|
|
|
|
Original Message
|
| RE: #4 and #8 smokes when the head fills up. |
| By Greg Westphall - 10/14/2003 7:54:53 AM; IP 12.158.13.35 |
I have a set of Edelbrock heads, an RPM Intake, and a 428CJ. The Edelbrock heads have a problem with their oil drainback holes. Check them out. You can fit your thumb down the stock drainback holes while you can barely fit your pinky down the Edelbrock ones. What is more important though is the mating surface between the cylinder head and the intake manifold. The drainback hole is positioned in such a way that the intakemanifold gasket and the intake manifolkd itself actually block a good portion of the drainback hole. Check it out for yourself. I contacted Edelbrock a few times and finally got through to them with this problem as well as a number of other problems I had. My heads arrived with a bunch of blasting shot still in some of the passages. I had to dissassemble them and throughly clean them. The disassembly and rfeassembly process apparently ruined the teflon seals.
Between the bad teflon seals and the oil pooling under the valve cover I had a real problem on my hands. Oil was getting sucked down the guides and carbon was building up on the stems inside the port, not to mention the amount of oil I was burning. The heads looked like they had 90,000 miles on them after only 5,000 miles. Every time I washed my car, I noticed the rear bumper was covered with a film of spent oil that had migrated from the exhaust pipes. I was not very happy. Edelbrock took the heads back and pressed in new guides because the upgraded seals (new style Edelbrock heads don't come with teflon seals) would not fit on the old guides. I also talked to them about the oil drainback problem. We resolved that the best solution was to trim the gasket slightly between the intake manifold and the cylinder head directly where the oil exits the head.
I reinstalled the heads with all of the changes and have driven the car another 5,000 miles since then. I am very happy to say that these changes took care of my problems. I burn very little oil now. I might add 1 quart between oil changes. I am running a Milodon Road Race oil pan with the baffles, a high volume pump ( although the stock pump actually was just fine, it is a long story why I switched it in the first place), and stock style adjustable rockers with a Crower mechanical cam. I am not running any restrictors to the shafts. I am running restrictors to the lifters though. I think this sends even more oil up top but it still hasn't been a problem.
I would suspect that I may have to restrict the oil up top if I experience valve seal wear. I will definitely restrict it if I switch to roller rockers. For now I am happy to leave it alone.
If I were you I would slam on a new set of teflon seals but make sure you use the protective sleeves that go over the stems so you don' ruin the seals. Also I would remove the intake manifold and perform the same modification to the intake manifold gasket that I spoke about ealier. I think you will be pleased with the results. |
 |
|
|
This thread, so far...
|
|
|
|
Post A Response
|
|
|
|
|
|