Thread: Roller Motor?

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hello all,I just signed in under new members. I have a couple questions for ya.I have a 91 RS camaro with a 1994 ,350ci (bored .040 over)out of a pickup, thats all I was told,(#14093638) its been all rebuilt ,from the bottom up. They used the 305 heads from the original motor.?? (dont ask) SO, I now have a set of LT1 aluminum heads ready for up to .550 lift, and a Lt4 hot cam, which will give me .525 lift w/1.6 rockers. I want to have all I need ready to do the swap with as little down time as possible.
First, could this be a roller motor already, what is the easiest check to find out?(pushrod length?) ( Because I will need a set of roller lifters). Will I need a different timing chain or gear set with a roller? I hear I need special head gaskets for aluminum heads and bolts as well, is this correct? Again , this a very low miles motor, so if it is a roller already , I could use many of the parts...
Thats all I can think of right now....Thanks fellas!!

pUP

Chances are if its a 94 350, its a roller motor, to be sure i would pull the intake and look at the lifters to make sure though. im willing to bet $$$ on it that its a roller if its a 94 and as far as a timing chain goes all you need is a cam button to keep the cam from "walking" on you and you can use whatever timing chain you want.

502 isnt there a better way than pulling intake off? cause he sayed the least amount of downtime u never know that could be his daily driver and if its already a roller wouldnt it already have some kind of thrust plate in it? just wondering cause i am looking into this same thing also

That would be perfect if it is! Aren't roller lifters longer then regular? Meaning , wouldn't the pushrods be a little shorter on the roller?, then I could just pull out a pushrod and I would know ...Thanks monte......
pUP

Chevy began putting Rollers in engines in 1987. If the engine is a 94 it has rollers. You can't use the LT1 aluminum heads with an intake manifold. It takes more than just gaskets. They work with Fuel injection only. I am not sure if you can buy an aftermarket manifold that is made for the LT1 heads or not, never checked in to it. You can install the fuel injection system from a LT1 but the intake has to be drilled to accept the distributor.
Ed

Oh no! your kidding, never even considered that problem! I cant believe I didn't hear that sometime while I was checking into getting these heads. They have to have something to bolt up by now...Thanks Hurst..........
pUP

Not to say anyone is wrong here but i personally have bolted up a set of lt1 vette heads to a performer RPM intake and the motor ran but the problem was that the LT1 heads was that they were 56cc's and the pistons were 12.5:1 with 76 cc heads. Not very compatible i think it put it over the 13:1 If your going to run those heads just make sure the compression is a little lower and that centerbolt valve covers wont work with many type rockers but they stock type im sure theyre are some that will work but i havent seen them i just pulled the heads and called it a day. Oh yeah make sure you use the correct head bolt also. If you look at the intake you will notice that everything lines up except for the one water passage on the heads i think its in the front of the heads, that water passage is there on the intake but the heads is blocked off and if you have high dome pistons you will have a problem with clearance as far as the spark plug shroud ( little square block in the combustion chamber just under the spark plug hole) As far as roller lifters, YES ROLLER LIFTER PUSHRODS ARE SHORTER THAN FLAT TAPPET PUSHRODS But, i like to see things to believe it. if in fact that block is a 94 then its is a roller motor. Oh by the way the motor was a 383 that i used the vette heads on let us know how it works out for ya

Books,Books,Books,.I cant say this enuff!!!QUOTE,from chevy high performance,"the lt1 was the next generation head developed for the small block after the l98 tpi,The lt 1 head uses a unique reverse coolingsystem,which meansit cannot be swaped onto older small blocks!!" It may work with what u have, block wise ,but u may need all the rest of the goodies.

THANKS a lot guys! Yes it is a reverse cooling motor, so I'm ok there.I did look into quite a bit before buying these heads. The intake thing threw me though. I searched last night and did find that they make an LT1 intake, for carbureted engines.(summit)
I'll have to dig a bit more to see what all I can use. Thanks again, I'll keep ya informed....
pUP

Originally posted by shawnlee28
Books,Books,Books,.I cant say this enuff!!!QUOTE,from chevy high performance,"the lt1 was the next generation head developed for the small block after the l98 tpi,The lt 1 head uses a unique reverse coolingsystem,which meansit cannot be swaped onto older small blocks!!" It may work with what u have, block wise ,but u may need all the rest of the goodies.

Yep you are 100% correct about that i totally forgot about it!!!!
I pulled those heads before i could ever do anything with them the compression was through the roof. i didnt have any problems with temp though....but i can see where there would have been i mean they were ony ran for a total of maybe 20 minutes to a half hour when i realized it was way too much comp, i mean it was pre-igniting at idle. but yeah that reverse cooling issue would have become a problem, thats why the front cooling passages on the heads were blocked off thats the only thing i saw that was different though. Whatever i wouldnt use them anymore anyway.
Good looking out shawnlee!!!!!

Books, Books, questions,answers..... Thats what I'm doing right now Shawnlee, RESEARCH. Thats why I'm throwing questions out there. Actually, the first thing I found out about these heads before I bought them was that they were for use with reverse flow only. I already know some of this from reading. I haven't done anything yet .Its not like I put together an engine that blew up when I turned it over. I 'm gettin all the pieces of the puzzle together before I even start....Thanks to you all for the info so far......its helping.............pUP

I know that the LT1 heads are reverse flow, but it seems that I read a tech article somewhere that said they would still work on a standard flow. The intakes are difinately different.
Ed