Half the things on this engine are an experiment, including the rail hold downs. A big part of why the whole thing is going to be tested on an engine run stand prior to being installed in the car. I just did oil pressure tests this weekend and have some work to do on the external oil line and regulator as it is having trouble giving me the pressure drop I want. With the injector rails, on the engine stand I'll easily be able to pressurize the fuel system without the engine running. With the pump I have I can take the static pressure up to 90psi or so. I might spill some fuel if it comes loose, but it'll just be lost fuel and I won't start the test if there is a point of ignition around. Honestly I want to know if the rails will leak around the O-rings as I single pass drilled them with no special finish. That's the real wild card. The hold downs I can run a bead of weld or gusset a small line of steel to prevent bending upwards if needed. Worse case I'll safety wire the injectors to the rail and do away with the hold downs all together.

It's going into a '69 Firebird (I know the exhaust will have to be reworked to fit the chassis).

Picked this car up in Alabama and drove it home. It had a non-original 400/TH400 combination in it. I've yanked the engine and trans out a while ago and have installed the L6 frame mounts in it. I am going to rebuild a TH2004r I have for it and put in a set of 4.56 gears that just recently showed up as well.



Here is the throttle bracket with TV cable attachment installed. I will probably weld on a tube or pulley wheel to support the near 90* bend(s) in the cable towards the firewall. As it sat there, I stood behind the engine and had no issues actuating the throttle and it returning. I'll probably have to get the Holley linkage kit for the 700r4/2004r TV cable.


Here is what I've accomplished in the last week:
Got the plugs completed.


I was looking in the service manual and saw the tool they used to remove the valve springs and have made something similar that I think will work out of a Buick rocker arm and old allen wrench.




Getting closer to a running engine. I assembled the valvetrain, set the cam timing, topped off the oil and started priming the system.

Here is the used C-cam. Its the 175HP 1bbl cam. Figured I'd use this cam to get the engine running and driving and after I have the car on the road for a while I'll swap to a bigger E-cam, 215HP 4bbl cam. Notice the cam lubricates the followers directly.


Here are the lash adjusters in place before I set the cam housing on. I greased up the cam and followers before assembly.


The stock oil pressure is set at around 30psi, so I swapped the stock relief spring with a spare Buick white spring I had, which is supposed to be 60psi in the Buick (my experience says 75psi). I primed the system up and the system pressurized to 95psi, so I cut three coils off and it dropped to 70psi, which I am good with.



But then I ran into a problem. My external oil pressure regulator isn't dropping the pressure to where I need it to be. The spring on the left is the spring that came in the regulator, so I went to the hardware store and bought the spring on the right, trimmed it down twice and still can not bleed off even close to enough pressure. So I figure I'll have to go to a regulator that has a return line. I have one more trick up my sleeve to try and get this regulator to work for me. I'm going to install a valve in the external line and see if I can drop the volume to the regulator and see if I can gain the pressure control I need there. Basically an external adjustable orfice tube, lol.


I have the wiring harness off for the cam housing installation. Took about 5 minutes to pull it off the engine. I'll tidy it up for re-installation. I'm pleased though with how easy it was to remove.


Now for my valvespring compressor \:\) I took a spare 9mm allen wrench and a universal stamped steel Buick rocker arm and began cutting, grinding and welding and came up with this. The T shaped one has a notch at the end to hook the oil galley in the lash adjuster hole and I welded a nub on the end of the rocker arm to keep the T part from sliding out. I stuck a standard 6 point impact socket and extensions on the end of the allen handle for extra leverage. I'm considering cutting down the allen handle and simply using the socket and extension for the lever. More compact.


In action. I originally left the loop on the rocker in place, though shaved a bit, for structural reasons, but I think I can safely remove it if I box in the rocker below the allen shaft and on the other side between the opening and slot for the T.


So where I sit is correcting the external pressure regulator control and tidying up my wiring harness for re-install. Then I'll set it up on the engine run stand and run through the fuel and spark checks before actually firing up the engine.