My 427 SOHC Build..... Finally the time has come!

[blykins]

Can you pull the valve covers easily?  Bearing issues will also show up by depositing debris in the tops of the heads.

[cobracammer]

Not really.

[cobracammer]

I think I know where it came from!  The stub cam has copper-esk journals that ride in the cam tunnel. When I installed it, the first lobe ( which slides in 1st was a little tight, eventually with the lube it slid in and the second one ( front lobe on stub cam) slid in normally. I am guessing this is where it came from. Worries me less than having main bearing problems, but hopefully it will clear up on the second run/ oil change.

It hit me all of a sudden. Pretty sure this is it!

[blykins]

Copper on a billet core camshaft or stub cam is from the heat treating process.   Whether it's a stub or a billet camshaft, there is nothing that's going to touch that part of the shaft.  The journals themselves will ride in the cam bearings and the journal will be the part that's a little snug when going in the cam bearing. 

My guess is that you have either had a piece of trash go through the bearings and it has scored one down to the copper, or you have a thrust bearing that's going away. 

What was your thrust bearing clearance and did you set the thrust bearings?  What were your main and rod bearing clearances? 

[cjshaker]

You usually don't have thrust bearing issues unless you have zero clearance or the trans is putting pressure on the crank. 

But, I would agree that it doesn't look good, especially if all the debris is copper colored.

Brent, I agree you don't usually have problems, especially this early, but other than bearings, it's the only copper colored pieces I could see making that stuff. Unless there are bronze bushings someplace in the engine. I'm not familiar with Cammers enough though.

[cobracammer]

Its all copper colored dust suspension in oil. No big pieces of metal anywhere.

When I measured the mains, they were all toward the larger side of therange (0.003 if i remember correctly.

I could definately see maybe my block cleaning before assembly was not perfect. I am going to change the oil with 8 quarts more break in oil, fill up the new filter, 30 min run again and ill check the oil and filter again

[blykins]

For future reference, when you build your next one, aluminum blocks expand in the mains when they get hot.  Your .003" cold clearance will end up at almost .004" when hot.  You may notice that when your oil temp is up and you may need to run some thicker oil, like a 20W-50 or so. 

So what was your crank thrust clearance?  The fine copper could be from the thrust bearing essentially being milled away.

[cobracammer]

Cant remember off hand

[cobracammer]

OK lets return to the point. I am new to engine building  LOL  I just looked up what thrust clearance to be sure I wasn't making comments about something and was confusing it for something else...... and as usual, it turns out I was.

When I Installed the crankshaft, I torqued all of the main caps except for the middle one (Where the thrust bearing is).  I then put the dial indicator on the snout of the crank and as directed, moved the crankshaft back and forth with a large flat tip screwdriver.  I think I was measuring run out? (Not thrust clearance).  When I went back and forth with the crank, I was again within spec (I checked this through the forum.... its probably back on one of these pages).  At this point I torqued down the center main cap. 

If I am not mistaken, measuring thrust bearing clearance requires you to measure the space between the crankshaft weight and the thrust bearing surface?  This I did not do it seems.  But if I did not have the correct run out when pushing the crankshaft forward and backwards, this would have meant my thrust bearing clearance was off no?  So since it was in spec, the clearance should be ok?

Again I want to run over this again (Because my pictures taken with an iPhone are not that great).....  There are no large pieces of metal in the oil of filter.  There are pieces about half the size of glitter, and there is even finer powder that stays suspended in the oil.

Almost all of the half size glitter "stuff" is gold in color....  I have been saying copper, but its more gold....  (hard to tell exactly as its soooo tiny).

Also I have 2 oil drain plugs on my pan and both are magnetic.  they had only a little tiny amount of dark powder (maybe the size of 1/4 of a pencil eraser) stuck to it...... again no half glitter size pieces or pieces of metal of any type/size.  It basically looked like a tiny amount of metallic powder.

I also see on the oil filter element (once I cut it out) that there was the red cam lube I used on the stub cam as well as some of the dark ARP torque lube... again not a lot.

Engine was primed when I first assembled it and sat for a few months before I tried to start it.....  Possibly not as lubricated at first start up as it should have been?  Also, this would make sense as when I was trying to find TDC with the breaker bar on the crank bolt, it was difficult to turn (but not impossible)......  This last time when I went to find TDC, it cranked smoothly clockwise and counterclockwise with not even half the effort it originally took.  I am guessing that since the engine was running for 30 min or so, its now completely lubed up!

I guess I want to make sure my description and bad pictures are not swaying anyone.  On the filter element, if you don't stick your face down against it, you cant see anything (that's how small the powder is).

I don't want to sound like someone making excuses, but I know my pictures suck (and those were the best of what I was able to take!)

[blykins]

Well, a magnet won't pickup bronze or aluminum of course....it's just going to pick up ring dust and any other ferrous material.

Crankshaft thrust clearance is crankshaft endplay.  It's how much axial movement you have with the caps torqued.  You put a dial indicator on the nose or the flange and wiggle it back and forth to see what clearance you have.  I like to see at least .004-.005" there and some of the combinations end up at .007-.008.

Measuring run-out on something tells you how out-of-round it is.  For instance if you were to put the crank in a set of V-blocks, put a dial indicator on a journal, and turn the crank, the dial indicator would tell you if it's out-of-round, bent, etc. 

It's fairly common to have crank/bearing/block combinations where you have no thrust clearance at all and the bearings have to be massaged. 

The bottom line is that you should not have any copper showing in the filter.   There's only so many places it can come from and if it's making metal during just a 10-15 break-in session, it could get worse during harder operation. 

[cobracammer]

Understood. Page 9 of this forum.  End play on the crankshaft came in at 0.005 (Of course I used the wrong terminology at the time)

I guess my only option at this time is to run it in the garage another time or 2 and see if this is something that goes away or gets worse).  If it doesn't go away after another 2 separate 30 minutes break in runs (new oil and new filter each time), I am guessing the whole thing is coming back out and getting new bearings.

Also, I was thinking, the valve guides are bronze no?  Is there anyway (just given the "grit size of these particles) that it could have been dust from a dry start from the valve guides?  2 valves per cylinder, 8 cylinders  .... 16 bronze valve guides would be a good source of this color dust.

Also I was looking up bearing failure, and they seem to appear as "chips".  There were no chips at all.  I think out of all the things mentioned so far, Brents suggestion on the thrust bearing makes the most sense....  powdery since its "slowly milling the sides of the thrust bearing surface.....

I am guessing if this is correct, changing out the oil 2 or 3 more times will solve the issue........  If its actually a main bearing issue, it will get worse over the next 2 oil changes/inspections.

Thoughts?

[blykins]

Valve guides are bronze, but whoever assembled your heads should have put assembly lube on the valves....if not, they need to be beaten about the head and neck.

.005" crank end-play isn't bad.  Hard to imagine that you're getting wear from that unless you have a clutch/trans/bell issue and all the end-play is being taken up because the crank is pushed forward. 

[cobracammer]

Trans slid in smooth once I got it all aligned.  Trans and bell housing were flush and did NOT use the bolts to pull them together.

2 interesting things I found while researching online.

1st)  TONS of people talk about gold dust in their oil filter after break in, but NO ONE post any pictures. 

2nd)  when people show spun bearings, they get pieces of silver chips before they start to get the inner copper color..  and its not usually dust.

I will feel a ton better if I flush this engine, add new break in oil and filter.... and the second inspection is clean as a whistle!  LOL

If not, what the hell.....  what's a little more experience with Mic-ing the journals and installing new main bearings  LOL

[blykins]

I hope everything turns out ok for you man.

One last question....

Is your throw out bearing touching the pressure plate at rest?

[cobracammer]

No, I checked in this one.  After the clutch is released, the throw out bearing completely releases the tension on the Clutch fingers.  Obviously, the bearing wont retract where there would be dead space between the fingers and the throw out bearing surface, but I am positive that there is no pressure at all on the clutch fingers after the clutch pedal is released