Thread: Hello from an old member

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Oh Dear Ryan !
Have I become a SBC drone now??

That does not suit my MO to be honest. There is no getting away from having a 350 sbc now I guess. So I need to somehow peronalise it I think?

DAMN!! At least when I had the Rover engine I could modify it with Chevy parts to be cool ?

So now I need to reverse engineer this situation by fitting Rover V8 parts to the SBC !!

If it runs 8's in the 1/4 or faster, I wouldn't be too worried if some one wanted to pick on your belly button. Not every sbc does that.

Ha Ha!
Some of my parts that have been arriving are now getting together as you can see here ??

So you ain't placing the blower on top of the Chevy yet ? What about the NOS gear ?

I was wondering the same thing. No blower?

I think Pel wants to learn how to handle all the power the Chevy will supply before he makes it go faster then the Rover or a Ford, wink wink.....

Won't be long now and you'll be telling us you've re-upped your subscription to Hot Rod Magazine!


Just kiddin' ya there mate...

Keep up the good work!

Ha Ha! Thanks for the comments guys.
The old 4/71 will not be big enough for the new engine so it has to go along with the old Rover V8 to fund the rest of my parts for the new BBC.. Thats the new "Belly Button Chevy"

I've been at the track all this weekend running the Slingshot and doing nitrous tuning on 2 cars + nitrous top ups for a few folk which inlcude 2 biker friends of mine who has 12 ounce bottles 12 Ounces ?? At least the other biker has 2lb bottles. I even cleared out the back seat of my truck and found enough parts to build an almost complete 150hp nitrous system for a nitrous newbie friend of mine. So I raced all weekend and came home $600 richer ! I still have a lot of nitrous stuff in the garage for the new engine though. I have two nitrous plates + a single 250hp set of noids + two additional sets of 150hp solenoids and a whole heap of plumbing to make them fit if I need any of this stuff for the new engine

A quick update guys!!
The old Blown Rover V8 is almost ready to go up for sale. I've had a brand new crank offset ground to match the old bent one. The block has been checked for line bore and its still straight as an arrow I have my new Eagle rods now which have been bushed to take my Rover Wrist pins so pistons cna be removed as the pins are slip fit. The last job is to get the rods ground down at the big end so the journals are the correct width to fit the new crank. I'm glad i waited to do this as the new crank journals are a few thou narrower than the old crank which was ground back in the early 90's. I intend to fit the crank with new shells and torque it up properly so the new buyer can see that it rotates smoothly. I have re honed the bores and will buy a new set of rings so the new owner can build the engine himself with the new big end shells I have bought. My reasoning is that if a guy wants to buy a Rover V8 of this spec he may well want to do final assembly as he likes to do it. On the SBC front the block is now fully cleaned by hand. All of the threads have been chased out and lubed. The only problem I have with the SBC now is the two drain plugs on each side of the block. These have corroded to the point where I could dig them out with a screwdriver. So I have to either recover those threads or re drill and tap them for new plugs. I still have to thread the front oil gallery holes and also thread the oil drain holes in the lifter gallery so I can fit standpipes which will stop oil draining onto the cam but also act as breather pipes. Progress is slow but steady on the SBC And I'm learning all the time about the SBC which is fun. Pics of the Rover stuff are attached Regards Pel

That is good news.. Sellin' parts and getting ready to sell the Rover. Glad to hear that you're enjoying the SBC buildup.

Nice new crank and good luck with the parts sales! How's everything else going for you?

Hi Ryan
Life is going well right now Buddy!
Still doing 6 days a week at work so garage time is limited as i not only need to get both the Rover snd the SBC engines finished, but i also need to complete the addition of a convervatory to the house which is now 7 weeks behind schedule My main problem seems to be that I was expecting to get a builder in to do some work for me. But it seems that at this time of the year in the UK if you ca
n find builder with no work booked uop for weeks on end then he is probably no good??

Holy Cow!! Has it been over 2 months since I last looked in here??
I was working 6 days a week uo to my holiday in August. I got back to work on 17th August and have been working 7 days a week since then. Hell! I got my brand new truck to drive on 17th August and today it clocked 6400 miles !!
On the Home front:
I have a builder arriving on Saturday 3rd October to lay the foundations + base and walls for our new Conservatory. That will be done over 3 weekends so by November I can start assembling the new addition onto its base at last. We may have Christmas lunch in the Conservatory if all goes well ?

On the Engine front:
The Rover will be ready fo assembly in 10 days time so I can sell it.
The SBC block is now back from the machine shop. It has been cleaned and honed and decked and it is now in the workshop doused in heavy oil. These iron blocks do go rusty quite fast in our climate in the UK. So I can now set about fittng freeze plugs etc. I was told that I should blank off the oil drain holes in the lifter gallery on the SBC as this would gain horsepower? My thought was that this would also block off many crankcase vent holes. So I bought some tubes that fit these holes which I had to thread so the oil does not go down these holes, but air air still vent from them
I now have a front motor mount plate for the SBC which will fit the MGB chassis rails. Today my TCI SFI 168 tooth flex plate arrived.. I was surprised as i forgot that I ordered it a few weeks back. So it was a nice surprise

I have found a fully forged rotating assembly at Summit Racing which seems to be rated for 750hp. But if I fit the ARP con rod kit they say it will be good for 1500hp ? So my goal of around 800hp with a small shot of nos seems possible. I wont buy the rotating assembly until I'm sure of what I need. At this time I'm thinking that I may run race fuel with a CR of around 12.5 - 13:1 to the best bang from the engine. I ideally want 700hp on the carbs and then add a small shot to top up as required to find my 8 second goal ?

This is all getting very exciting for me now. But the best part is!!! I just email suppliers in the USA to tell them what Engine I have and they advise on what parts I need to reach my goal I was hoping to have the SBC ready by this month but due to work and home issues I have now pushed that date back to June 2016 to roll the car out for shakedowns. And i think I may just make that date if all goes well and we dont have a horrible winter as the car is still outside and I have to work outside unless I can some friends to free up some garage space for me and the MGB as I need to do a little work on the cage and the chassis to make it a little stronger.
So thats the Home front and the Garage front dealt with.

On the Family / Grandpa front:
My Darling Grand Daughter Faith was 2 years old on Tuesday 15th September!! Where the hell did that 2 years go guys?
She is now talking very well and she is having swimming lessons. She loves the water.
Gill and I took Faith and her mum (my eldest Daughter Vicki) to The Canary islands in August for a week in the sun. We had such a great time. Faith was in 7th heaven on the beach in Fuerteventura. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pfo339amR58

Medical front:
I went to the doctors a few weeks back to get him to look at my damaged knee as I partly dislocated it when trying to move a heavy grease digester tank on a job for a client. He said the knee should be ok if I took care of it. He then said "your records show that you have not had a general check up in 15 years" I asked why this was required as I felt fine. His reply was quite funny... He said "You only seem to come here when you are broken, but we do need to give you a genral health check I'm afraid" So I got a lung function check which was fine. I had my blood pressure checked and to the Doc's surprise it was perfect. Then I had 4 blood samples taken. I went back a week later for results and they took the blood samples again and told me that they thought I had not fasted for 12 hours before even though I had. Another week later and I go back again to find that I am Diabetic? So I now have to take pills every day. Since then I have cut out chocolate, halved my beer consumption, cut out crisps (potato chips) And now only drink Diet soda. Fast forward 2 weeks and I'm 13lbs lighter ?? I have to go back to the Doctors next week to see the Diabetes nurse so she can school me on how to eat?
By the time I roll the car out in June next year I may be 40lbs lighter That can only be a GOOD thing eh?

Regards to all you folks over the pond !
Pel

Hang in there Pel we want to see tose Lower times in the near future, and don't be a stranger!

Pel, sorry to hear of the diabetes, but at least they caught it. It sounds mild since you don't need inculine to treat it? That's great everything else is going great. Good luck with the conservatory and getting it all done.