505 Stroker swap

[timmycharger]

The issues I am having with my transmission/clutch has sped up my plan to swap my current 440 to a 505 stroker I had built last year, or at least the short block. Here is the thread for the engine.


http://www.dodgecharger.com/forum/index.php/topic,143472.0.html


So far, things are coming apart very smoothly since its only been about 10 years since I bolted everything together. I will be dropping the K frame down from below vs pulling the motor/trans from the top which is a little bit of work but worth it in my opinion especially if you have worked with 2 inch TTI headers and a manual transmission, not fun.  I will be able to not disturb the a/c lines as I plan on suspending the compressor and hoses with a home made bracket while the engine is out. I will be doing the same for the front calipers so I dont have to bleed the brakes again.

I have the US car tool body lift that I will be using and will be posting pics when I get to that point.

What is up with the valley pan? Never saw one balloon up like that. Backfire maybe?

[70 sublime]

Will be watching as you take it apart to see if you can figure out what the clutch pedal problem was

[timmycharger]

Will be watching as you take it apart to see if you can figure out what the clutch pedal problem was

Yes, I sure hope it is something obvious so I don't have these same issues again. 

[496polara]

I wouldn't think a backfire could do that? My initial though was too much crankcase pressure.

Maybe I missed it,did you decide on the cam you were going to run?

[metallicareload99]

MIGHT want to do a compression test before pulling out any more?!?!?

I had a valley pan do that when 3 or so pistons had the ring lands come out in multiple pieces. The stock cast pistons got rattled into pieces from detonation/preignition  The intake was probably the only thing keeping it from blowing all the way out

[timmycharger]

I wouldn't think a backfire could do that? My initial though was too much crankcase pressure.

Maybe I missed it,did you decide on the cam you were going to run?

Hmm, maybe a clogged PCV valve?    I will be replacing it on the new motor.

No decision on the cam yet, I will be calling to talk to either Hughes Engines or Dwayne Porter with my car and engine specs, but it will definitely be a hydraulic roller.

[timmycharger]

MIGHT want to do a compression test before pulling out any more?!?!?

I had a valley pan do that when 3 or so pistons had the ring lands come out in multiple pieces. The stock cast pistons got rattled into pieces from detonation/preignition  The intake was probably the only thing keeping it from blowing all the way out

I may just for shits and giggles but this engine is going to be pulled and sold eventually.  I will be posting several pics of this engine when it comes apart, hopefully that will tell me more. 

[496polara]

I wouldn't think a backfire could do that? My initial though was too much crankcase pressure.

Maybe I missed it,did you decide on the cam you were going to run?

Hmm, maybe a clogged PCV valve?    I will be replacing it on the new motor.

No decision on the cam yet, I will be calling to talk to either Hughes Engines or Dwayne Porter with my car and engine specs, but it will definitely be a hydraulic roller.

No disrespect to Dave but my money would be with Dwayne. He specd my 505 cam.

[Kern Dog]

Dwayne is a great asset to this hobby.

[timmycharger]

Appreciate the feedback. Dave helped me about 25 years ago when I first was setting up the engine I am now pulling out, I ended up getting a cam and 1.6 rockers from them and was very happy. 

The rockers and shafts are still mint, maybe 800 miles on them before I took them off for reasons I don't remember haha. I never used them on the current version of the 440 that is in the car now, as I had a ticking that I thought was the rockers but ended up being something else.  I will give them a visual inspection and will plan on using them on the stroker. I trust these 1998/1999 ish rockers and shafts more than pretty much anything  you can buy today post COVID.

Over the years I read great stuff about Dwayne, many Mopar guys on many forums.

I will most likely end up going through Dwayne, his shop is about 2 hours from my house and I was interested in having him go through my stock Edelbrock RPM heads and set them up for the cam I choose.



 

[Charger-Bodie]

ive seen a valley pan do that once when crankcase was flooded with gas. but it was ignighted by a distributer fighting for ground.

[timmycharger]

ive seen a valley pan do that once when crankcase was flooded with gas. but it was ignighted by a distributer fighting for ground.

interesting, maybe when I take it apart I will know more so that it does not happen again.   

[Kern Dog]

I have found that Dwayne is willing to talk car stuff for a LONG time, much longer than I would think that a working guy would be able to do. A few times I'd wonder you're really taking a lot of time to help me here, is your boss okay with this ?

[timmycharger]

I have found that Dwayne is willing to talk car stuff for a LONG time, much longer than I would think that a working guy would be able to do. A few times I'd wonder you're really taking a lot of time to help me here, is your boss okay with this ?

haha I would not expect that, my experiences in the past was to not to play 20 questions with these guys as they are very busy, but I made myself a nice cheat sheet with all my car's specs so I can get the best cam for what I want to do.

Decision made, I ended up calling Dwayne this AM and left him a message. At a minimum I will buy the cam, but will talk to him about lifters, springs, seals, etc and the timing set you ended up with on your build. I will then be sourcing the other stuff like the cam button, distributor gear and other stuff elsewhere. Your thread on  your roller cam has been super helpful 

[Kern Dog]

Thanks, man.
The threads we make serve a few purposes. I admit that in some cases, I'm bragging a bit.
These serve as a record for others that may be considering the same thing for their own cars. I've read threads from other people and taken their experiences into consideration on how to proceed with my own cars.
A guy at FBBO did a thread on a 5 speed conversion in his 66 Satellite. It took me 2 years to muster up the motivation to order mine. His thread had some great info, stuff that prepared me for my own project.
I love knowing that something that I did helped other people. I also like knowing that I saved someone from trouble by warning of something that they didn't know about.

[timmycharger]

Agreed. This forum has been the key to give me the confidence to tear into the car as far as I did. I had people tell me when my car was down to a shell that it will never see the road again but seeing other people's builds and things they were doing I was like, hell I can do that too.

I always have that in mind when I post pics of what I am doing, maybe it will help the next guy or give them the confidence to go outside their comfort zone.

[Kern Dog]

There sure are some negative people out there. They are not hard to spot though.
If you look at these cars as investments, you may never do anything since most of the time, you'd be upside down moneywise. Do it for the love of the car, the hobby.

[timmycharger]

Did some more work over the weekend. Everything is now ready for the engine and transmission to be dropped out from the bottom. I have the body lift in place and the K frame rolling stand ready to go, just have to remove the 4 transmission crossmember bolts and the K frame bolts and its out.

I suspended the A/C compressor and power steering pump from a support across the engine bay as I didn't want to disturb any of the connections, did the same with the brake calipers.

[timmycharger]

Made some progress over the weekend. The engine/trans/K frame have been removed from below and the disassembly of the engine has begun. Pretty easy process, even doing it by myself which I had to as both my boys were not available and I am far too impatient to wait. Couple of annoying things I forgot to disconnect like the steering coupler and the z bar but after that, smooth sailing.

The US Car tool body lift worked perfectly however there are even easier options out there. I was watching a you tube vid of a member (former?) Chris Birdsong (CB Restorations) and he had a slick set of mounts that go down by the bottom of the radiator support instead of using the bumper bolts which allows the same job w/o removing the bumper and valance.

My homemade rolling rig that was buried in storage for 10 years still worked great.

I removed the starter before remembering I wanted to do a compression test so I ended up rotating the crank by hand with the spark plugs removed to see if all the valves were opening and sure enough, I have a wiped intake cam lobe at cylinder 8.

I will say it was still running well for having only 7 cylinders for who knows how long. 

[timmycharger]

some pics:

[Kern Dog]

Pretty bold, leaving the radiator in place.





Good thing it all worked out. I like the wood bridge to support the A/C compressor.

[timmycharger]

Yeah, I didn't think the radiator was in the way, the fans are super low profile, won't be an issue if I am careful putting it back.


Good thing it all worked out. I like the wood bridge to support the A/C compressor.
[/quote]

ha, figured a piece of 3/4 oak flooring bullnose wouldn't flex and it was the perfect size!



Man, wish I had a lift for this project, it certainly would have made the process easier, I am still a bit sore from getting off the creeper/ground 400 times over the weekend.

[timmycharger]

Did a little bit of work yesterday, slow progress but better than no progress!

[timmycharger]

now I can start planning the build of the new block as the old block is completely stripped and ready for sale.

[timmycharger]

Ok, finally connected with Dwayne Porter about helping me choose a cam for my 505 block. He is a very knowledgeable, patient and helpful guy, as said before, an asset to the Mopar community.

I ended up pulling the trigger on a Cam, lifter set, roller cam button and the timing chain set. Total was about $1500 or so, prices have been creeping up over the last few months but it is what it is if you want to play with hydraulic roller cams.

I still have a list of parts to get but this will at least get me going for a while. Shout out to Kern Dog who's thread outlines pretty much everything else I need to do. I am going to cheat a little bit and bring my heads over to Dwayne since I am only a few hrs away for a valve job and installation of the correct springs for the cam.

The cam he recommended will have 236/242 duration @.050 with 570/580 lift and 112 degree lobe separation. This is all with my 1.6 roller rockers.

Went with Comp Camps lifters which he also recommended.

KD, Dwayne told me that my cam is basically a half step below yours as you have a 5 speed with a different first gear, he felt that with my stock 4 speed gearing, the slightly smaller cam would have better manners. Crazy that he remembered you and your motor!

I am pretty optimistic about this set up, I will be re using my 2 inch TTI headers and my Performer RPM 84CC heads with the Hughes roller rockers along with my modified six pack set up (metering plates in outboards).

I am shooting for over 500HP with this setup with gobs of low end torque without having to rev it over 5500 RPM. 

Now the waiting begins for the parts! 

[496polara]

It may be an unpopular opinion and likely not worth the extra $$$ unless you sold your 2" headers but I believe the 1 7/8 tubes with that cam size and the 4 speed would help with low speed/part throttle torque and drivability.
I realize a 505 will have torque to spare so maybe a moot point. Just a suggestion from my feeble mind.

[timmycharger]

It may be an unpopular opinion and likely not worth the extra $$$ unless you sold your 2" headers but I believe the 1 7/8 tubes with that cam size and the 4 speed would help with low speed/part throttle torque and drivability.
I realize a 505 will have torque to spare so maybe a moot point. Just a suggestion from my feeble mind.

I have been going back and forth about re using the 2 inch headers vs getting new ones. I will need to spend money in having them sand blasted and re coated which may be half the price of getting new ones. If I do need to get new ones, I was leaning on getting 1 and 7/8 ones as I feel the same about the low end torque.

The guy who helped me choose my cam didn't say anything about the headers.

[Kern Dog]

I am not surprised that Dwayne remembered me. He was really helpful to me over the years. I have a few topics going at the FBBO site and he chimed in there several times.
The cam you are using will probably not be much different from mine, though you're at 505 versus my 495 cubes. Idle is great, power is right where you need it. Idle vacuum is strong enough for power brakes and you'll find that it pulls clean right from idle. If you've ever had a setup that snorts, hesitates or is sluggish from idle and requires rpm to feel comfortable, you'll know how much better it is to be able to leave from a low rpm and just accelerate like you would in a newer car.
Good luck, man!

[timmycharger]

Spent alot of time cleaning up parts that I will be re using like the water pump housing, oil pan and the heads. The heads will be going to Dwayne Porter most likely for a valve job and installation of the new springs to match my new cam. 

Speaking of the cam, it has arrived along with the roller lifters, cam button and timing chain.  Got my 1990's era Hughes engines 1.6 roller rockers out of storage, they still look brand new since they have very low miles on them.

[timmycharger]

I spent some time this past weekend installing and degreeing the cam. This actually took a lot of time because I wanted to be sure I got this process right.

My Cam has a center line of 108 which is the number I had to get to.

At first I was getting numbers all over the place, didn't matter if I had the crank sprocket set to zero (dot to dot), advanced 2 degrees or advanced 4 degrees.  Then after watching many videos, I realized my method of finding TDC was not ideal. I was using a dial gauge to find TDC but what happens is the dwell issue, where the piston sort of hits the top but the crank/rods still sort of move some resulting in inaccurate measurements.

I ended up making a piston stop and using the method of finding 2 points on the degree wheel and dividing by 2 which gave me TDC exactly.

Once I had that established, i first set the lower sprocket of the chain to zero and just lined up the dots. This resulted in me getting a centerline number of 111.5.  I checked it at .050, .080 and .100

I then installed the crank sprocket at the 2 degrees advanced slot and re did the TDC and this time I was at 109.5. Getting closer. 

Lastly, I installed th3 crank sprocket at the 4 degrees advanced slot, re did the TDC (2 more times to ensure accuracy) and ended up with exactly 108 most of the time, few times 108.5, others 107.5.

I used a dial gauge on the intake lifter, just on the edge of it so I didn't have to use a pushrod, I still was able to get all the travel from the lifter for max lift before testing it at .050 before/after.

I think I feel confident that I got this process correct, just seems wild to me that it was off so much from just lining up the dots.

[Kern Dog]

How is your progress, man?
Maybe you're still employed and busy during the week. Good luck and report back!

[timmycharger]

Yeah, I've got at least 4 more years before I can call it a career haha.. Yeah, managed to get some more time in last weekend but had to put everything on hold.

I tend to be a bit OCD about things sometimes and even though last week I degreed the cam and got to the 108 number several times, I went and did it again. I took all the tools out again and started from scratch. Good news is that I kept getting to the 108 number consistently so I am at peace with this process and can move on to the timing cover and cam button.

I saw several different ways to get to the 0.008 spec but for me, the easiest way is just to mock it all up with the gasket and use a piece of plastigauge to show me how close I am.

The process itself is pretty easy, the hardest part was getting the plastigauge to stay put on the button which just needed a bit of moisture on the button to make it stick. I then tightened down the top 4 bolts of the cover and measured the squish. I will grind down the back of the button and sleeve until I get the desired spec.

The problem right now is that I am using the wrong plastigauge. All I had was the red stuff that has the wrong range, I need the blue plastigauge which is .004 to .009. I bought it and will be finishing that up this weekend.

Plan is to button up the timing cover and oil pan this weekend. I picked up a Summit Racing branded SFI damper and will be installing that as well with the same homemade tool that you made for yours, pretty simple.

[timmycharger]

The plastigauge came in yesterday and I was eager to set the cam button to timing cover clearance. I used the correct range this time and after much trial and error, taking off the cover and carefully grinding the back of the button and sleeve until I had .008 as desired.

I mocked up the cover with the damper and was happy to see that at TDC, everything is lining up to the zero mark on the cover. With moving the crank key to the A4 slot, I was thinking it would be off for some reason?

Slow progress but going in the right direction.

[Kern Dog]

Your balancer installer looks like one that I built. I didn't see the need to buy one that I could build for a lot less.

[timmycharger]

Your balancer installer looks like one that I built. I didn't see the need to buy one that I could build for a lot less.

Yep, copied yours from your thread, no way was I paying for something so simple. I think I am into it for about 10 bucks for the rod and nut. Made mine a bit longer in case I can use it for something else in the future, I dont know.

[timmycharger]

Some updates since the site was down. With help from my son, we installed the pickup and oil pan. I had to modify the stroker windage tray from 440 source as it was too tall, I cut it down the side and re welded it so it is just above the rod bolts, clears everything now with the hemi pan.

I initially bought the Summit brand damper but didnt like how far it stuck out so I ended up with a 440 source piece that fits much better.

Installed the HV oil pump and buttoned up the bottom end and flipped the motor over on the stand. Next are the heads which will be sent for porting and a valve job.

On track to have this running again in the Spring.

[Kern Dog]

"Running by Spring"





I know that it gets cold over there but come on, man!

[timmycharger]

"Running by Spring"

I know that it gets cold over there but come on, man!

Ha no, I don't think you do know how cold it gets here, nor know about the corrosive salt that is used on the roads in the Northeast. When was the las time you drove in zero degree/single digit weather and over a foot of snow?  You wouldn't last a week here.


Regardless, I drive my Charger up until the salt trucks are out and then not until the street sweepers clean the salt off the road in the Spring. This time around, its in pieces and I am definitely not going to rush to slap it together just so I can drive it a few weeks, that is dumb.

Also, some of us are not flush with cash so I am selling off my parts stash to fund this stroker project, I am right on schedule with time and money.

I have heat in my garage and look forward to taking my time making sure all is right.

[Kern Dog]

"Running by Spring"

I know that it gets cold over there but come on, man!

Ha no, I don't think you do know how cold it gets here, nor know about the corrosive salt that is used on the roads in the Northeast. When was the las time you drove in zero degree/single digit weather and over a foot of snow?  You wouldn't last a week here.

Seems pretty rude of you to write that, man. I've been friendly to you in every comment that you've made.

[timmycharger]

"Running by Spring"

I know that it gets cold over there but come on, man!

Ha no, I don't think you do know how cold it gets here, nor know about the corrosive salt that is used on the roads in the Northeast. When was the las time you drove in zero degree/single digit weather and over a foot of snow?  You wouldn't last a week here.

Seems pretty rude of you to write that, man. I've been friendly to you in every comment that you've made.

Yup, sure was, as was your comment. You try and bust my balls, Ill be busting them right back. Also, why does it matter to you if I don't drive it again until Spring? I thought you encouraged people who work on their own stuff? not anymore? 

Not a good look by the way. This site has been up only a week and you are already starting shit with several members. Why is that? 


   

[Kern Dog]

Whoa. You are going way overboard, man. I welcomed you at the FBBO forum as I have done here. There has never been any ill will coming from me toward you. EVERY post that I have made toward you has been friendly.
If you misinterpreted anything, that is your issue to deal with.
How could you get it so wrong?

[Kern Dog]

[/quote]

 This site has been up only a week and you are already starting shit with several members. Why is that? 
[/quote]

"Several members".
Name them.
I did not intentionally start anything with you and I certainly did not "start anything" with Kunkel. The guy's only purpose in life seems to be chasing after me and shitting on what I write. If you doubt me look at his post history here.
Read the comments I made to you again. There is no "starting shit".

[timmycharger]

nope, not at all. I reacted appropriately to your nonsense with some of my own. 

Thank GOD you welcomed me over at FBBO, I was really having a hard time, I almost deleted my account when I didn't get a reply right away 

Get over yourself man, you are not the ambassador of the car forums. 

[timmycharger]

 This site has been up only a week and you are already starting shit with several members. Why is that? 
[/quote]

"Several members".
Name them.
I did not intentionally start anything with you and I certainly did not "start anything" with Kunkel. The guy's only purpose in life seems to be chasing after me and shitting on what I write. If you doubt me look at his post history here.
Read the comments I made to you again. There is no "starting shit".
[/quote]

I dont know, man, seems every time there is an argument here, you are involved.  Below is just from the other day?

It would be nice if the guy would post up an answer to the question asked in the title of this topic....

He did, you just weren't paying attention.

This is the second time that I am asking but I suspect that you won't answer because the man did not address the most recent disruption.

[Kern Dog]

Old Mopars posted on Moparts that he emailed troy weeks ago and didn't get a response.
He gets on here and tells me that I didn't pay attention. To what? The site owner hasn't posted anything. There was nothing from Troy on the "why" of it all.
If you think that you have the right to respond to what "seems" like rude behavior, take a fucking look at what those two did. I did not start anything, I responded to them when they were rude to me.
I was not wrong. If you think that I was, feel free to express how YOU would have handled either of those guys in a different manner.
I have no pattern of being rude to you. If you thought post #36 was rude, maybe you haven't played team sports or worked any blue collar jobs to understand how guys often interact. I was teasing, not insulting.
You're right about not lasting a week. I hate the cold. I'd never live anywhere that it snows. To me, that and 120 degree heat are nature's way of saying GTFO.
Cheers

[timmycharger]

Nah, I'd rather not argue,  I would rather just focus on moving on and finishing this motor swap! May be a while until the next update, after the heads are done. I will then be measuring for new push rods, installing the intake and then getting everything back on the K frame.