Andrew: when your Alpine is towed, the tranny rear bearing gets NO lube
action . If towed more than say 25 miles you will likely burn it up and
sieze the output shaft into the tail housing. I have had many brought in
with a front end lifted (riding on rear wheels) and found this costly
damage present.
If you tow the car (and many other brands of cars with stick or auto
trans.) have the rear U-joint taken off and pull out the drive shaft.
Put a baggy and rubber band around the trans tail shaft to contain the oil
and prevent dirt entering.
In the old days (pre 65) most cars with auto trans. had a "rear oil pump"
and could be push started. The bean counters found the tranny would be much
cheaper without this nice feature and everyone ceased using them.
I think Mercedes hung on for another 4-5 years then also quit.
Many manual trans. as well as transfer cases and other types of devices
require the engine idling or car under power, to spin the counter shaft
gear set and thereby throw oil up and around the gear box. Internal troughs
or guides will send some oil to the rear bearing. When these types are flat
towed with a dead engine, this lube action is not present !
I have told you guys about Rootes but you all own other brands as well so
you must contact your mfr. zone office and ask a tech rep. the question.
Local mechanics and service managers sometimes know squat about the cars
they service.....ask the mfr. rep and get a correct answer !
If you don't want to bother removing the drive shaft, then tow the car with
the rear wheels off the ground and steering wheel lashed tightly.
Dick T.
-----------------------
Jarrid: I shall await with interest, your crower cam data.
On Rootes engines (which is what I am always concerned with here) we use
only a flat bottom lifter and flat top cam lobe grind.
I think you might be accidently using the wrong word when you keep talking
about "concave" but then quote that the lifter is ground to be .002" high
in the center. This would of course NOT be a concave surface but rather it
is a "convex" surface. Yes..some lifters are ground with a large radius
base which gives perhaps.001" to .002" of curvature on the base.
This design is to be used with cam lobe having a slight angle . The idea is
that this set up causes lifter to be rotated nicely and the parts seems to
wear in OK. This cannot be used with extreme heavy valves, extra high
spring pressures, high lifts and just about anything else which would
raise the contact pressures beyond the ability of the lifter/lobe to
survive. In such high output setups a flat lifter/lobe is used to handle
the pressures and possibly a roller tappet of interposed finger may be employed.
Crower must know what they are selling and they have provided metal
treatments or contact areas which handle the loads ok.
Most regrinders do not employ anything but a flat lobe grind for the Rootes
cams because our lifters are assumed to be flat.
You mentioned an engine getting lifter damage and circular grooving in only
a short time. IMO, this may indicate some grit trapped or lubricant
breakdown allowed the scoring. There are other causes as well but I believe
this was only on one lifter so it may have been a soft base problem or just
a poorly made lifter.
You mention hvaing to make many adjustments on a rebuilt engine. I NEVER
have had this happen in all the years I rebuilt these engines. Why you
have such a situation is most unusual I think.
You mention $150 to harden lifters and rockers.......this sounds strange as
the rockers are forged steel and the basic alloy of the steel gives them
their desired hardness, no flame or quench or case hardening is ever
required at the arm tip. I suggest you stop this waste of money.
You do raise an interesting point however, when you ask "can cast iron be hardened?"
I do apply the Casinet to a lifter base while it is heated to a red glow on
the base. Seems like it works as the base responds to a sharp scratch test
like I would expect a hardened surface to do. Steel in it's simple form is
nothing more than iron with carbon added ! Of course modern steel has lots
of other metals alloyed in it.
The cast iron would seem to be hardened by having the high carbon powder
"sintered' into its surface. Thats all i know on this subject and if some
metallurgist is reading this, please post your comments???
----------------
Chris Albers: you ask for info on race engine and this is a big book and
lots of memory also.
First......you MUST use forged pistons or you can forget about high output.
We need 12:1 CR or higher in order to get decent results. I have my own die
which gives this CR and it is stored at a well known Calif piston co.
Currently rings, pin and piston will cost about $150 per cyl.
Chevy Z-28 rods, Crane cam, custom made header system which is tuned to
boost HP at the 6000-8000 rpm range, big oil pan, big cooler, thick
radiator, no fan, electronic ign.,cold air pleneum box from left headlamp,
cyl's bored .060" oversize, plane iron piston rings, no chrome rings, ring
gaps set to min. space, loose bearing clearences on rods and
mains,lightened flywheel, ballistic shield around flywheel region, oil temp
gage in pan, modified stat to run 215 deg coolant, heatshield between carbs
and manifold, electric fule pump with pressure regulator at 2.0 psi, carbs
choke system removed and epoxy smooth in carb throats, polished throttle
valves and the usual manifold and port jobs. manifolds piloted into head to
assure alignment of ports, interior of engine block polished and painted to
give slick surface which returns oil faster to pan, timing cover has oil
seal installed to matching pulley surface, side plate vented to overflow
catch tank, all threaded fasteners assembled with Loc-tite and no cotter
pins or lock washers employed, crank-pistons-rods-flywheel- clutch-pulley
balanced as one assembly. Water passages in head and block altered to
improve flow at rear and reduce overcooling at front, all core plugs held
by screwed locks, crank journals line bored and crank fitted to assure zero
variations in bearing contact areas, problem oil feed to #2 main bearing
drilled out as required, heavy valve springs, higher lift cam, rocker posts
adjusted for high lift geometry, TRW bearings, rocker shaft spacer springs
removed and solid spacers used, rocker oil feed Tee shimmed to stop
leakage, another 100 little tricky things to find a pony here and there as
well as to build reliability. You won't get an honest dyno reading of
150-160 without a turbo or supercharger, but we obtained a true 140 bph at
Denver altitude, at 7500 rpm. Engine was regularly shifted at 7500 and if
needed to complete a pass, we could go to 8000-8100 a few times briefly.
I hesitate to guess the current cost in man hours and parts today, but it
would be perhaps around $4000-5000 to build one if you furnish the core
engine block, crank and head.
BTW, this car uses a forged steel crank not some cheap cast iron crank.
This report has been a mouthfull but should at least let you see the amount
of work and cost involved. If you want your Alpine to run fast, stuff in a
bigger engine?? or....get your std. engine pepped up a bit and enjoy
vintage motoring. It has lots of speed running stock !
--------------Dick T.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Tue Sep 05 2000 - 09:56:01 CDT