I just came from my garage and am pretty disappointed so if I miss any details just ask.

We finished up my H/C swap tonight and put everything back together and after a few times cranking it over (flicking the ignition), it sounds stuck. I decide to try and start it, it cranks over and sounds like crap and then BANG!, it shuts off.

We try and crank it by hand and it is *VERY* hard to turn over. We marked the pulley with white out and could only get it to turn 1/2 way, in either direction, before encountering resistence and being unable to turn it further. Also, when cranking it Counter clockwise we hear a THUD, metal hitting metal sound ... we turned it back and forth multiple times, and at the same spot we would hear the same sound.

We immediately think it could be:
- improperly milled heads (they were milled .015)
- improperly installed cam (installed correctly, dot-to-dot, as per LS1howto.com)
- problem with the springs
- dropped valve


We started to diagnose it by loosening the rockers, one cylinder at a time, and trying to turn it over. (loosen, try and turn over, repeat). Problem was still there. Valves looked fine. Springs looked fine.

Took the spark plugs out and they looked fine as well. They were covered in gas, but that was from flicking the ignition previously. We try and crank it over without plugs and with the rockers loose and after a few turns WATER starts spilling from cylinder 1 (first cylinder on the drivers side). It is very easy to turn over now. I turn it several more times and lots more fluid comes out. The cylinder was filled with water (we had filled the coolant reservoir with water to do a coolant flush).

What could cause this!?
What Damage could there be to my motor?


We are thinking of these possible causes:
- O-rings
- cracked cylinder wall
- improperly installed or broken head gasket (we used Brand New GM MLS gaskets with ARP bolts)
- hole in the head


The heads were ported and polished by a local machine shop when the springs were getting installed. They may have gone too thin somewhere, maybe on the runners ... something we couldnt see with the springs/valves installed and when re-installing the heads.


We cant see why there would be an issue with my o-rings or cylinder walls, everything looked great when it was apart. Cant imagine what would be wrong with the head gaskets as they are brand new, and even if there was a hole in them it would too small to completely fil an entire cylinder.


Thoughts / Ideas / Help?


We are thinking of removing the cylinder heads and taking them to the machine shop where they were ported to have the springs and valves removed and heads examined.

Thanks,

 

the head gasket didn't deal for some reason. The only way to tell if there is any damage is to pull the head that had the coolant in the cylinders. You have to pull it anyway. Good luck

 

No way...

The amount of water pouring out of the spark plug hole is ridiculous. Imagine turning the crank literally 1/8th of a turn, no spark plugs in the spark plug holes, and water GUSHES out. I can understand at the *MOST* maybe a few drops coming out of the 1 cylinder, but pouring?

The heads were torqued down correctly, first at 30 all around, than 50, than a final pass at 70. I did it in the exact/correct order each pass. The block was ARP studded, and because of such you need to put the head gasket over the studs etc. before the head slides on, everything lined up A-OK from what I could tell.

 

I have heard that with the ARP bolts instead of studs with milled heads that the bolts bottom out before the heads are actually torqued to the right spec. I could be wrong but I have heard that.

 

yes but it had to of hydrolocked. That is why you couldn't turn the engine. I have heard of this before. What kind of gaskets did you use?

 

I should also note, their was no actual metal to metal contact anywhere.

All the Rocker arms were loosened off as so the pushrods would NOT hit and open up the Valves, and the motor still could not spin a full rotation. Obviously something is 'holding' it, but what? Well, to much cylinder pressure is what, the water in the cylinder wasnt allowing for anymore spin, because without touching anything else other than pulling the spark plugs out and having water pour out of the cylinder, the engine now spun freely.

The reason why I'm VERY confident its not a head gasket, is because after the motor could spin freely with the plugs out, I torqued down both the Rockers on cylinder #1 and as we manually cranked over the motor, AS the Intake valve was opening, water was GUSHING out of the spark plug hole.

Ive come to a personal conclusion that their must be a rupture behind the Intake valve into the Water-jacket of the head on the Intake port.

All that water in the cylinder wouldnt let us 'crank' anymore due to Hydro-locking is my guess...

Anyone else with comments, thought or ideas on this?

 

You would be wrong. The ARP stud kit comes with ARP moly assembly lubricant, Studs, Washers & Nuts. Every single ARP stud I put in myself and used the moly assembly lube on *every* thread of every stud. Once the head was slid over the ARP's, you could see their was threads flush with the head-bolt base-circle, ontop of each base-circle also sat a ARP washer, which took up even 'more' threads.

The ARP's are not the issue, all nuts definitely were torque'd down correctly without issue.

 

I agree. We're trying to rule-out/figure out 'why' or what other possibilities their are.

Gaskets were brand new Factory GM stamped/sealed/bagged/packaged MLS gaskets.

 

I actually had that problem. I had ARP studs and had a hairline gap and blew my gasket. It wasn't seated right. The guy at a shop told me that it wasn't the first time he heard about it.

 

That sucks...

If that was the case here, there should be more than just 1 cylinder leaking water/coolant.

And like I said, you could see threads the whole way down on the studs over the head bolt base.

 

We wont know until we pull the heads off i guess ... and even then, we still have to get them disassembled to inspect everything.

I am concerned about the engine. Could this have caused any more problems?

 

I doubt that it could have done much to the engine bc according to you guys the engine didnt run but for a split second so i doubt that much could have happened in that short length of time.

 

Sounds like a port job gone wrong

Hope you get it fixed

 

You would think the person doing the porting would notice he punched through and if so epoxy weld it closed.

And its JinxedZ's car, Im just one of his best friends who helped

 

Z28 MeTaL HeAd pretty much built my car ... we've done all the mods and work on it ourselves.




Im tempted to say F-it and call TSP .... 408.

 

What I would suspect is wrong stud install/ or water was left in the holes.
When you install studs you have to lightly turn them untill they bottom out and then back off 1/2 turn.
If that is not done then you crack the block when torking afterwards.

 

Im not sure I would trust that thought process on my motor.You may be right and there may be nothing wrong but you may also be terribly wrong. He said that the motor was running and it clunked before it died. Normally those clunks are rods bending when a engine has hydro locked itself.
Since there is a major possibility of a bent rod it would be a good idea to remove that piston and rod from the cylinder that had the fluid in it and inspect it.I would much rather take the time to do that then put the motor all back together and start it up and end up with a rod and piston through the side of my block

 

Sounds like the head porter punched through a water jacket in the head. Hopefully nothing else is messed up.

 

Ive never heard of the stud going through a block before, especially on these.

 

The motor never ran. We cranked it over a few times to prime the oil pump with a flick at the key, not a constant crank, a few very quick spurts, that is all, on the last crank the motor stopped turning and we heard a thuds (which was the cylinder number 1 cylinder filled with water.

After this happened, I hand cranked the motor counter-clockwise, away from the point where it stopped spinning. It went 1 full rotation backwards. After some more hand cranking I couldnt figure out what else to do, JinxedZ decided to go for another crank with the starter, where it went 'thud' again.

The motor NEVER actually fired over, it didnt even think about it.