You may or may not have seen all my desparate posts looking for help. Here is the story in short
1) Assembled engine w/ 462 milled heads, had too many leaks due to the heads beign massively milled. With these heads, aside from the leaks, engine ran STRONG!!

2) Installed BRAND new Dart Pro-1 Aluminum heads. Started it up and she ran great for about 15 miles. No leaks.

3) Developed a noticeable miss and loss of power. Checked ALL I can think of, and that everyone has suggested. Below is a list of what I have tried

* Properly adjusted my aluminum roller rockers.

* Set base timing to 6-8*

* Checked for vacuum leaks

* Made sure wires were seated on plugs and cap.

* Compression test indicated 130's on the pass. side and 160's on the driver's side

* Leakdown test was good

So, I have tried everything. If I just rev it with no load, it seems fine. But under load it seems like a cylinder is missing, but the shop says all are hitting good.

They tried to tell me that it just needs to warm up, since they are aluminum heads, and I am not running a choke. I would believe that but, I know how my engine ran before it developed this problem. It was AWESOME! Then this crap happens.

Any advice is GREATLY appreciated!!!! Feel free to ask ?'s, I will most likely be able to answer them in order to help us come to a conclusion.

I am gonna have the g/f crank it over, while I have the valve covers off, so I can see that all the cam lobes are good. I'll get back later, it may rain, so that may take a while.

BamaZ28
joe

 

like in my other replys the compression isnt right
you have a head gasket problem I saw the pics of your rocker covers
there was a lot of coolant there i build engines for a living
you need to pressurize the cylinders 1 at a time with both valves
closed and see where that other 30lbs of compression are going
both banks sould be the same or it will run like it has a miss under load
at idle no load it will probably run fine its not a difficult thing to do but it is
nesesary to find your problem

 

Sorry, I was assuming that the compression on that side was down because I had over tightened the roller rockers, adn therefore not allowing the valve to seat 100%, I am gonna go get me a compression tester and see how it goes, please hang in there with me, I really appreciate the help!!!!!!!

 

If you had ovettightened the valves, you would have had the problem from the start. You didn't, so it's something that happened after the engine had enough run time to heat cycle/wear parts in. Besides, if it was misadjusted rockers, big coincidence they are all on one bank.

The mayonnaise and low #'s on one side is a sure sign the head gasket is leaking on the low side. Mayo might come from a leaking intake, crack, etc, but combined with the #'s, I vote head gasket. Popping might be from a worn out cam lobe, which can happen on a new install. Especially if there is water in the oil. Also look for trash in a carb passage, another common occurance on fresh installs.

 

I hooked up the exhuast and guess what................it won't start now!!!!! It is backfiring through the carb, which makes me think it is timing. I have this stupid, cheap light that is hard to see during the day, so I can't set it now. But, I tried moving the distributor as much as I could w/o removing it form the block and still nothing. Keep in mind, it ran fine yesterday with open headers...........this is getting WIERD!!!

BTW, thanks for all the help so far! Keep it coming!

 

Oh.......and the oil foam is gone Thank GOD!!!