All joking aside, Is he 90 years old?

This is all bad advice. It sounds like he builds/built a lot of flat tappet gen I stuff.

20w50 is too heavy. it is recommended when you need to take up slop in the build. It also requires more hp to push, and does not flow as quickly. You get a higher pressure at the gauge. Whoopeee, that doesn't mean you are protecting your engine better.

There is nothing wrong with synthetics. Some of our cars left the factory with it. Zero, zilch, nada. Some vettes in the 70s even left the factory with synthetics, with flat tappet cams and gen I engines.

And he can get to chugging. The only off the shelf oil at this time, 9/27/12, that has the "proper" ZDDP levels people look for is valvoline VR1. No Castrol, Mobil, Shell, Pennzoil, Wolf's Head, Quaker State, etc off the shelf oil has it anymore. So if you want zinc, it ain't in Pennzoil. Rotella used to, but not anymore. It was confirmed right from Shell.

yeah his penzoil is still in boxes has seen some years.
hes owned a machine shop for over 40 years id assume he'd no more than me.
i do want to run a 1540 but didnt know sheep stopped putting in zinc

This is really going places

Yes, and none of them good.

Oy Vey, someone should really straighten out this whole thing before it all goes to hell. If metal got to your mains then it no doubt got to the cam. I have a ruined cam and crank to prove it. As for the oil, I have cans of oil going back at least 30 years, doesn't mean I'll dump it into any engines of mine just because it has additives or whatever else that is not around anymore. I just put any old conventional oil in the L98 and changed it twice in less than 500 miles on the bottom end rebuild. All good. But that is all I will say, someone else can do the lecture for newer engines, I haven't done any newer ones.

yeah it had seen some metal 50k miles ago when the ms3 broke the piston to valve clearance. it was at .022 and it caused a rocker to break into many pieces.
the motor was flushed the debris was removed thale cam was replaced.
regardless idk where the motor was for the first 97k miles of its life. who know how long those grooves in tge mains caused by the debris is.
i always ran 10w30 rotella in my car with a bosch oil filter. and have been finding minimal shavings on the plug fir quite sine time.
i find it quite impressive hiw long its lasted with the top end worked.
and especially when im a few rpms shy of 7k because when its up there i all in my mind is "any second and this bit** is going to f******* blow"


whats been on my mind is my oil pressure at idle
i never got a manual reading on it so who knows but my dash gauge tells me 40 which i always though it was high and 70 at redline
i fin it quite high and i think its too much pressure and no flow but i honestly have no clue so discuss.

Wait. You had a rocker come apart in the engine and only swapped the cam?

i had a MS3 and no piston to valve clearance issues.

I assume when you said the rocker came apart, you mean it blew out the needle bearings. Ive seen people count up all the bearing pieces and be ok afterwards, but that's pushing it. I had my stock rockers rebuilt with trunion bearings when i put the cam in.

As for oil, after a new rebuild you should be fine running 5w30, 10w30, or 10w40. Just change oil often to begin with. Don't run old outdated oil.

At this point...
1. Yank the cam and have it checked out or send it back to Texas speed and have them check it.
2. Have the block sent out and cleaned, flushed and inspected
3. Replace ALL your bearings(cam/crank/rods),
4. Install new oil pump
5. Install GOOD aftermarket or rebuilt rocker arms(especially since you push it to 7k and stay with stock ratio)
6. Install ARP rod bolts.
7. Install dual spring valve springs for over .650" lift (you better have these already though)

....You do all that, run regular oil(don't bother with synthetic) and you'll be fine.

the ns3 had problems with the 215 heads because they were milled a little too much. i see no cam wear. as in the after market rocker i use to have it literally broke in 3 and managed its way to the pan. now i have stock rockers with avtrunion kit.
im not worried of the top end at all.
i just want to know what bearings to get.
grooved or non grooved the cam is good ill flush it regardless after 200 miles

someone on here has to know pros and cons of grooved bearings.

mains are 3/4 groove style
rods are chamfer

anyways getting into gaskets for the rebuild.
should i replace the metal ones or no.
and one more thing does anyone have the procedure to bolt up the pan and torque specs. or can this all be found on shop key?

the headaches begin

dont worry everything is under control.
just waiting on the rain to go away to put it on the k member and rolling it under the car.

put it all together started her up and same noise.
like a rubbing screech.
removing the heads.
not going to lie was quite glad it was mosdiagnosed to a bearing.
i wouldnt of given that bottom end another 20kmiles.
i checked all the rods and mains for taper and out of round.
so now i know that bottom end is pristine.
i have some pretty low compression on cylinder 5.
pretty fun so far especially doing it with my old man.
will keep everyone updated.

Is the trans connected?

x2, throw out bearing?

not clutch related.
and its fairly new.
pulled the valve covers of and let it run getting no oil up a pushrod...
and starts to smoke lightly after awhile.

going to remove heads replace lifters(suggestions. ls7?)
and the valves. that were sligtly bent due to the ms3.
which we knowingly knew that #5 had low compression.

Wait, you bent your valves due to improper PTV clearance and you kept running them?

it hit and blew the rocker into 3 pieces.
compression checked and had almost 70 pounds compared to the 110-120 on the others.
we ran it.
still put down 430(just a worked 215 trick flow head stock rockers with trunion and springs.stock fuel and ignition) 50k miles ago.

what is the rule of thumb on compression readings, no more than 10% variation? That is nearly 40%

5% is normal. 40% is wild. That's basically a dead cyl.

I can only imagine what you would have gotten if everything was in order.

New parts don't mean anything fyi........ I've seen parts out of the box plenty of times

If the valves hit the pistons, it's a sure bet they're bent.

Wait, you had the motor out of the car and didn't pull the heads?!?!