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immortality wrote:Seems excessive to use that type of coating on hydraulic lifter internals.

I remember cleaning it off new equipment, could be a right PITA.

I agree, they already have a square of VCI paper in the bags.

Cleaned them all out, some were really stuck and needed soaking in solvent and needed the plunger blown out by compressed air. When putting them back it's critical to check the plunger travel as I found it possible for the return spring to get stuck on the lower ledge inside the body and limit travel to about 3-4mm.


Also my cam is being made and will be ready soon.

It's most likely a paraffin based product ... Soaking them in oil (a little heat helps) probably would have cleaned them right up without disassembly.

Cam arrived. Entered the specs in dynosim 5 from the report card attached below. Also altered the specs to better suit the combo than what Formula Holden used. Upped the comp to 12:1 and a larger throttle body as 60mm is a bit limiting for such an engine. Back in the day they made 340hp which is confirmed by dynosim, with the changes and slightly larger cam the sim spits out 380hp which would be great if I can get that, 100hp/L would be a sweet milestone to reach.

In other news, I hit a roo in the shitbox at the end of my road near the housing estate out of all places as I went over a crest. There were 4 of them, 3 jumped over the road and couldn't avoid anything Stripped the front end and just managed to find a bonnet after 2 days of ringing dozens of wreckers, super hard to get now. The rad support is a bit sad but like my newphew's VS it was damaged exactly the same way. So I will do the same and use his winch to pull it back out and try beat it back into shape as best as I can.

That cam is similar to the cam in my 202, it makes about 320hp, so 380 should be achievable, just need some good fuel.

Yeah it should do as the V6 heads flow a lot better than the 202 ones. HSD can do the Formula spec heads and they flow about 245-250 cfm @28 which is pretty decent for the valve sizes. Stock is like 168 or something like that.

Pre-eco Buicks are pretty good when it comes to knock limits and with a cam like that. High comp should be relatively easy on 98 fuel without too much trouble. They ran 10:1 for the series so they could also sell the ACL/Mahle pistons on the shelf for consumer use since it was a Repco/ACL developed engine, they used 97 super and like 31-32º WOT timing. There is plenty in the tank for higher comp than that. I will let my engine builder work out the exact details.

Got the shitbox back on the road the other day. Some pics of the repairs.

Rad support was about 35-40mm out of whack but I got it back within 3mm using a winch and some old fashion panel beating

Turned out better than it was before.

Has new rad, headlights, indicators, grille and decent'ish bonnet.


Bit of bashing and stretching.

Still need to put on the replacement badge.

Also, Gareth has pulled the engine and auto out for me from the new white car and I picked up the engine to work on at home. Cheers Gareth


Spent today removing all the sensitive parts in prep to clean the engine. Came up mint
Tomorrow I will be removing the manifold and rocker covers to replace springs, seals and lifters and measure up the lifter preload.

After that is done, new gaskets and then I will do the sump gaskets another day.

Can anyone confirm the torque specs for the older VN-VP lifter spider bolts? My book is for the later plastic retainers which have a very different bolt.

I took a guess at 18Nm ?

Did a heap of work on the engine and very happy so far. Changed the plastic retainers to the older metal dog bones and spider, new lifters in, new valve stem seals and springs and locks.

Cleaned up as much as I could any gunk and carbon build up.

Measured up the preload with the OEM pushrod and then with the adjustable one which measures closest to the 7.95" pushrods so I ordered a set. OEM ones were a little too long and varied in lengths I found.

Pushrods arrived. Not quite the length I needed as I needed ideally an in between size of 7.925". So the preload checked in a few positions was 3mm. Ideal wound be 2.5mm or just under but that should be fine.

Did the sump gasket after the top end was done.

Also cleaned out the oil filter adapter and installed the ZZP spring, plunger and spacing washer kit with new gasket. Old spring was about 1.2mm shorter.

Bores have good hone marks and the compression feels really good when turning the engine with a breaker bar, far more than the shitbox.

Almost ready to go. Just few tiny things to finish.