Vinny P

Huge;

I am sorry to hear of your explosion. I may have something for you if you are interested. I am upgrading to an HP500EFI, I will be selling my '99 454 Magnum EFI, has about 170 hours on it. I have someone interested in it, but he has not given me a definite answer yet. Also, the engine will not be available for a few weeks. if interested shoot me a private message and I will send particulars.

WETTE VETTE

He had a similar problem. From the best we could tell he floated his exhaust valves and a couple hit the pistons. One really hit hard and broke taking out that piston and tearing up that combustion chamber. Then the 3 bolts that hold the cam gear on sheared and luckily everything stopped in the top end. Major carnige!!! Big bucks!!! $1250.00 for cyl head repairs, valves and new springs, a new cam, new roller lifters, 4 new JE pistons, some block clean up, and while he is at it he is putting on a Jesel belt drive. He only had 32 passes. Seeing that damage makes me want to keep my boat on the trailer. Sorry about your bad luck!!

Tinkerer

When you say that you cracked the block do you mean that you split a cylinder. If so than just sleave the cylinder- about $75 to 100 to fix. I would think reversion or water leak.

huge

The block is split length wise down the cylinder in 3 places and also across the deck. sleeving is out of the question. the block is hooped! I have checked for reversion many times any never found that to be a problem. I had a couple of guys over today to inspect the engine(a crew chief for a 6 sec drag car and a HD instructor)and they both agree that the fault was in the valve itself. The metallurgy wasn't up to snuff or a poor weld process on the two piece valve. Does anyone know what brand of inconel valves would be best? cost?

JSV

I use Ferrea super alloy exhaust valves. They flow more air than the Manleys and in my opinion they are a better valve overall. Your problem is definately a two piece exhaust valve, however excessive heat caused the problem. I would also be concerened with the signs of heat in the rear cylinders on the block in the picture. Make sure the gasket is closing off the front holes so the water can get to the rear of the block. My opinion

HighPriority

Sorry to hear about your problems, I have been there and done that twice myself. Cam someone tell us why # 5 cly. on these BBC seen to have so many prblems?


Warren
High Priority Offshore

RumRunner

Make sure to use Inconel exhaust valves, stainless are fine for the intakes. Also make sure they loosen up your exhaust guides alittle since a marine engine runs at hotter cylinder temps. Long durations at WOT. Make sure your cooling system is up to par, check your head temps at several points.

mopower

Huge, you pretty much have all the bad news. Now the good news,maybe.
In the first picture posted ,it looks like the valve seat is missing from the exhaust?? Is it? I know of aleast two other people last year who lost valve seats on new 2001 Merlin heads. A friend of mine in a WD for merlin and told me the hole in the heads were cut too big and the seats didn't have the required .003 interference fit. Under high heat conditions this cause them to come out. The problem has since been remedied with larger valve seats. If you bought these heads new and still have your reciept I'd definitly call World products and complain. One guy got 2 new heads AND $1600 for further repairs . Good luck!
Mopower

jpclear

Dennis Moore's BB Chevy bible goes into lots of detail on why some cyls. don't get exhaust out as well as others (#5 is one) and those ex. valves get hotter and fail sooner. It's not always #5 though; Dropped #5 the first time and #2 last time. Yes, have heard lots of good things about Ferrea too, but decided to go with the Manley inconel extreme duty cause thats what Merc. uses in their HP and race stuff and since they guarranty their stuff even if only for a short time I figure thats who I better go with. Maybe it's just cause they can buy cheaper from Manley, however. And yes, reversion can be a great problem (that's what they tried to tell me when I dropped the first one) But that was NOT my problem. (as was well proven when I dropped #2 last time) Sorry about the block Huge. I was luckier there cause I had a bowtie with lots of meat and just had to keep going bigger. Luck! --- Jer

KENNY

Are you sure there was no reversion,looks like the same rust color in the c. chamber and on top of some pistons as in the block,
Just dont want to see you put it all back together and have it happen again because of a bad exhaust system.What kind of exhaust did you have.