably would have opted for an origional old style Tick polluter cam. The one (they still make) but it was their first version of the polluter V1 cam series on a 112 LSA. I have a manual and I do like to wind it out a bit so that's why I decided to not drop a few hundred bucks more and go to something different and if I get good performance out of it and high lift ASA cam has nothing but great reviews everywhere you go. I'll swap it into the next engine (6.0L......6.2L.....7.0L) for this car down the road or just get a new one.
I had already sent the computer off to be tuned with a copy of the cam card which also made making a cam change decision that late in the game even more challenging since frost tunes took from November 12th to December 7th to tune my computer and get it back to me and never once replied to a single email so i had no idea when id get my computer back or if id ever see it again!!! So communicating with him was a no go.
I asked a few people with the parts choices I made now going to a 5.3L block should I make cam choice change and since I like to wind it up a bit they all said "since I'm not seeking every tenth of a HP and it's a high winding fun street car that id be fine but for more power and all they would just dump the 5.3 and source a 6....6.2...7L and start with that and not bother with the 5.3"
Each time i turned around, something else came up and plans and parts kept changing and plan kept changing. At this point I'll just run it till it blows and source a new engine at some point next year or two years and slowly build up until I'm ready to drop it in or when my current clutch starts to fail then it will be time to swap it all at one shot.
"If I knew then what i know now......i would have done it all complety different."
Had to use Wade's valves since mine were God awful and would NOT clean up no matter what I soaked them in or the wire wheel would not remove the rust and carbon crud so I'm sooo happy Wade sent me the valves as well as the heads. Thank you again sir... going to pickup heads now they are ready to go.
Your valves looked horrid at first but wire wheel make them sparkle almost like new. Few micro small digs and nicks from carbon build up but I hope lapping compound will file those small imperfections out against the seats and they will end up looking even better than they do now. I hope anyway. More photos to come after I grab the heads.
Thank you... im thankful you sent the valves with the heads because mine are so shot so rusted and pitted if i took them to be ground down they would probably sink into the head 1/4 inch further and lose their strength and mushroom out and eventually fail. So THANK YOU for not taking these heads apart and including all items.
Well I have finished cleaning the cylinder chambers on 1 head and marked it with a sharpie so I can go grab a lapping tool and clovers lapping compound tomorrow (clovers is what I was told to use but I don't think it will make a life changing difference if I use permatex compound) and I'll get the valve lapping done and get the heads rebuilt and thank God I have a few valve spring compressors that work like vice grips on the heads and I'll be able to install all 16 springs in probably 15 minutes or so and not have to mess with clothes line rope and the bolt down spring compressor tool thank God. So yeah these heads should be all wrapped up and done and ready to bolt down tomorrow. I know the drivers side header is going to give me nightmare issues but I'll work around it and get these heads torqued down and start getting everything back together vs tearing it apart more and more and more.
Here are some shots of the freshly machined heads.
They came out great. I do need to finish cleaning the one so don't judge the chambers and exhaust ports on that one.
Pic of engine. Decks of block cleaned up really well too. So it hopefully will not throw me any more curve *****
And I can get it all back together and check all fluids and fired up by this weekend fingers 🤞 crossed.
we will see...
Thanks again your help has saved this car and project without question.
Jay, you really did an excellent job cleaning up those dirty valves from the 853 heads. Nicely done.
Hopefully everything keeps moving along well!
Well... these rocker arms don't fit in the #853 heads either... so I am going scorpion and if they don't work it's a new set of stock rocker arms and bolts and i am done with this. Got the heads installed and had to fight that drivers side header but finally got the bolts torqued down... one thing though maybe someone has an idea of why dont they use torque numbers instead of 22 ft lbs then 90° then another 90° and 50° for the 2 short bolts on the outer edges? Why not just say start at 22 ft lbs then to 55 or whatever then to 90 or whatever that final 90° ends up being? Or are all torque to yield bolts installed and configured in this manner???
I realize it is about the stretch of the bolt as to how it works and clamps and functions but why not just put down 3 passes torqued to 22 1st pass xx 2nd pass xx 3rd pass? Would that not be easier? More accurate? I guess i should get a torque to yield degree tool if this comes up again and it will im sure when i bump to a 6.0 or 6.2 or 7.0 liter down the road. Just wondered what you all thought about this procedure?
thanks again for the heads Wade they came out awesome and installed perfectly and cleaned up like brand new and valves all lapped in beautifully and polished up brilliantly on the valves seating surfaces after lapping with the compound then I used the Zep orange pumice hand cleaner to do a final lapping of the valves which ended up polishing the mating surfaces better than the lapping compound did alone (lapping compound left the surfaces heavily scratched and gray in appearance) and it looks like they all went to the machine shop and got cut and polished there.
again thank you for including the valves and all because I'm shocked my stock original heads and valves made any compression at all in what horrible shape they were...are in and would NOT clean up like the valves you sent in these heads. If I had to use my #806 head valves they would have to be machined because they are screwed and just won't even lap off the gritty crud and excessive deep pitting around their sealing surfaces. So thank you very much sir. You saved me more $at machine shop or purchasing new valves completely... my 1st xmas present for this year
merry Xmas to all...
Jay.
I'll snap a few photos of the scorpions when they arrive and I get them installed but here are some of the pro comps installed both with and without shims under the rocker stands ... with the shims under the stands the new pushrod length would need to be about 7 and 3/32nds and with no shims it came to roughly 6 and 27/32nds give or take a bit but still was way too close to the edges of the heads and I just want to do a bolt in and go....plug n play so to speak and in the marine community the scorpions which I believe is a Ft. Lauderdale company has a phenomenal reputation on tall and short deck big block Chevy... Dart... Mercruiser and Mercury Racing engines so I hope their measurements and geometry are just bolt down and use the stock 7.400 length pushrods I got from ws6store.com and I hope to be done!!!!!!! Even with 2 shims under each stand bolt these were touching the edges in some spots and too close if they heated up would expand and touch the head and grind themselves and the head to clearance themselves and spew metal shavings thru entire engine So i tried 2 types of the pro comps and returned them both...wrote reviews on summit racing pages with photos so others can decide for themselves if they want to grind the heads for clearance or buy a different brand. Scorpions here i come.
ohhh and about 2/3rds of the stand 12 point bolts were 15mm and the other ones were 9/16ths. Not a huge deal but just weird needing 2 different 12 point sockets to get the stands torqued down correctly.
Last edited by 41ApacheWarParty; 12-23-2022 at 09:31 AM.
Jay, very happy the 853's help get the project going in the right direction. It's good knowing they'll see use on a car instead of just sit on the shelf another 20 years!. Glad the valve cleaned up nice.
Wish you the best wrapping with the Scorpion's and a Merry Christmas 🎅 🎄 too!
one thing though maybe someone has an idea of why dont they use torque numbers instead of 22 ft lbs then 90° then another 90° and 50° for the 2 short bolts on the outer edges? Why not just say start at 22 ft lbs then to 55 or whatever then to 90 or whatever that final 90° ends up being?
Same reason every engine in existence (almost) has you torque them in three steps.
Because you can't tighten them all simultaneously.
Same reason every engine in existence (almost) has you torque them in three steps.
Because you can't tighten them all simultaneously.
I think I may have buggered up my point... I don't have an issue with torquing in 3 steps... that's always standard practice.....
I was wondering why GM goes from the 1st step of 22 foot pounds to 90° then 3rd step another 90° instead of just saying torque to 22 on 1st pass then?? On 2nd pass and ?? Ft lbs on 3rd pass... or let's put it this way.....
why do pass 1 at 22 ft lbs then pass 2 at 90° then pass 3 at an additional 90° not just say 22 ft lbs on 1st pass then like pass 2 increase to 65 ft lbs and lets say for sake of argument go to125 foot pounds on 3rd pass?
(Foot pound numbers are just a guess in the question above. PLEASE no one use those numbers instead they are totally arbitrary and just an example for making a point and asking a question) this was just a curiosity question, not anything of any major importance.
Torqueing by angle eliminates variables in friction within the threads, under the bolt head, and also from valve spring pressure. You get a more consistent bolt stretch doing it that way. At least, that's my understanding.
I think I may have buggered up my point... I don't have an issue with torquing in 3 steps... that's always standard practice.....
I was wondering why GM goes from the 1st step of 22 foot pounds to 90° then 3rd step another 90° instead of just saying torque to 22 on 1st pass then?? On 2nd pass and ?? Ft lbs on 3rd pass... or let's put it this way.....
why do pass 1 at 22 ft lbs then pass 2 at 90° then pass 3 at an additional 90° not just say 22 ft lbs on 1st pass then like pass 2 increase to 65 ft lbs and lets say for sake of argument go to125 foot pounds on 3rd pass?
(Foot pound numbers are just a guess in the question above. PLEASE no one use those numbers instead they are totally arbitrary and just an example for making a point and asking a question) this was just a curiosity question, not anything of any major importance.
Merry Xmas Wade sir. 🎄
There are a lot of things that don't make sense.
My question is why didn't you mock up the rocker arms when the heads were off and dirty? At that time you 'should' have seen the interference between the head and rocker and could have clearanced it all with a carbide burr on a die grinder and cleaned it up in one shot, put it together and now you'd be trying to figure out why the pushrods don't work right. (because thats whats coming next).
Stop overthinking the easy things and start looking at the next step before you get there. What you're doing doesn't take months.
I'm trying to help you save time and money, think ahead. Read advice and if you disagree with it you don't have to tell someone you they're being a meanie
And if I ever say anything that helps I don't need a thank you, thats not what I'm after. I want to see this guy on the internet have success, I don't enjoy watching someone run into one problem after the next.
If you get a slightly thinner Cometic MLS gasket you can gain a bit of compression
I purchased the Fel-Pro perma torque 26191 MLS head gaskets for this and while I have not got.to a point where I can start it up yet I've used all Fel-Pro gaskets on every project I've ever done and to date have never had a single failure so I can't see why these would fail.
I was told that the scorpions would be here today or tomorrow and I looked at the tracking information provided and they are now back ordered to a ship date of valentine's day so I had to switch to Pro Form shaft mount pedestal style roller rocker arms. The site RPM SPEED.Com had the scorpions SCP1098 for $399.99 so summit hemmed and hawed about price matching it since they have thrm at $574.00 so perhaps that's why I got the "back order" notice ..... maybe??? I hope these Pro Forms fit and give me no problems. I don't know anything about Pro Form roller rocker arms but I did have some of their other performance parts on my blown 80 corvett These look identical to the Harland sharps down to the angle cuts in the back and on the top front surfaces so either they are made by the same people and branded by Pro Form or they are an exact copy.
e, their adjustable timing distributor was super helpful and ran really well and I heard their LS valve swap tool is great also... so we shall see what happens. Should be here by end of this week.
So I'll try to get most of the car back together while I wait for these to come in.
We just will have to wait and see.
12-09-2022, 02:31 PM
