Thread: 428 smokes ... #1 Cylinder only

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I had that same problem with a tripower manifold on a 390. Fought it for months and then decided to go back to a 4 barrel. Changed manifold and the smoke went away. I asked a big time Ford drag racer about it and he said look for a crack in the underside of the intake runner. Sure enough there it was, welded the crack, reinstalled, and smoke went away. I was told that many of the stock Ford aluminum intakes did that??? The crack was very hairline in nature really had to clean it well to see it.

John

Had a similar problem with a Ford Y-block last year. After much frustration I finally found that someone in the past had ported the head and got a bit carried away and ground the intake runner paper thin. Finally it cracked and was allowing oil to be sucked into the head, causing that cylinder to smoke and fouling the plug. It wasn't in a spot that could be welded, and the owner didn't want to pay for a new head, so some careful work with some epoxy sealed the crack. A year later it's still running strong.

Thanks guys. No porting done, so hopefully stock heads are thick enough, although a crack did occur to me. I did look at the underside of the manifold for cracks and didn't see any, but that certainly doesn't mean there isn't one. It did look a bit "wet" looking up the manifold intake runner.

I wonder how they check aluminum for cracks.....I doubt magnafluxing would work..... And it's not a Ford manifold....it's a 2x4 360Deg Offenhauser, so "readily available" is not likely. Bad port matching anyway......would try to find a different 2x4 manifold....mind you, then there's that epoxy idea.....

anyways, you guys are right....I need to do a close inspection for manifold cracks.......thank-you