Good morning.  A friend of mine is assembling a 390.  After installing the rocker shafts, he noticed the rocker arm wasn't properly located on the valve stem top.  In fact, it was close to sliding off.  The heads are brand new Edelbrocks.  He called me as I've assembled a few FE engines but I've never had this problem.  What could be causing this?  Wrong rocker stands?  Wrong length pushrods?  He also said the engine used to break rocker arms before the rebuild.  Any ideas as to how to correct the problem?  Thank you.

Although I've been reading Car Craft for more years than I care to think about, I always take what any mag prints with a grain of salt.  If it don't sound right it probably isn't!  As proof, on page 93 of the September issue, they refer to a 64 Falcon's original engine as a "260-inch inline six"!  Never heard of that one!

Thank you for the great information and for the comeback.  I'm always grateful to folks with more knowledge who are willing to teach me something!   I remember something called a Ported Vacuum Switch which screwed into the water neck.  It was my understanding that it would switch from ported vacuum to manifold vacuum if it sensed an overheat condition.  It would advance timing at idle and also increase idle RPM to bring the engine temp back down.  It was an early band-aid emission device.  I'm pretty sure the 428CJ had vacuum advance with a PVS.  I can certainly see how a pretty wild engine wouldn't do well with vacuum advance but on a milder street engine I would think it would help low speed street operation both in a cleaner idle and helping reduce engine temperature.  Educate me!  LOL!

From what I've heard, vacuum advance will help with cooling and will make the car idle cleaner.

The Heli Coil repair has always worked well for me but if I had access to a good welder, I'd probably weld them up and drill and tap them.

I've built a number of drag cars over the years and whenever I install a roll cage, belts or whatever, I do it with the thought in mind that somebody is going to test my work someday.  I've seen rollbars made of exhaust tubing which would fold over and kill the driver if the car goes on it's lid.  I've seen bungee cords holding batteries in place and all kinds of things that would cause mayhem in a crash.  This video has been around a while but it shows how NOT to build a car.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfbc-51fRkQ 

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