Thread: 350 Build

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Tech,
I was hoping you may be able to help me with something on this 350 engine I am wanting to swap into my 63 Chevy II wagon. The wagon has a great running 327 that supposedly only has about 20,000 miles or less but for some reason it seems the cam in it is too huge of a lope and burning VERY rich to the point that it smells in the cab and your eyes will burn very badly. Also while in gear at stops it almost stalls out but doesn't. I swapped carbs on it, changed plugs (need to check timing again but doubt this is why it's lopey and rich). Instead of swapping cams on it and not really knowing the mileage, I have a 350 I pulled out of an S10 I had with a V8 in it that looks to have VERY low miles (guy said 50 miles only). The cylinder walls have no ridge and look clean, etc.
Anyways here is what I plan to do. I am selling my daily driver (Honda) this weekend to a buddy of mine at the fire dept and using the $3500 I am getting from it to put into this 63 wagon. The heads were taken off of the 350 and it needs new lifters, cam since I dont even know what it is, and push rods. I want to buy a new cam kit and maybe even just get all new heads for it. I just need help to decide on what top end kit to buy and what my overall compression should/will be. The pistons are flat tops with the relief indentions in them for the valves. If I email you detailed pictures do you think you may be able to help me out on what I should do and what you think about the engine?
My plan is to use this car for a daily driver and I am trying to push about 22 MPG city and 25 or so highway. I have a TH350 tranny that I am just going to use since I dont have money for a 700R4 and I will be looking for a 3.08 gear or possibly a 3.28 (I believe that is a Chevy gear?). I just want a good reliable engine/tranny combo that will get decent MPG and keeping it simple. I have an Edelbrock RPM intake manifold and a Weiland intake manifold (I will find out the exact one) that I can use. As for carb I am not sure on that. My guess is a plain Holley 600cfm tops.
I'd appreciate any info here since I am going to have money coming up in about 2 weeks and trying to plan out if it's worth me getting this wagon going for a daily or selling it.

Originally Posted by FMXhellraiser

Tech,
I was hoping you may be able to help me with something on this 350 engine I am wanting to swap into my 63 Chevy II wagon. The wagon has a great running 327 that supposedly only has about 20,000 miles or less but for some reason it seems the cam in it is too huge of a lope and burning VERY rich to the point that it smells in the cab and your eyes will burn very badly. Also while in gear at stops it almost stalls out but doesn't. I swapped carbs on it, changed plugs (need to check timing again but doubt this is why it's lopey and rich).

I'm not Tech... but I can't help but to think that if your 327 is great running you might be able to tweak out the little problems fairly easily. In the past I have chased problems that I thought were carb related that were actually timing related. If your cam is "too huge" ignore the factory timing specs and time it to where it runs the best with some trial and error. If your timing is off, it could cause your stalling and lopey idle. Also, smelly fumes in the passenger compartment might be an exhaust leak. Are you shooting fuel out of the tailpipe? Black sooty smoke? Get your timing taken care of before you try to play with any fuel issues. That's not what you asked, but I just thought I would put in my 2 cents...

65ny is correct about the ignition timing. A truckload of cam calls for a truckload of timing.

You didn't say what converter is behind the 327, but I'll assume a stock one. Using a stock converter will require some ignition curve, while a looser (3000-3500) converter could allow locked out timing with no centrifugal advance.

I always try to fix things with the least amount out of pocket, so let's proceed along that line. Get an ignition re-curve kit from Summit or wherever. Put 16 degrees of centrifugal advance in the distributor. Find a local shop with a distributor machine and set the dizzy for 16, all in by 2600-2800. Set the initial timing at the crank at 20 degrees. 20 plus 16 will give you 36 total. If the motor tries to kick back against the starter because of all the initial advance, install a momentary-off pushbutton that breaks the circuit on the wire going to the coil. Mount it on the dash or wherever you can mount it in the cabin. Push the momentary button to kill ignition while you turn the key to spin the motor. Once the motor is spinning, release the momentary pushbutton and the motor will fire. If you had a very loose converter, I would suggest locking out the centrifugal by using small tie wraps on the centrifugal weights to cinch them at zero and use 36 degrees at the crank with the momentary switch.

This is only a stop-gap operation to get you operating with the 327 until you can either find time to change the cam in it or build up a mild-mannered 350. I wish I could have gotten to you before you laid out money for another flat tappet block. Here in Phoenix, in the last 3 weeks, I've seen two rebuildable roller long blocks on craigslist for under $200. If you put the word Vortec into the search under auto parts, you can find these motors. The ideal one to start with is the '96 to '98 5700 Vortec from a Chevy truck. That motor will have the L31 Vortec heads on it and it won't get much better than that for a starting point for a streetable 350 or 383 build. The motors I called about still had the roller lifters (re-useable), dog bones and spider. One of them was a 4-bolt block.

I'm just including this for others on the board. DON'T EVER BUY ANOTHER FLAT TAPPET BLOCK TO START A BUILD WITH.

FMX, do not buy heads or cam or anything else from ANYWHERE until I see pics of the pistons and you measure the piston deck height.

Sounds good guys, I appreciate the help! The reasons I will not use the 327 is because even though the previous owner said it had "probably" (were his words) 20,000 miles or less, I still dont trust what other people say and do not plan to get this car stripped, sand blasted and COMPLETELY gone through and painted and find out the motor doesn't last but a year or so on me. Also it's a 69 block and there are no mounting holes in the head for my A/C conversion and power steering conversion which I am sure can still be done but with expensive mounting brackets.
I will first get some pictures of the 350 for you and have you tell me what you think about it. I'd like to use the 350 already since I have it torn down and I will know my own cam and head setup on it. If I keep this 350 then I may just keep the heads that are on it and just put new lifters and push rods in it with a spring kit and be done. Like I said, I want a reliable daily driver out of this car and a big cam is not going to help with that and fuel mileage. As for the exhaust, it's not leaking it's just that it turnsdown under the car near the rear doors/rear end and it is a little black but mostly just raw fuel (BADLY). This was done by the PO and it's something I am changing. I dont need exhaust fumes comming back into the cab and plus it's much too loud for a daily driver.
Before we go any further, let me get those pictures posted up here sometime today with the head information and block information. Now with the deckheight how should I measure this?
As for the 327 and powerglide, I dont mind pulling it and not using it because I have a long future plan of building a T bucket in the next year or so and have been gathering parts for it for a long time. I was first going to use a 302 motor in it but I didnt have a Ford tranny for it but now I have a Chevy combo, S10 rear end, fuel cell and a bunch of other parts to get a T bucket going.
Thanks again guys!

Do you own a dial caliper?

Tech,
No I do not actually. Wish I did but most of my tools I have are for detailing or auto body. I really need a set of calipers because there have been numerous times I've needed them.
I also do not know about getting the pictures of the engine today but am still going to try to here a little later and post them tonight. If not then it will be Thursday before I post them.

OK, when produced at the factory, blocks are cut with a nominal block deck height of +/- 9.025" (centerline of the main bearing bore to the block deck where the head bolts on). This assumes that the block has not been decked by some knot-head before you got it. Adding up your stack of parts will tell you the piston deck height and the gasket to use for a tight squish. 350 crank radius of 1.74" + 5.700" rod length + 1.560" piston compression height = 9.000". Theoretically, this would leave a piston deck height of 0.025", which, together with an 0.015" head gasket would produce a squish of 0.040".

However, don't assume anything. Always measure your clearances before final machining and assembly. You still have the pistons in the short block and that's good. With the motor on a stand, tilt it so that one bank is level. Using a steel rule and a set of feeler gauges, we'll find the actual piston deck height. Standing at the side of the block, span the edge of your rule across the bore about 1/4" from the edge of the bore at either the 3 oclock or 9 oclock position of the piston. Slide feeler gauge blades between the bottom of the edge of the steel rule and the piston crown. Checking the piston at noon or 6 oclock will allow the piston to rock on its wrist pin and tilt one way or the other, giving you an erroneous reading. 3 or 9 is directly above the pin. Rotate the crank a few degrees backward and forward and re-check your measurement to make sure the piston is at TDC. If you find a piston deck height of 0.020" to 0.030", you'll be fine with an 0.015" steel shim gasket (assuming the block decks are smooth and parallel). Do this measurement on each of the four corners of the block to see if there is a slope to the block front to rear and/or a difference from one bank to the other that would require cutting the block decks to correct the fault.