Franksantoro

So recently I did a Btr stage 1 cam in my 5.3l. I never pulled the heads. Just held lifters up with dowel rods.
the new cam went in and I lined up the sprockets dot to dot and tightened them . Check to see if it would turn over by hand and it did. So then I went and did the valve springs . Used air in each cylinder to hold my valves up. Got them all done and put my rocker arms and push rods in, engine then wouldn’t crank by hand. So then I removed push rods and rockers and it still will not crank by hand. It gets binded up. I took the timing cover back off and I don’t see any issue. When the dots are lined up it seems to be at TDC so I don’t understand what is getting caught up in the engine. I just removed the cam sprocket and the cam moves freely but it is the crankshaft that is binded up. Anyone have a clue?

JakeRobb

Are the spark plugs installed? Hopefully this is obvious, but I just want to make sure you’re not just fighting compression.