Ok, so I am long overdue for an update. Everyone knows that I went to BG and the engine started making a noise similar to bunch of marbles in the washer on spin cycle. But before I cover that, let's back up some. Last I updated this, I was having issues with the Quick 6, which turned out to be nothing with the controller and everything with Holley V300. It sucks. I had their launch control wired up as it has been for years, but in V300, it was sending a 12V signal up the transbrake wire and causing the controller to lose it's mind and cycle off and on. Once I removed that from my outputs, everything worked perfectly again.
Now, back to the marbles in the washer, or is a drier a better example? Anyway, I dropped the engine out and I pulled the pan off; and I'll edit this and attach pics once I am finished typing and upload them. I got the windage tray off, and saw the #8 rod bolts had backed out about 3 turns each. The noise I heard was the piston hitting the head and the rod slamming around on the crank. The bearing was stuck on the crank, well sort of, more stuck to each other than the crank. I completely expected the crank and rod to be garbage, but when I pulled the cap off and unstuck the bearings, the crank looked like new! The bearings had taken all the beating and let the crank come out unscathed. I took the rod with new rod bolts to my buddy and he reconditioned it while I waited. It wasn't that bad. Problem was, upon further inspection, the skirt was cracked and the piston skirts had collapsed. They just weren't designed for this much power. Turns out all 8 were rocking in the bores, with 8 being the worst. It had .009" piston to wall clearance and the top of the piston ringland above the top ring had been rubbing the bore! That's how loose these were in the bores. I ran a hone in that cylinder to see if I could get it to straighten out, but it took nearly .010" to get it round again and it was still tapered and tight at the bottom. So with my limited hone equipment, there was no way it was going to be saved, so it will be sold off. I had 2 other blocks, so after talking with Todd Warren, I decided to take one down to BES and have it sleeved. I dropped off one that had horrible bores in it, damaged from rust due to water in the cylinders. I took the other one to my friend Mike to have it honed to fit my other reciprocating assembly with DSS pistons and Manley rods. I am selling that spare engine to finance this endeavor. Both of these blocks are 12MM blocks, and I was surprised to find that my race engine was only an 11mm block and it had zero gasket issues, I attribute that to the tune.
Todd helped me out with a set of Molnex power adder plus rods with ARP 2000 bolts, so those are on the shelf. Pistons are coming from DSS, their drag radial/outlaw design, very thick long skirts, with reinforcements all the way around the piston and .250" wall pins. I am going with a 3.640 bore and coating the pistons to get my clearance dialed in. Heads will be coming from a 2015 F150, and I'll port those with Warren springs and cams so I'll be flowing a lot more air and have larger valves too boot.
Intake is still up in the air, but I'm leaning towards the Holley low ram for it. Not sure yet. Turbo and kit are remaining basically the same. I am making updates to the cage, basically the frame rails and bars running over to the rocker bar so the cage will cert to 7.50 because I'm going to need it.
Trans is still going to be a 6R80, but I am upgrading a few of the internal parts. I have a bolt together Circle D converter to go into it as well. I need to come up with an exhaust system for it, as I plan to do a bunch of drag and drives, although I've missed out on both sick events registration, I'm going to try and make it into the Midwest event and Hot Rod drag week. I also want to do all the NMRA events I can muster, as the suspension changes I did improved the car 100%, so drag radials hooked as good as slicks pretty much. Things will change tho when I am putting a lot of power down from the get go, where before my 60fts were only 1.7 to 1.8, they should drop deep into the 1.2 to 1.1s after all these changes. Remember, I was running a stock F150 converter and trans, no mods other than deleting the thermostat block.
So, car is apart until the block gets done, then I'll start putting it all together and update as I go along.