FE Power Forums
FE Power Forums => FE Technical Forum => Topic started by: 390owner on March 04, 2020, 08:52:30 PM
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I posted a while back about my build 390 using oil. I have about 6000 mile on a complete rebuild by a machine shop. The same machine shop built me a 390 20 years ago so I used the same guy anyway at about 500 miles I am a quart low. When I first installed the new 390 my pvc valve was bad and was sucking oil into the engine. I drove it like this for about 3000 miles not knowing. Anyway could that have kept the rings from seating? I have talked to the machine shop several times. He says to keep driving it and it should stop using oil. I checked the oil today and I am down a little over 1\2 a quart at 307 miles. The engine runs better every time i drive it. Pulls like everything. I cant make it smoke. The vacuum is good. What do you guys think??
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My guess is that you've coked up the rings with all of that oil going through the PCV. Put a quart of Rislone in there to clean things up.
I bet your oil consumption will drop dramatically! Edit: Also make sure your valve cover is well baffled so you don't keep sucking oil through the PCV. I'm assuming you have oil restrictors in to control the amount of oil up top.
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That is something else I did was replace my chrome valve covers with the stock one. What is the stuff your are talking about and where do I get it
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Rislone Engine Treatment. Available at most auto parts places. It has a good quality engine oil as its base, plus effective solvents to break up sludge, varnish, and piston ring deposits. I've had good luck with it and you won't hurt anything.
https://shop.advanceautoparts.com/p/rislone-engine-oil-treatment-32-oz-100qr/7081049-P
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Rislone Engine Treatment. Available at most auto parts places. It has a good quality engine oil as its base, plus effective solvents to break up sludge, varnish, and piston ring deposits. I've had good luck with it and you won't hurt anything.
https://shop.advanceautoparts.com/p/rislone-engine-oil-treatment-32-oz-100qr/7081049-P
Yep, 2X to some Rislone! Be sure to get the Engine Treatment however.
I'd also fire it up cold and have someone follow you through the car's warm-up and some throttle work, including some long slow downs with the throttle closed (high vaccum). Have found that one can't really tell if it's a smoker while driving same!
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Ok as long as it wont hurt my new engine. Yeah I told the wife she was going to have to follow me and make sure it was not smoking. The exhaust turns out behind the rear tires and I can see them in the mirrors but mainly when I shift or first start up or lay the hammer down.
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To be sure use the non turbo version. Of course the turbo version is never in the store. Pick up oil and filter also. Top of oil. Warm engine. Pour in rislone. X minutes of idle Drain. New filter. New oil. Put a can of sea foam eng treatment in gas also
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To be sure use the non turbo version. Of course the turbo version is never in the store. Pick up oil and filter also. Top of oil. Warm engine. Pour in rislone. X minutes of idle Drain. New filter. New oil. Put a can of sea foam eng treatment in gas also
Actually - That's not correct. The instructions say to drive the vehicle for (at least) a few hundred miles with a quart of Rislone in the crankcase. That's what I have done with good results. You need time and miles for the solvents to do their work. Remember, Rislone has a base of good quality motor oil so it will not hurt to drive with it.
As for Sea Foam in the gas, well it won't really hurt anything. The only real benefit is if you need to stabilize the fuel for a car you don't drive frequently. Gasolines already have a good detergent package in them to take care of deposits. Sea Foam won't help with the ethanol eating up rubber parts in the carburetor. That's a whole other problem...
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Instructions are on the web and have several scenarios but I am wrong about topping off first. Maybe metal can way back when said top off.
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Ok so I had my son follow me today behind the bronco with the 390. It smoked after I let off then got back on the gas. It also puffed some blue smoke when I shifted.
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my guess is the rings never seated. Put some Rislone in it and drive it like you stole it. You don't need to over rev it, but I'd punish that bad girl.
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If it smokes when you let off the gas, that’s a high vacuum scenario. I would look at valve seals, guides, and most likely intake gaskets.
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Yes to Rislone.
But, keep in mind too that given the pipes and especially the mufflers have be liberally oiled, it will take some time and miles, given the rings do get seated, for the oil coating to burn off and stop making smoke. Had the same some years ago (valve guide wear) and was surprised how long it took for the oil to burn off completely and all smoking to go away.
On edit: as Brent just said, you must also look into the intake gaskets, seals, guides and evne the PCV valve, if used. FE's are prone to intake gasket leaks for a host of reasons.
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intake gasket,i sealed mine up good this last time and it no longer uses a quart of oil every few days like it did.
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This engine has been completely worked including the heads and guides and everything else. Could it still be the guides? Also if the intake gasket was leaking would a vacuum gauge not show it?
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Do you think it is slowly getting better or worse? What kind of rings did you use and what kind of oil do you use? All the plugs look the same?
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This engine has been completely worked including the heads and guides and everything else. Could it still be the guides? Also if the intake gasket was leaking would a vacuum gauge not show it?
Probably not.
What do the plugs look like? Have you looked at all 8?
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The last thing to try if you cant find it get some bon ami cleaner and pour it down the carb when its running the rings will seat this was done by gm to fix the 55 265 and later the 327 look it up it works.I have seen it done
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I think it is getting a little better. It is not using as much as it was at first. The plugs all look the same and are clean.
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I hope it goes well for you .
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I'd keep running it.
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my guess is the rings never seated. Put some Rislone in it and drive it like you stole it. You don't need to over rev it, but I'd punish that bad girl.
Which Rislone are you recommending for new engines that didn't seal? There seem to be quite a few. One is synthetic. Brent and a couple others suggested staying away from synthetics on new builds. Or is the small quantity safe?
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The last thing to try if you cant find it get some bon ami cleaner and pour it down the carb when its running the rings will seat this was done by gm to fix the 55 265 and later the 327 look it up it works.I have seen it done
It's been since about 1970 since I've thought of this. I personally know of it being done on a FE, seemed to work for a while, then lost can bearings.
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my guess is the rings never seated. Put some Rislone in it and drive it like you stole it. You don't need to over rev it, but I'd punish that bad girl.
Which Rislone are you recommending for new engines that didn't seal? There seem to be quite a few. One is synthetic. Brent and a couple others suggested staying away from synthetics on new builds. Or is the small quantity safe?
Rislone Engine Treatment. Available at most auto parts places. It has a good quality engine oil as its base, plus effective solvents to break up sludge, varnish, and piston ring deposits. I've had good luck with it and you won't hurt anything.
https://shop.advanceautoparts.com/p/rislone-engine-oil-treatment-32-oz-100qr/7081049-P
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ok a update on the oil consuming on new 390. If I rev it to 3000 the let off and give it gas again it puffs smoke every time Blue smoke Still sound like the rings?
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Maybe. But we still have not seen either a compression test nor leakdown test. It is possible btw both may look pretty good if the oil rings/expanders are stuck. Easy stuff to check too is if the vavle seals are still good, the guide-to-valve clearances are not excessive (a bit harder to diagnose) and one is sure no intake gasket leaks nor PCV valve issues are the cause of the smoke.
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I had something similar in my 67 F250 with 390 & NP435. Taking off, wouldnt smoke, shifted below 2500-3000 it wouldnt smoke either, but higher and it would. Thought maybe too much oil up top sucking it out the pvc, so I restricted the oil coming up top. That wasnt it. Thought valve guide seals, they were a bit hard, but still pliable and all 16 were whole, still replaced with alex's parts positive seal (the ones for factory sized guides). Same problem. Just kept driving the truck as it was my only means, so I would just short shift. Then it started to get worse, it would start to smoke on shifts no matter the RPM, but it was erratic. Then once in a while, it would throw a bunch of smoke out of the exhaust when I would take off from a stop, I could tell it was going to do it as it would just slightly start to run rough right before it did it. It was embarrassing to me as it would leave this huge smoke ball that would just linger. Finally took the valve covers off and it was the intake gasket. The #3 & #6 intake gasket separated near the top. Weirdest thing I ever saw. Fixed it, still smoked a bit, but after a couple months, no smoke. Like they said before, some residual oil I figure in the exhaust. In the one picture, you can see the #6 gasket sticking up slightly.
This truck has C6AE-U heads and CJ intake.
Keith
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I am going to put a vacuum gauge on it again and see what it says. Like mentioned before this engine a year ago had all new parts put into it by a machine shop that has been in business for over30 years. I am sure the guides and seals are still good from the build. I will try to get a compression test done also. If the intake seal was bad shouldent the vacuum gauge show it??
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Vacuum gauge rarely shows a vacuum leak like that.
To me, it absolutely doesn't sound like rings. It sounds like oil being pulled by the guides or the bottom of the intake, or into the PCV. Why? could be many reasons
1 - Crappy valve seals
2 - Blocked returns
3 - Loose guides
4 - No seals on the exhaust, old school not the greatest idea IMHO
5 - Poor gasket seal on the bottom of the intake
6 - Bad design for the valve cover baffle allowing oil to be sucked in
Questions
What is your intake/head combo and what did you use for intake gaskets?
What did you use for valve seals?
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Yes, it's possible but not likely a vac. gauge could show a leaking intake gasket. But only if it's a somewhat massive leak.
But, you've not posted from what I can see what you idle vac. numbers are.
As pointed out in other posts....My427Stang even listed possible causes noted below:
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Vacuum gauge rarely shows a vacuum leak like that.
To me, it absolutely doesn't sound like rings. It sounds like oil being pulled by the guides or the bottom of the intake, or into the PCV. Why? Could be many reasons
1 - Crappy valve seals
2 - Blocked returns
3 - Loose guides
4 - No seals on the exhaust, old school not the greatest idea IMHO
5 - Poor gasket seal on the bottom of the intake
6 - Bad design for the valve cover baffle allowing oil to be sucked in
Questions
What is your intake/head combo and what did you use for intake gaskets?
What did you use for valve seals?
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
You could pull the intake and carefully inspect the lower edges (valley side) of the gaskets to see if they have uniform crush all around each 8 intake runners. That and the overall condition of the gaskets. Then, you could use a valve spring puller to remove a few at random and check if the seals are intact, tight and not damaged. Or, take off the heads and have a shop check the guides, seals, etc.
Short of some teardown and close inspection, you'll either need to live with the smoke or dig into it.
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Here is the vacuum reading. It is not steady for sure(https://live.staticflickr.com/31337/49782596461_ec217b3fd9.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2iR7PwD)IMG_2849 (https://flic.kr/p/2iR7PwD) by Daniel Crymes (https://www.flickr.com/photos/169098912@N02/), on Flickr
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Do you have a working PCV system?
Mine was doing the same after the rebuild until I installed one.
Pulling a vacuum under the pistons helps keep the oil from going past the rings
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Yes
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What inlet manifold is it? I am just screwing together my 390 and dummied up the heads & manifold (RPM) last night to check the gaps. I noticed something holding the manifold up slightly. The port flanges are very very deep & hitting the head/block intersection area. This will be enough so as not to get full compression on the gaskets. I will be removing quite a bit of material (probably around .100 or so) from the bottom of this flange area to let the manifold sit down properly.
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Here is the vacuum reading. It is not steady for sure(https://live.staticflickr.com/31337/49782596461_ec217b3fd9.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2iR7PwD)IMG_2849 (https://flic.kr/p/2iR7PwD) by Daniel Crymes (https://www.flickr.com/photos/169098912@N02/), on Flickr
Not good. Yeah, the low reading and bouncing needle means something is amiss. As noted, perhaps the intake was hanging up on the OEM Ford aligment dowel pin on the china wall, the head gasket tabs that some gaskets have to hold up the intake gaskets in the correct position or (generally non-OEM intakes) the casting on the valley side is preventing the intake gaskets from fully sealing. That's why a careful inspection of the intake gaskets sometimes reveals that at the perimeter (thin: valley side) the gaskets aren't equally compressed, hence a valley gasket leak and smoke.
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Which intake, which heads, which gasket? :)
I can't promise an answer, but there are a lot of potential mismatches of those three parts the many of us would know right off the bat
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Stock heads stock four barrel intake. Good gaskets but I will have to look for the brand the machine shop used I think it was fel pro gaskets but I will check
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Casting numbers on each would help more but ask if he used the all blue Felpro or the Printoseal
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Have someone follow you again to watch exhaust while you get on it hard and let off the throttle entirely. If it smoked while on the throttle hard, it's rings, if it smokes off the throttle or heavy downshift deceleration, it's the guides. Just because they're new valve guides doesn't mean that they are clearances right. Sounds dumb, but check that valve seals are installed properly or that they weren't forgotten entirely.
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intake gasket,i sealed mine up good this last time and it no longer uses a quart of oil every few days like it did.
when i switched from a pi intake to a rpm,my engine done the same thing yours is doing.i took the intake off twice and both times it smoked and used oil when i put it back on,the third time i put it on i used a very healthy amount of sealer on it.it no longer smokes or uses oil.
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Here are a couple of plugs. My stupid phone would not focus but you can see they are black. If I lean my carb any more than it is now the engine surges.https://flic.kr/p/https://flic.kr/p/https://flic.kr/p/2iSagjC
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https://flic.kr/p/2iSd4tk
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https://flic.kr/p/https://flic.kr/p/2iSagjC
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https://flic.kr/p/2iSagjC
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The plugs have 2500 miles on them
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i have a whole coffee can full of used plugs,most of them are oil fouled when it was sucking oil with the bad intake seal.i thought i was never going to find out why it was smoking and using oil,til i used ++ amounts of sealer.after that i changed my oil 2500 miles later,and it was still full.i did not add any oil between changes. issues solved! p.s. my plugs looked exactly like yours,oiled.
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So all eight of the plugs looked the same?
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No about half were oiled the other half were ok.i guess where my intake wasn't sealed good,it leaked or sucked oil in more than one spot.but i went ahead and changed them all while i was at it.but i finally got it fixed when i threw the sealer to it.
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That is what I cant figure out all my plugs look the same all black
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mine were all black,but only about half had wet oil all over them
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I pulled my pcv valve today and put a vent in its place. I then plugged the vacuum port on the base of the carb. I drove it over 100 miles the oil did not move on the dip stick when I checked it after the trip. Will it hurt the engine to not run a pcv? Or if I use a smaller vacuum hose for the pcv will it keep it from sucking oil? Before on a trip of about 80 miles the oil would be 1/4 down on the dip stick every time.
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Won't hurt a thing. None of my engines leave here with PCV valves.
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I pulled my pcv valve today and put a vent in its place. I then plugged the vacuum port on the base of the carb. I drove it over 100 miles the oil did not move on the dip stick when I checked it after the trip. Will it hurt the engine to not run a pcv? Or if I use a smaller vacuum hose for the pcv will it keep it from sucking oil? Before on a trip of about 80 miles the oil would be 1/4 down on the dip stick every time.
Yes, you can use your current hose and plug it with any number of materials after you drill a small hole in that plug, say a 1/8"s or so to limit vacuum. Interesting too is why your engine started using oil after some years, I presume. Often, a valve cover change is at fault where their is zero or inadequate shielding on the head side fo the cover, where oil splash is directly sucked up into the valve. Some sheet metal shielding, like that on OEM Ford covers, is present for that very reason.
In some other posts today, some have had issues and don't like to run a PCV valve. I agree for all-out, competition engines. But, for lesser mortals that only occasionally run up the rpms a lot, that valve does have benefits.
Keep in mind billions of miles (no kidding) have been run by all the makes of cars here in the USA and abroad since PCV valves started up in the early 1960's without any problems. In fact, most of the troubles, even as noted in another post here, relate to possible detonation issues in modified engines and/or unusual oil consumption. Detonation due to oiled combustion chambers is a real issue IF the PCV valve malfunctions or, as noted, changes to the valve covers or other breather related issues, Then yes by all means "hot" engines should not run the valve.
But and IMO, the vast majority of basically street engines we actually "drive" here can likely benefit by running one. The choice is yours.
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This is a new engine. I have about 7000 miles on it. It has been using oil since I put it in my bronco. It did get a little better. So that is why I removed the pcv to see if it made a difference on the oil disappearing it did. Thanks for the input I think I will run it a while without it and see what happens. I would like it to work without sucking oil so I did not smell the fumes. I did change the valve covers back to the stock covers from a chrome set I had on it before
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what year Bronco ?
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1979 (https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/49444497727_aa9a281c01.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2ikeYy8)IMG_1546 (https://flic.kr/p/2ikeYy8) by Daniel Crymes (https://www.flickr.com/photos/169098912@N02/), on Flickr
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Nice!
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Sweet ride!
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oh yea , I like that , with a fe on top of that , cool .
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Thanks the 390 pulls it down the road with no problem. This is the second 390 I put in it . I wore the first one out.
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I pulled my pcv valve today and put a vent in its place. I then plugged the vacuum port on the base of the carb. I drove it over 100 miles the oil did not move on the dip stick when I checked it after the trip. Will it hurt the engine to not run a pcv? Or if I use a smaller vacuum hose for the pcv will it keep it from sucking oil? Before on a trip of about 80 miles the oil would be 1/4 down on the dip stick every time.
Yes, you can use your current hose and plug it with any number of materials after you drill a small hole in that plug, say a 1/8"s or so to limit vacuum. Interesting too is why your engine started using oil after some years, I presume. Often, a valve cover change is at fault where their is zero or inadequate shielding on the head side fo the cover, where oil splash is directly sucked up into the valve. Some sheet metal shielding, like that on OEM Ford covers, is present for that very reason.
In some other posts today, some have had issues and don't like to run a PCV valve. I agree for all-out, competition engines. But, for lesser mortals that only occasionally run up the rpms a lot, that valve does have benefits.
Keep in mind billions of miles (no kidding) have been run by all the makes of cars here in the USA and abroad since PCV valves started up in the early 1960's without any problems. In fact, most of the troubles, even as noted in another post here, relate to possible detonation issues in modified engines and/or unusual oil consumption. Detonation due to oiled combustion chambers is a real issue IF the PCV valve malfunctions or, as noted, changes to the valve covers or other breather related issues, Then yes by all means "hot" engines should not run the valve.
But and IMO, the vast majority of basically street engines we actually "drive" here can likely benefit by running one. The choice is yours.
I am a PCV valve fan too, like any other component, it can be done wrong or right, but when done right, it's evacuating your crankcase at idle and part throttle, nothing wrong with that on the street.
The challenge becomes evacuation at WOT and oil control, but with a well baffled system, oil control is less of an issue. It doesn't help WOT though, and if run there for a long time, the only real answer is also tying it to the air cleaner with some sort of oil control again, but that's never perfect either when feeding right into the carb.
I wonder how a pan evac could work with a PCV. You get part throttle and WOT?
I do agree most vents work well, but, they don't evacuate, they just relieve, and that mist isn't just oil, it's also stuff you want out of there. Does it matter that much? I don't know, probably not, but I use PCVs where I can on the street
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I had a VERY similar situation with my 428
It ended up being my valve guides were shot
I tried Viton seals Teflon seals and nothing would help
I replaced the heads with Edelbrock heads
PROBLEM SOLVED
good luck
Dave
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Always seal your rocker stand bolts/studs with teflon tape or they can leak oil into the intake ports through the bottom of the bolt hole, especially on aluminum aftermarket heads.