I ran the renegade brand caps, had a good local machine shop do the work, never had a problem with them at ~875-900 crank hp.

 

Roughly what did it cost for the caps and to have them fit to the block?

 

Okay, here goes. What all the others guys meant to say:
"Only a moron would attempt to install a set of splayed caps himself (after being advised not to by people who know way more than said moron) if he lacks the experience and expensive tools and fixtures to do it right".

But dont listen to us, I am sure you have block mill or a gazillion dollar digital Bridgeport out back in the shed next to the 18V Dewalt cordless.

I mean seriously, who really needs a $500.00 dial indicator that reads to .0001" of an inch when you have red plasti-gage, or do you need the green, Im confused now. Aw **** it, just use them both and average it out for more accuracy. That $500.00 could by a bunch of cold beer and cheap Chinese knock off tools.

Also I would go ahead and just assume that the bottoms of the caps are perfectly flat, you could always throw em' on the belt sander for more piece of mind. Petty little details.

It is good to see that you are at least convinced that you will have to have a shop line-hone it. But just in case you have second thoughts, might want to avoid the dingleberry hone which would most likely not produce an acceptable finish.

Aw ****, I might be getting to water'y now.

I think you should goferit.

Sorry dude, you brought this one on yourself.

 

I think it's ironic when someone asks advice, gets it, and then wants to argue. It's not that they should accept it blindly, discussing it is fine. But in this case, it seems the IP has only a rudimentary knowledge of block machining (based on the original question). So maybe he should listen to the more experienced people posting. At the shop I am associated with, the owner has built hundreds of race engines. We have a mill, lathe, press, measuring tools, etc. We send out this sort of work to a guy who has machined many hundreds (probably thousands) of blocks and has high quality equipment. It isn't that expensive and it is something where the tolerances are in the 0.001" range. This requires experience and good equipment to achieve and verify. It is worth the ~$150 charge. The desire to DIY is admirable and the desire to build on a budget is something I respect. But sometimes you need to accept reality and pay the man.



Rich

 

Amen!

 

well i work at a machine shop ... am building an lt1 for myself... and installed a set of eagle splayed caps on it... and have done it on several others in the past... i definately would not reccomend trying it yourself ... unless you have a bridgeport mill with a digital read out, a rod/main cap cutter, and an align hone in your garage ..
btw we charge $400 to install the caps and line bore it afterwards

 

I think $400 is what I paid for the 3 ProGram caps and install, align bore/hone, and strap for the front cap.

 

Figure the center three Pro-gram caps are $225 plus $90 for the stud kit.

I had 5 or 6 quotes for this a couple of months ago in Detriot area and they were $400-$600 labor (plus parts).

-Scott.

 

Just to install main caps? That is way high, at least in this area.

Rich

 

Coming into this post, seeing you made the topic I had a rather large hunch you was going to try to do this yourself no matter what we said. Which is cool, if you do decide to do it yourself make sure to keep us updated

 

lol... come on guys I'm not stupid and arguing for the sake of arguing.
I was wondering how involved this modification is and the 'you can't do it yourself' answers weren't quite cuttin it, I wanted to know why.
If i could get it done for $150 I wouldn't even question it, or even for twice that. I heard from a friend it's about $600, yikes.

 

2 bolt mains for life!

 

$150 is about the average fair price.

 

Yes, that was to machine the block register flat, drill/fit the center three caps, align bore and align hone. I don't know if it was just machine shop cost in this area or if I picked five shops that happened to quote that way.

I'm glad I waited as it looks like the Dart block is on the horizon.

-Scott.

 

Just putting the caps on isn't all there is to it... If you have the parts already you can get that done by itself for $200 ... but then you have to pay to Line bore it ... the process involved is time consuming... thats why it costs what it does... Line boring usually runs about 175-225 ... and i've never talked to anyone that enjoys line boring blocks lol
personally i would not build an lt1 without putting splayed caps on it unless you plan on making less than 400hp at the crank... i've taken lt1s apart at the shop that had arp studs in them with the stock caps making around 400 horse and the caps were walking back and forth and had no register left... it is a very wise investment IMO