[gteaeye]

Hey everyone,
After a long time dealing with other time distractions, I'm now building my engine Ford 331 stroker, roller liters, afr 185 heads, moderately aggressive cam for the roadster. Hoping for 400hp to the wheels. Should be fun.

big problem, I can't find the main bearing caps. I asked around what I should do to replace them. Some are saying to just rip them off another Ford 302 and your set, but others (my machine shop) are saying I need to get them and then have additional machining done.

Any thoughts anybody? Im not against having additional work done, but is the machine shop just looking for $ or is the machining really necessary?
I assume (you know what they say about assuming) that it should be pretty standard that piece, and its the bearing that mates to the crank, but I don't feel like redoing the motor in 200 miles.

And no, regretfully, I dont know what happened to the pieces. Fml.
Thanks for looking

 

[Don Payne]

You should really have them machined. Just slapping on an old set in no way will guarantee that your clearances will be acceptable (.002"-.003"), nor that they will be round, nor that all of the caps will line up straight.

Basically, they need to plane the mating surfaces flat and then align hone the mains. For instance, there is a reason that mains are numbered, it is so that you don't mix them up. Even after they are machined you should not mount them in a position different from where they were at the time the machining was done. Anyone with more experience, feel free to correct me if I am wrong.

Just my $.02.

 

[2FAST4U]

You need to have the block aligned bored or aligned honed with the new bearing caps. It's actually not a big deal and will make for a better engine

 

[J Persons]

What Don said. You cannot swap mains from one engine to another without first having them align honed to your block. This is also true for new main caps.

 

[Lex]

What everyone else said. Align bore and hone it or your asking for trouble!

 

[Mark Reid]

Yeah, what they said!

 

[gteaeye]

Well ok then. Thank you.

Thanks for everyones input. I am still kicking myself for misplacing them, and quite frankly I wish i had someone else to blame.

 

[Useless]

I think that i would remove everything out of the garage and clean it up they might be in a box you do do you expect them to be in

 

[Daddy-O]

What they all said. Or just buy another set and the old ones will magically reappear!

 

[Don Payne]

Yeah, I'll bet a garage clean will find them. I always find long lost crud doing that.

 

[gteaeye]

well thank you everyone for volunteering to help me clean my garage! we start tomorrow morning at 8:00 sharp. What does everyone want for breakfast?

Thanks again for pointing me in the right direction with doing it right, i'll keep yall posted if i find it.

 

[BigLeo69]

I think that i would remove everything out of the garage and clean it up they might be in a box you do do you expect them to be in

yep:icon18:good answer

they need to be aligned honed only, align boring will change cam to crank center

 

[Useless]

need air line tickets

 

[2fastCobra]

You can get a Dart Iron Eagle 302 race block and have something strong so you can then hook up 500-600 hp worth of NOS or a very BIG turbo. That is what I would do.