Have been thrashing like mad to get the FlatCad assembled and ready to go to the dyno - worked all weekend and only have 3 evenings left to complete it. I hope the Flathead Gods smile on me and allow me to continue without any unknown drama coming my way. If everything goes like clockwork - I might just make it. It is down to the wire. To put this whole things together in about 40 hours of work is quite an effort . . . I sure hope I can make it (as I have a normal job too!).
Got the whole lower end, custom main caps, girdle, crank, rods and pistons in. Chris Daniels has been helping out - without him, not a chance I'd have gotten this far.
Bearings - Some Unexpected Goodness:
A good thing happened, but only because I screwed up on a part number that I gave Buddy for the main bearings. When you have a billet crankshaft made for a 'normal' engine like a BBC, you'll have 1/8" radius fillets on all the journals - for strength. Due to this, you normally run narrower 'N' bearings (so they don't get pinched on the fillets). Last year we just ordered the normal Clevite V-Series mains - with the N suffix. I didn't even think about it.
BUT - when I gave Buddy the part numbers for bearings this year - I forgot the 'N". As luck has it, we don't need the narrow bearings on the flatcad as the journal widths are about 1.250 - much wider than a BBC, so there is room for the wider bearings . . . and they are 11% wider - which is a lot more bearing surface (with 3 mains, we need all we can get!). Cool! :rolleyes:
ORings:
As we're going to have higher cylinder pressure this year, we decided to redo the ORing setup - we now have stainless O-Rings in the heads and a receiver groove in the block. The grooves in the heads are .030 deep and .039 wide - we'll have a .041 stainless wire pushed into them. The block has a .010 deep receiver groove that is .0625 wide (it is centered on the head rings).
Mains:
Don and Kenny did one hell of a job on the new lower main and girdle setup. We created a splayed center main cap to replace our square one from last year and also a wider front main cap that picks up the sides or the block. Also, Don added dowel pins to tops/bottoms of all caps. This is about as strong as we can make it. Lets hope the lower end stays together.
Pistons:
You'll see the purdy coatings on the tops, dry film on the sides and a heat shield coating on the undersides.
Rings:
We're running Akerly/Childs HTD 'hellfire' style rings. 1.5, 1.5, 3.0 mm stuff - all from late model Ford mod motors.
To follow are a couple posts with a bunch of pictures from when the block came home earlier this week and during the assembly process - enjoy: