Head mods

[Jim E]

I had Standard Crankshaft destroke one for a chevy rod stock piston build and it was about $180 but the crank had a bad thrust surface area that had to be welded, they also stroked on for the 2 liter big bore chevy rod build I did and it cost $125. Even with shipping it is hard to beat them for quality and cost.

 

[Alpine 1789]

Even with shipping it is hard to beat them for quality and cost.

Yep. I got a quote from them when I had mine done and even with shipping they were more than $100 less than the local place I used. I went locally for reasons other than price, but it is hard to beat Standard.

 

[ceecpa]

We've had our Series V for 6 years and I'm getting ready to begin the restoration. A few years ago there was an article about using Chevy rods in the SV engine but now I can't find it on the website. There was also an article about modifying the timing cover to use a Chevy front crank seal.

Can anyone point me to those articles?

Thanks,
Chuck Edwards

 

[ceecpa]

Chevy pistons

I opened an old book in the Fat Dog Garage and found the link. It's http://www.team.net/www/rootes/sunbeam/alpine/mk1-5/techtips/techtips.html

We've had our Series V for 6 years and I'm getting ready to begin the restoration. A few years ago there was an article about using Chevy rods in the SV engine but now I can't find it on the website. There was also an article about modifying the timing cover to use a Chevy front crank seal.

Can anyone point me to those articles?

Thanks,
Chuck Edwards

 

[Tom H]

There are more recent articles in the Marque publications, found on the home page here under SAOCA info. See issues 11 and 14.

Tom

 

[Alpine 1789]

There were two articles published in the club's old Marque and both are now available on this website. I wrote the first, which was appropriately titled "My 1789 Chevy Rod Engine" and published in Issue Number 11; Jan Servaites wrote the second (called "The Tedder Project), which was published in Issue Number 14. Both are available on this site.

 

[husky drvr]

We've had our Series V for 6 years and I'm getting ready to begin the restoration. A few years ago there was an article about using Chevy rods in the SV engine but now I can't find it on the website. There was also an article about modifying the timing cover to use a Chevy front crank seal.

Can anyone point me to those articles?

Thanks,
Chuck Edwards

Chuck,

Do not try to use modified Chevy v8 rods for this application.

 

[Tom H]

The Recent Marque articles referred to by me and Jim do not use Chevy V8 rods. They use Chevy rods from smaller blocks. And here's a thread with links and suggestions about the timing cover seal:

http://www.sunbeamalpine.org/forum/showthread.php?t=10252&highlight=timing

Tom

 

[Jim E]

250 chevy 6 cylinder rods are the ticket or at least one way to go that is not pricey.

 

[old grumpy]

Do you guys often brake the original Rootes conrods?
Are they bad or good enough for 130 bhp?

 

[RootesRacer]

Do you guys often brake the original Rootes conrods?
Are they bad or good enough for 130 bhp?

Grumpy, its like this.

The stock rods are OK, but the bolts are known to periodically fail.

IMO the stock rods are good for 130BHP, but for how long?

Folks that are going with the chevy rods are also going with custom pistons (because the chevy rods are too long), or they are shortening the stock pistons in order to get proper compression height.

When you make custom pistons, most manufacturers charge extra if you dont
have "normal" pin sizes. Rootes uses an odd pin size, going with SBC pins makes the pistons cheaper, and is a double win with the chevy rods.
Chevy pins weigh less than rootes pins, but also there are some very nice
aftermarket pins available that weight less yet.

The stock I6 250 rods are wider than the rootes rods, which means you have them narrowed (or some like to widen the crank journals).
The v8 rods mentioned in Milos writeup requires welding to widen them, which
you are really asking for problems on.
The stock rod bolts are 3/8 which is considerably stronger than the rootes
rod bolts, plus there is a strong, cheap rod bolt aftermarket.

My rods are actually 6 inch C/C rods from crower, and use 7/16 cap screw
style rod bolts made of inconel, uses lightweight floating tapered pins, and
weight still 75% of the rootes rod. These are some of the nice things you
can do for relatively cheap if you go with the chevy rods.

 

[old grumpy]

Sounds reasonable!
Wounder why Rootes have these big diameter pins. I have Volvo pistons and they have of course smaller piston pins.

 

[puff4]

The stock rods are OK, but the bolts are known to periodically fail.

Hmm... OK, so why not just get better bolts? I've got a set of ARP's for the rods - are they no longer available?

 

[alpine_64]

Hmm... OK, so why not just get better bolts? I've got a set of ARP's for the rods - are they no longer available?

Kevin IIRC the arp bolts for the rootes engines became NLA a while back, much like some of the ISKY stuff.. i think they just sold out of stock and never figured a big enough market to re run

 

[old grumpy]

Grumpy, its like this.....

Does this sentence have some kind of patronizing tone, or am I just oversensitive?

 

[Bill Blue]

Does this sentence have some kind of patronizing tone, or am I just oversensitive?

I vote for oversensitive. I didn't detect any patronization is his response, just laying out the facts. I have asked RootesRacer a lot of stupid questions over the years and have never had any problems with the "tone" of his answers. In fact, I find him eager to share knowledge and explain.

Bill

 

[old grumpy]

I vote for oversensitive. I didn't detect any patronization is his response, just laying out the facts. I have asked RootesRacer a lot of stupid questions over the years and have never had any problems with the "tone" of his answers. In fact, I find him eager to share knowledge and explain.

Bill

No, no, no. I also have a batch of stupid questions waiting to be asked.
It was only the sentence "its like this"

Or maybe one of the words in the sentence "its like this"

or maybe just a letter in this sentence. For instance the "t"....or maybe "k"..

 

[RootesRacer]

Does this sentence have some kind of patronizing tone, or am I just oversensitive?

Oversensitive for sure.

It wasnt intended to sound patronizing, sorry if it did.

 

[RootesRacer]

Hmm... OK, so why not just get better bolts? I've got a set of ARP's for the rods - are they no longer available?

The original sets were commissioned by Ramon Spontelli and it took a fairly long time for him to recover his investment (years).
The only way that ARP would make them was for someone (like Ramon) to pony up the money for the required build.

That said, not only are the ARP bolts again unavailable, but the rod bolts only cure half the problem, the other half is the rod itself.

The rootes rods are notoriously heavy, and since its setup with 11/32 rod bolts, as well has the oddball wrist pins, folks making higher output engines often feel the need for stronger lighter rods to go with their custom pistons.

 

[Jim E]

I talked to the folks at ARP a couple years back about the rod bolts and actually bought the last bolts they were willing to sell. [nope I do not have any now] I ask the fellow if they would make a new run of bolts and he said more or less the bolts are really odd ball and there is not a blank they make that they can use to make the bolt and it would require them to make a bolt from scratch or some such big money deal. He then went on to tell me the guy who made the Sunbeam bolts was no longer worked there and never should have made the bolts, ARP lost money on the deal and he ask if I was the guy who talked the fellow into making the bolts. No idea if what he told me is all true but there you go. So I doubt we will ever get new rod bolts.