The water pump leak is bizarre. Installed the pump for the third time and as I filled the rad it dripped badly. I said screw it. Do it another day.

About a week later I come back to it and fill it up again to try and see once again where exactly it was coming from. It would NOT leak. The was no leak. i wasn't going to takle it all apart if it wasn't leaking.

Yesterday we filled the rad 2 - 3 times and the pump DIDN'T leak. Car ran for 10 mins with no problem.

However, we got the car up to operating temp and then it started to leak badly again. I'm pretty sure its a problem with the gasket on the pump to the block.

Yes the wires were crossed. Problem was the harness was wired incorrectly by CSI. They had black / blue on the pump but when you clicked in the harness together it was reversed. I didn't notice that at the time.

On the temp sensor issue, we had to re-plumb some of the coolant lines and we placed the temp sensor in this re-plumbed line. It appears that the sensor is not hitting water. It is reading super hot but the cars gauge is fine. In addition Rash says the car does not 'feel' excessively hot.

 

Translation = Time for another rebuild.

 

There is no question about the car getting excessively overheating. It didn't happen.

The FAST temp sensor was reading hot - up to 205 F - but the cars gauge never got to 100C and we tested that the gauge was working. As Rash pointed out that 190 is regular temp for running a car. I'm not worried about the rings at this point.
*crosses fingers*

 

Yeah but all this ideling around and checking stuff like cooling system etc.. you prolly took out the cross hatching on the cylinder walls which are sooooooooo important, the first 30 mins are the most important of the engine, the the first 5 are even more important then 10, get the drift? You have to load the engine and beat it around not idling and chase cooling system stuff.

Sorry, but stupid of Rash to experiment coolant sensor placement on a brand new engine, that is something that comes after break in and down the road.

 

Thank you all for you opinion.

But with great respect I'll defer to the opinion of the engine builder as to the implications. He was there from the start and he's not the least bit concerned about anything. Given his experience I'll take his opinion until there is a reason not too.

I asked him about the fact that the car was ideling and I had understood that it was suppose to be revved and load etc etc.

His exact phrase was "...not a problem with a roller cam. No need to "break" the engine in." Again, we was there from the start, the car did NOT overheat it just got hotter then it should have. The car was idling for a good 5 - 10 mins before the temps got to the 190 range. He was closely following the air fuel ratio and the car ran in the 13.5 - 14 range throughout.

Candidly, I have realized I'll should just keep my experiences to myself.

 

This had nothing to do with Rash. The new blower bracketery required relocating some plumbing. He was not involved in that.

 

With moly rings break-in of rings is no where near as sensitive as it used to be. They dont really require any break in like chromoly rings did. Add to that a roller cam and you dont really need any special break-in. For a high mileage (low horsepower, daily driver) engine I still like to do the traditional break-in procedures but a 15psi 383....... no point.
The CTS location was my idea. I am actually pretty suprised there was an issue as I looked closely at how I was mounting it. I had the end directly in the stream of moving coolant. Theoretically it doesn't get much better than that but obviously something didnt work. Small air lock around the upper part of the probe out of the moving coolant is my only guess.
BTW you can take apart an engine with 60,000+km on it and still have crosshatching on it. It takes a lot of miles to polish walls with soft moly rings.

 

well that last post by me was actually by matt from my house .. but I still don't see how having a "roller cam" could have anything to do with not needing to break in your engine

 

I wrote a whole book about how the coolant sensor/roller cam comment was so wrong its not even funny since you're breaking in the rings not the cam, I laughed hard, then a laughed some more.

Then I deleted everything since I see noone participating in this engine rebuild cares about what is said anyways.

So, my comment? No comment at all, let it be I said, let it be.

 

That is Rash's guess as well. It may NOT be a problem but it seemed to be reading hotter then Rash intuitively thought the car "was".

 

Payam, the roller cams dont need a break-in like flat tappet cams (30min of 2200rpm) because there is less friction. The whole point of keeping the rpms up with a flat tappet is because there is not enough oil getting onto the cam/lifters at idle to keep them from milling each other down. They are just splash lubed. With a roller lifter there is less friction, which means less oil is required and no real break-in is required. Just driving gets enough oil on the cam.
Since the cam doesnt need to be broken in that just leaves the rings and since they are nice, soft moly coated rings that pretty much break themselves in there is no need to load the engine like you have to with chromoly rings. Chromoly rings are so hard that you have to roll into the throttle to near redline in a higher gear several times to get them to seat. If you just let them idle they will polish off the crosshatch and never seat. The moly rings have a moly coating/mix. The moly sort of fills in the holes and makes a smooth, lower friction sealing surface. Then the moly slowly wears down and as it does it exposes the cylinderwalls a little at a time and the end result is a good sealing surface with no real break-in. Like using bondo to fill some scratches, as you sand it off it leaves the scratches filled in, and polishes the metal around it. Keep sanding and eventually you would end up with all metal but you would always have a smooth surface.

Matt, I think you had better write that book again. Making comments like that without backing them up doesnt make you look very good. If you dont feel like responding with some usefull data maybe you shouldnt respond at all in a technical post.

 

The explanation that Cory provided was almost verboten what Rash explained to me.

 

Actually, here is a simplification of the book:

Coolant temp sensor doesn't read air pockets, liquid only.

If you read, thats what I'm saying, the roller cam DOES NOT NEED BREAK IN, thats why I said start it up and start driving her hard to break in the rings since the roller cam doesn't need a break in, what part of that didn't you understand?

Moly rings not needing standard break in procedure? Sure go ahead, risk that while it is the best to drive her hard to break her in properly, thats what I'm saying, you're not reading.

It appears that although stated from the beginning, you people take what I said and repeat it like I said something different, I guess it true what they said about retards, never argue with a retard, they'll bring you down to their level and then beat you with a experience.

BTW, I do look good, just read my sig

 

Youre right, but when the end is in moving coolant it will pick up that temp and then the dry heat of the air will increase the temp of the sensor. This is why air pockets crack heads, higher localized temps. I am still not convinced as there was a real problem. The factory guage is not accurate and 100C is 212F so I am not concerned about 7F difference, but I wasnt there, and Rash was so I will go by his decision.
You never said anything about the cam in your previous posts. All you said is that somehow the soft moly rings have taken out the crosshatch of the cylinder by idling. The whole point of the crosshatch is to basically make it a file to wear the rings until they seat. With old chromo rings and a course crosshatch yes, you have to run the engine under load to seat them, just like I said before. But with these fancy moly rings and a fine crosshatch you do not need to. The rings will be just fine.
No, what I read was a story about soft moly rings removing the crosshatch from an iron block. Thats like saying a peice of aluminum is going to remove the teeth from a file. Not going to happen.
No, I repeat exactly what you said in your written posts. Its easy when you can copy&paste. Calling someone a retard does not gain you any respect or makes people think you are any smarter Matt. Anyone can call anyone else a name, but not everyone can back up what they say with knowledge and experience.
You are trying to say because you have a whole 420rwhp you look good? Dont forget you we are talking about a car that will make substantially more than that. You are also trying to hack on Rash who (although I have never heard a #) has at least 3x the power you have. Possibly 4x. So if looking good is directly involved with horsepower, compared to Rash (you know, the guy who has a 6second car and specializes in building engines) you look utterly, and absolutely foolish. Then again, that makes sense either way.

 

Cory, if you read my last posts no where do I say idle or rev to 2k, I say go and break in the engine by putting it under load, leaving out the cam. Reason being because its a roller cam so just concentrate on the rings.

Even if the rings are soft, you want to wear "them" in evenly, by not driving her around under load and decel to lube the rings, you'll end up with a bad wear pattern on the rings/bore, both will wear they are not alluminum soft.

Yeah air voids crack heads and if coolant is not flowing because of an air pocket it will heat up I'm not doubting that, but I'm doubting you previous statement where you implied it was reading air, or perhaps thats how I interpretted it.

The retard calling is a standard joke and nothing is meant by that.

However, after 4-5 engine rebuilds you guys keep doing the same thing over and over again.

Also, 420rwhp is the most anyone in Canada that I know of that was able to get out of a stock 350 LT1, thats called . Anyone can take a 396 but huge heads/blower and make power, thats not saying much.

400rwhp noone was able to get out of a 350 LT1 stock bottom end, LET alone STOCK LT1 heads ported and only flowing 267cfrm. I'm making 420RWHP and 373RWTQ on stock bottom end LT1, stock LT1 heads ported and can drive around in 6th gear at 1400rpm no problem.

You're right on the fact that soft Moly rings dont' need the standard break in procedure, I'm not saying you're wrong but with soft moly rings, with engine build set up for rings like this, in the end, the scratches this fine in the bore, there's little or no 'controlled abrasion' in a cylinder set up for soft moly rings because they don't really need it, there's little or no break-in required.

But using common sense, I'd rather break them in properly and why not? Why I say? Because the last time it didn't work so this time do it this way is that not right?

Not breaking those rings in is like saying, yeah my head ported assembled all the heads to spec, he's "EXPERIENCED" MY A$$, take them apart and go over them yourself, measure everything yourself, set them up yourself for your setup, so why risk it?

In your case, the last 3 times the rings didn't seat, so go over what you did to cause this and learn from it and do it differently, the last 3 times you relied on the fact the rings don't require much of a break in and you had blow by each time, this time why not do it totally differently by doing the standard break in procedure? Thats how people learn and change things to work to your benifit.

Anywho, I don't want to start a war when the grass is greener up here