Jeep Strokers

It's pretty much shorblocked...I'll install the damper when I get the spacer made next week.

Bag it and tag it Dan-O.....Now it's time to finish the cylinder head:)

Nice degree wheel and I like what you did with the oil pan. Did you remember the cam spring and pin before you put the timing cover on?

I borrowed that wheel from the shop. It was made by Gearhead Tools, who is now out of business, and came with a variety of center spacer hubs to fit different size crank bolts. Mine is essentially the same but is the Powerhouse/Comp Cams brand that uses a variety of 1/2" drive crank sockets none of which worked on the tiny snout of the L6 very well.

I did remember the spring and pin, then almost forgot the oil slinger...LOL. When I took the first engine apart it did not have them (in fact the bolt did not have a hole in it) and the timing chain was hella stretched and the gears were tore up pretty good. I don't know if the early engines did not have them or if the previous rebuilder just stuffed any old cam bolt in there but when I saw it in the second engine I thought it was a cool deal. I read a thread where someone made a solid pin, and I thought about using a thrust button from a V8 roller cam deal but my app is a pretty basic driver and I'm guessing the stock arrangement works pretty good.

I recall reading that the early engines didn't have the spring and pin setup

Day 20.....

I spent another six hours porting today. I pretty much hate rubbing on cast iron. It takes forever, and even on a porting bench I can just feel the stuff getting in my pores. I finished blending the bowls to the radius cutter we used on the seats for the LS1 valves. I port matched the roof of the intake runners and also raised the roof of the exhaust port about .050". There's apretty good bump in there and I would have liked to raise it a little more but I don't know these castings so I'm skeered of hitting water and scrapping a head I have a lot of work in. The cutter did a great job of putting the seats and radius in for the larger valves and required just a small bump with stones to complete the valve job. Tomorrow I will surface the head, set stem heights and assemble it.

I had to make a crank key for the balancer. The one that came out of my 4.0 cranks just didn't fit right and I found one the proper length but it was too thin so I took a too long one of the correct thickness and ground it to match the one that was too thin. It fit perfectly.

Well the build is nearing it's end and may very well be done tomorrow (well, maybe and maybe not cause of pushrods), so I stopped by Napa on the way home and got a new cap, rotor, plugs, wires, and motor and tranny mounts. I already have a new temp sender and might get a new pressure sender as well.

I still have a wrecking yard trip to make. The old power steering box was leaking pretty good and I'm hoping I can get a good one from Pik-A-Part without paying a couple hundred bucks at Napa. I have a laundry list of little pieces I need to get before I install the stroker. I still need to get injectors, an adjustable MAP and FPR, and Renix TPS adapter. I'm hoping I can get a longer kick down cable as well 'cause I saw one another site that had used the later manifold and it was really stretched. It'll be a whole day at the bone yard assuming I actually take the right tools which is unlikely:)

I'll post pics of the head tomorrow.....

Bowl work after cutting for larger seats and before shaping the guide bosses....my phone died shortly after so this is the only pic I got of the bowl work.

This is a view of the port match on the intake and where I raised the roof a little on the exhaust. You can see the scribe line in the dykem of how far I could have potentially gone but was skeered to because that is also very near where the water jacket starts as best I could tell by measuring down from the temp sender port I drilled and tapped for the Renix location. Since I chose not to go that far I never calculated the area relative to the valve size so I don't know if I would even have to go that far. I did raise the roof maybe .050" and blended it down towards the bowl.

A couple views of the combustion chambers with the LS1 valves installed. The chambers are polished but have been glass beaded so they're dull looking.

Day 21.....

OMG, the closer I get the less I get done. I dropped a keeper in the porting bench and it took an hour to retrieve it cause you have to disassemle the darn bench plus once i was there I cleaned it out for the guys.

Surfaced the head today. After spending about and hour and ahalf looking for the right stuff to fixture it up I took about .005" off of it. Washed it yet again and began assembly.

I set the stem heights and began to check for coil bind. It was soooooo tedious. Because I'm using stock springs and shimming them up for additional pressure I'm getting really close to .060" before coil bind so I must have triple checked each spring. I would have liked to buy some other spring but I really didn't want to go back to my old aluminum cover 'cause that thing would never stay torqued and liked to leak. I've read a bunch on here of people having trouble with fitment of aftermarket springs on the sheet metal cover so I punted. Besides my cam is only a little more lift than stock with more duration so I was able to pull it off....I think...lol. As the valves seat I will gain just a little and should be fine.

I put the head on the block and measured for P-rod length but by the time I was done it was too late to order them for delivery by tomorrow so I'll try to find them locally. I still have to paint the head and torque it but if I can find pushrods I should be done with the long block tomorrow. BTW that Mopar Performance head gasket is really f'n sharp....ask me how I know

gonridnu wrote:I would have liked to buy some other spring but I really didn't want to go back to my old aluminum cover 'cause that thing would never stay torqued and liked to leak. I've read a bunch on here of people having trouble with fitment of aftermarket springs on the sheet metal cover so I punted.

Once again, take a hammer to the valve cover to clearance it. Or use Lafrad's beehive setup. Whats your fear of the hammer?

BTW that Mopar Performance head gasket is really f'n sharp....ask me how I know

Yeah.. that thing will cut you if you aren't carefil.

I like Lafrad's set up a lot and even have some new hemi retainers, but $325 for springs when I could make new stockers work on my low lift cam by shimming a little seemed a bit extreme even for me....That's the better part of a new set of tires....LOL

I got about 90 lbs on the seat and 210 over the nose with .060" to coil bind without valve cover clearance issues all for the low low price of $40 for springs and $1.89 for LS1 locks.

Ur right....unless I'm shoeing horses I don't do hammers very well...

Silver U really got me thinking now....I read Lafrad's whole thread. Last time I just saw the price of the springs and decided I did not need to do it, but I have an idea which is always dangerous. He sez the Crower ovate springs are targeted at the ford 3V OHC crowd. Perhaps maybe the stock spring for that application can also be made to work on the 4.0 head for a bunch less money. Stock springs are usually way cheap from aftermarket suppliers. For example I paid like $2.34 ea. for my stock replacement 4.0 springs. I'll check the spring specs and prices when I get to the shop and report back. This might cost me a day or two if it works out:)

The stockers aren't even close....but I did figure out the V-10 dodge trucks use the same part number spring as our jeeps...not that it helps any just a factoid. I'm tired of looking through diametrical spring charts so it's back to the motor....

http://www.naxja.org/forum/showthread.php?t=992922

He used some beehive valve springs, but he thought it was a big secret and like an ass he didn't share. Maybe you can identify the springs and retainers?