I bought a 355 longblock with full accessories a while ago and I'm in the processing of taking it apart to change heads and cam. A few things that were wrong:

-loose intake bolts
-loose head bolts
-home depot bolt in place of timing cover bolt
-cam retaining bolts were so tight they broke my torx bits when trying to loosen them
-valve spring failure that did not result in a dropped valve


I am just worried that people that put this motor together treated the bottom end the same way, and was just wanting some opinions on whether I should just finish my head/cam swap or take the short block apart too and inspect it first.

 

Hmmm, it would really suck later to find out that they put the mains on wrong or something!! It's a trust thing, do you really trust that they put the rest together right? Think about it.

-Paul

 

If you're like me, you would tear it down. I hate when people cob things. If the top end is cobbed, the bottem end is probably the same way. Who knows if they even torqued things that should be torqued.

 

Take it apart!

 

Yeah, there isn't much left to go.

 

A couple days worth of grief is worth not hearing your engine scramble itself after a WOT run.

I speak from experience, pull that sucker apart.