Im fascinated and educated about valve timing. I have a 69-72 timing set for my engine and Im looking forward to comparing it to your pics.
Don, if you have a 250 inline...your stuck with factory/replacement timing set. Nobody makes the double roller timing set for us 250 guys that I know of. The '69 gear set is our best option. I read where the 289 timing gear/chain can be made to fit but the cost for the set is up there in price and the chain will fit loosely. You can have the machine shop cut a new keyway in your crank gear or go with an offset key if you needed.
No worries fella’s, were all a bunch of problem solvers around these parts! A little side bar is perfectly ok with me
Thanks for the reminder groberts101! When I was originally doing my homework I wanted a solid lifter set up with a mid-range cam. After researching different vendors I never really came up with a solution. From Classic Inlines, I went to each of the vendors, Crane, Clifford, Comp Cams, Isky , Schneder and a few others. I didn’t really see what I was looking for and as stated above, one of my main requirements was “solid lifter”. Of what I found, the ones that do make a solid lifter start at the high end 278/278 and above, so that’s why I ended up buying the 278/278. So I called around a few places to see about getting it reground and decided to go with Crower about 45 minutes away. I have to say, awesome service! They had me taken care of within 24 hours. I fully expected two weeks! To top it off, it came with a cam card, a big tube of assembly grease, stickers and packaged up just like brand new. If you’re in the area, Ramiro at the front desk on the shop floor will treat you right! I’ve included a scan of the cam card for your perusal. I went with a dual pattern as advertised 264/274 @ 112⁰. *Note to self, next time buy a custom grind from the beginning, save yourself time and money….. Crower had blanks too, Ramiro knew what I had within a nanosecond of opening the box and knew just about what I was looking for right off the bat.
still a healthy cam for that little motor but the shorter overlap/wider LSA will help you build cylinder pressure down low and into the midrange quite nicely. Should idle nice and smooth with a small hint of "healthy".. and make excellent vacuum too. Have any other build spec's to share with us? Any headwork? Stock valve sizes? Matching springs too? Piston to deck clearance? Flat top pistons or dished? Intake or exhaust manifold mods? Or headers maybe?(hopefully) C'mon with the details man.. inquiring minds want to know!
I don’t want to jinx anything but I can say flat top pistons are about ready to go in. The block’s been decked ten thousands (not a zero deck). I’m not quite that experienced to pull that off yet LOL!. I can say headers will be a must for what I have planned and I’m starting to get pretty excited but the expensive bits are coming up so “we’ll see” how things go. All I can say is, Stay Tuned!!!!
ok.. attention caught! lol And hopefully those figures for the top ring end gaps are just a randomly inputed number or you'll butt the ends when that thing warms up real good.
Just saw your post on your 200 build. Back in 1972 I did a very similar job on my 200 Maverick. See if you can get your hands on a cylinder head from a 170 ci motor. It will give you a nice performance kick (different combustion chambers). Wish I still had that motor. It was a blast to drive. Cant wait to see how your project turns out.
Everything on my sheet so far is actual, I put the top ring in each cylinder and squared them up by pressing them in about an inch with a piston. After that, I measured each gap with a feeler gauge. Classic Inlines specifications calls for a Compression Ring Gap of .015 + .005 and an Oil Ring Gap of .020 + .030. I was hoping to get all the rod bearing clearances and ring gaps measured today. I’ll post up my results later today.
You probably know this but just in case...make sure you thoroughly lubricate the piston pins before you stab the pistons in the block. They probably are fairly dry when you got them back from the machinest that assembled them. If you don't the motor will seize when you try to start it. I usually fill up a coffee can with motor oil and dunk the piston in it once all the rings are installed. Then let the excess just drip off and in the block it goes!
Got my measurements done today, I did however come up with a different result on the top rings than the initial measurement. What’s the old saying measure three times and cut once? We’ll this time I triple checked all the rings and even moved them around between cylinders until I got the same results all the way across. Got them all bagged up per each cylinder. Not sure why I got what I got the other day except that I was in the middle of some honey dues. I had a few minutes between projects.... Focus grasshopper, focus..!!! Any suggestions on clocking the rings? My initial thought was to make a star (five sided), separate out the top and middle rings as far apart as I could get them. See crude graphic below. For the graph below, front of the engine is ---->
