How to Rebuild a Corvette 454 Engine - Part 7 - Page 3

Next I submerged each piston in a small container of oil to ensure the rings, connecting rod and wrist pin were all well oiled prior to installation.

After allowing the oil to drip off in a separate pail for a few minutes, I verified all the ring end positions, adjusted them as necessary, and then used a ring compressor to compress the rings. After oiling the connecting rod bearing the assembly was ready for installation in the block. I should also note here that having a very clean work area during this process is especially important. All these oily parts act like dirt magnets. With this in mind the first thing I did was thoroughly clean my work area and then put down a clean piece of cardboard as a working surface. This is a messy process and I didn't want to get a bunch of oil smeared all over my bench.

To facilitate installation I rotated the engine block so that the cylinder bores were as close to vertical as possible. I'm starting with piston number one so I also rotated the crankshaft to bottom dead center for that piston. After double checking for the correct piston orientation I set piston one in bore one taking care not to scratch the cylinder wall with the connecting rod.

Using the wooden handle of my rubber mallet I gently, but firmly, tapped the top of the piston to drive it out of the compressor and into the block. Don't hit too hard or you'll risk breaking a ring or knocking the bearing off of the rod. In a few cases I had some difficulty with pistons not entering the bores and getting hung up, I simply removed them, reset the ring compressor, and started over. I figured doing so was a lot easier than replacing broken rings. Once the piston enters the bore be sure the connecting rod clears the crankshaft journal properly. This can be easily forgotten leading to a heavily scratched journal and a lot of headache!

With the piston set into the bore and the connecting rod set against the crankshaft journal I installed the connecting rod caps (with plenty of oil) and torqued the rod bolts to manufacturer specs.

Phew! This took a while, but here are a few shots of the end result, it's really starting to come together now!

I'm not quite sure where else to put this, so I'll add it here as a point of interest. At this point I've not mentioned anything about balancing the rotating assembly and thought I should. Engine balancing is quite an involved and important process that, unfortunately, some people overlook. A complete balance job includes dynamically balancing the harmonic balancer, crankshaft, connecting rods, pistons, rings, wrist pins, flywheel, and clutch pressure plate. Simply weighing each component separately and balancing each part is not sufficient, the process must be dynamic (the whole assembly must be spun) to be accurate. I was fortunate enough to have the machine shop owner spend about a half hour explaining the whole process to me and it's quite something.

Anyway, stay tuned there's more to come soon! I'm off to the machine shop to pick up the roller cam!