I'm doing head gaskets and am contemplating at least getting the intake ported by AI or Lloyd Elliot, but I wanted to get your opinions on whether or not it would be worthwhile based on my mods. I don't plan to go beyond a 54MM TB so the intake porting would mostly be for enlarging the inlet areas and runners. As for the heads, they were lightly ported (not even flowbenched) and my engine builders said they are similar to lt4 heads, the intake was untouched I'm pretty sure.

I was planning on doing 1.6 rr but it seems they are more expensive than I thought, unless I am mistaken, can I just get the rockers, springs and studs, and reuse the caps and stuff, or do I have to get the whole spring kit and get new pushrods (I'm told that 94's are already hardened). I thought it was only a little over $350 in parts, depending on the type of rocker but it's looking like much more than that.

So what do you think, worth it or not?

 

If you're talking about the intake manifold leave it stock. There's no gains to be had at your power levels.

 

Leave the intake stock; polishing it with ever finer grit emorycloth and aluminum polish will make it look better, but it is very good & efficient stock.
The heads are another matter; if it looks equal to an LT4 head then you can polish up the bowl and the exhaust side from end to end and seek a mirror finish. The intake side profits from turbulance and the exhaust side needs a smooth exit. Very slightly larger valves help. If you exceed the LT4 size the machine shop will have to put in larger valve seats. The LT-4 Hot cam is cheap on these boards and on ebay. It comes with the 1.6 rockers, cam, HD springs,etc. You the will need a HD timing chain and Ti retainers. All this can be done economicly and get a sweet lope and 30 HP or so. GM has made this unit reliable and fun.

 

After looking at your sig. I'm confused. Do you already have a small cam in the motor?

 

yep, pretty small cam. 214/220, 0.452 int./0.465 exh. lift with 1.5 rockers. I've decided to not really do any porting and just focus on getting the head gaskets fixed and do a budget rocker swap with a roller tip rather than full roller as I won't be spinning very high rpms. Sure I'd like to do a cam, probably bigger than the hotcam as long as it's smoggable, but I'm not sure that I could do that mysellf and even so, I'd have to wait even longer without my own car and save up more. I'm using my dad's truck off and on and getting rides to work for the time being.

I don't make very much money and am still paying off the rebuild and bs hospital bills that insurance didn't cover. As much as I'd LOVE to do a camswap, it all adds up and I'm not sure I can afford it. It's my big mistake not knowing anything and getting a bigger cam during the rebuild. I asked for one that didn't require tuning because back then I thought tuning was more expensive than it is.

btw, do I have to do anything special to my head gaskets because the heads were ported?

My build sheet here says:

Deck Height: 0.025

Head Gasket Thickness: 0.05

 

What happened that you need head gaskets? How many miles since the rebuild? No matter what you have the heads milled, to be sure that their flat and seal properly with the new gaskets.
If your tight on money just fix the problem at hand and worry about further mods down the road.
The deck height your refering to is how far the piston is down in the cylinder from the top of the block when the piston is all the way up. It sounds like your at where it came from from the factory. I would think it would be less than that if it was rebuilt. Usually the shop would mill the deck to make sure that it has a straight and true surface for the same reason as the heads.

 

I say port both

 

lots of white smoke, slight power loss, coolant loss which I assume would have gotten worse. I took it to a shop down the street to get it tested for compression/leakdown and they found hydrocarbons in the block. I never overheated or anything so I don't know what happened. Although I will say that my temp gauge has been malfunctioning and will be replaced. I didn't really see signs of it until I started unbolting things. If I looked at the dipsticks, it wouldn't look milky, but now that I've unbolted the intake manifold, I see signs of oil and coolant mixture, as well as various spots around the car, such as near the oil filter there is some blowby and it is milky.

Speaking of, when I was taking the manifold off, over half of the bolts on each side were able to be taken off with my fingers. What could this mean? Don't know if it's related or not, but I had a problem that never went away or couldn't be found where the car would miss/stumble, then backfire from the front of the engine....maybe from the intake?

I took it down the street because my engine builders have been getting on my nerves lately with overcharging and recently I had to take it in for a low res pulse circuit failure which turned out to be some coil wires needing replaced, but they didn't even notice the white smoke or the running crappy. In fact when they told me it was ready to be picked up they said they took it for a test drive to see if the problem would re-occur and it "ran great!" . I'm not so sure about those guys, I think I'll get the heads pressure tested somewhere else.

 

forgot to answer the mileage on new engine: Engine was rebuilt exactly 12,324 miles ago

 

hey Marc

You should look into the Comp Magnum 1.6s. They are easy to install and I did it with the stock springs with no probs at all (as well as lots of room left until coil bind). The important points of these rockers is theyre SA and dont require hardened rods or guide plates, they don't have to be adjusted every couple hundred miles like some, are completely quiet so the LT4 knock module isn't required, and on top of all that they can be had brand new for under $200... ebay probly cheapest prices... So look into 'em and good luck.\

--Nick

 

That could definately cause an intake leak and the miss/stumble/backfire.

 

I actually just bought some PRW 1.6 roller tips, which are just like the comp magnums, only a little cheaper. I am using some lt4 springs though, everything else stock.

I got both heads off btw, no visible problem with gaskets or heads, looking for a place to take them tomorrow. I hope they are just warped.

 

I would ahve the heads presure tested and check for a small crack between the very center nead bolt hole and the water jacket that is right next to it (1/2" away). If there is a crack, it can be ground away and welded up to be good as new but if there is a crack there, it will continue to get hot and get worse, even with new gaskets.

If they pressure test OK, get them milled and you should be fine.

Lloyd