Olds 358 build

[olds307 and 403]

Ok, I have a better understanding what they did, never seen that before on a new piston.

Yeah, these definitely are nothing like a stock piston, like a Speedpro, for example. The 2mm oil rings take quite a few minutes to get in place, barely any extra space and finicky. The 1mm Moly coated top rings are actually super easy to install and don't seem that much smaller than 1.5mm and have decent street tension.

 

[olds307 and 403]

Good new everyone! Well I removed #8 piston thinking the rod was backwards, pretty sure it was right. Talking to Mark he says the rods should go straight on any properly cut crank. So after I loosely test fitted a few cylinders, they seemed to go together. I put number one and two pistons, rings, bearings and rods bolts barely tight. I could not hardly move the crank. Side clearance was any where from .010" to basically 0, all over the place. I put a bolt in the end of the crank and turned it by a hand a revolution. This is what the bottom of the bearings looked like.

Needless to say, it won't be going back to Parkland Engine Rebuilders. Their work is wrong and I question everything they did. I am going to contact Precise Engine Rebuilders to get this straighted out. They honed the small end of the rods and internally balanced the crank. Their work seemed fine and didn't take a year to get it done. I will get them to check cylinder bore, bearing clearances, rod big end and rod side clearance along with assembly of the short block. Ah engine rebuilding, good times.