Saturday Was A Great Day!

1st Gen HEMI projects and products.

Moderator: scottm

Post Reply
DavidBraley
Posts: 163
Joined: Sat Jan 30, 2010 7:40 pm
Location: Fort Collins, Colorado

Saturday Was A Great Day!

Post by DavidBraley »

Sorry if I put this in the wrong place. :oops: But it is 1G Hemi related. :D

Like the title says, Saturday the 27th was a really great day for me. I got up around 5:30 in the morning, walked around like a Zombie just long enough to get my eyes focused, then jumped into my little junky truck, and started my journey from Fort Collins, CO, to Albuquerque, New Mexico. 520 miles one way according to GoogleMaps. The purpose of this trip? To pick up a 392 block! Woo Hu!

In Albuquerque, I finally got to meet Larry Srader (392heminut) in person. Larry is the most laid back and friendly guy you will ever meet. If any of you ever get a chance to meet him in person, you'll be glad you did. :wink:

Larry and his family where in Albuquerque putting on a big Thanksgiving dinner for his son who is in college becoming a Physical Therapist. He drove all the way up from Deming, New Mexico, and brought the block up with him. By meeting him in Albuquerque, he saved me from driving another 500 plus miles. :o

After spending about an hour visiting with Larry and his son, I jumped back into my truck and headed back to Fort Collins. I made the day long trip down to Albuquerque and back in one long breath. I walked back through my front door last night about 11:15 in the evening. 1040 miles in one day is not too bad. I was so excited, there was no way I could pull over and stop to relax! I'm just so thankful to finally find a block that I didn't need to take a mortgage out on my house to buy! And I owe all the thanks to Larry Srader! Thanks again man.

The block is a standard bore WITH the main caps. Over the last 18 months of my journey to find a block, they all seemed to have their main caps missing for some dumb reason or another. After being used in a car, the block was used in an irrigation pump. Years ago, a farmer near Deming took the 392 engine out of a NewYorker, and used it on one of his irrigation pumps that was once powered by an Industrial engine. I think it's really cool to think of this hunk of iron working to help grow food. :roll:

I will be pressure testing the block when I get my torque plate finished. Larry says there is some some questions in his mind about how sound an earlier crack repair was done. I told Larry that I was just so damn thankful to find a block I could afford, that even if the old repair needed a little work, I didn't care one bit. I've repaired MUCH worse in the past with no problems. 8)

Here are some pics of my new block!!!!! :D


It's a NE57 out of a 1957 NewYorker:

Image


Top view:

Image


And the rolling cart it will sit on until I get a proper stand built for it:

Image


Next up; I've got some 3" square by 1/4" wall tubing I'm going to make a super heavy duty engine stand out of. This will be an engine stand worthy of a HEMI! Once I've got the block up on a stand, I'll clean it off a bit, and take some very careful measurements to compare to the ones I took off the heads. If I get confirmation from my earlier measurements, I'll finish up my torque plate. I'll update the drawing I made of cylinderbore-headbolt-dowlpin locations on my simple drawing too.

Well, that's it for today. Take care all!

David
Horsepower determines how fast you hit the wall. Torque determines the size of the hole you make. Holzwarth's Law
392heminut
Posts: 488
Joined: Sat Nov 30, 2002 2:16 pm

Re: Saturday Was A Great Day!

Post by 392heminut »

I'm just glad to get someone hooked up with that block that is going to have fun with it! Looking forward to the pics as it comes together David! :)
Owner of the Poor Man's Hemi Cuda
dan miller
Posts: 86
Joined: Wed Dec 27, 2006 5:05 am

Re: Saturday Was A Great Day!

Post by dan miller »

Hello David

I've been reading your posts and looking at your pictures. Nice

If I might, I would like to offer an opinion on block cleaning. We run a bottle brush hone through the bores and then sonic check. Then we run it through thermal cleaning and a shotabrader. The thermal cleaning kills the rust and the shotabrader cleans it (and gets surprisingly deep into the water jackets). Then, we fill and machine.

We have, until recently, cryo treated the blocks. We have lately been convinced that it is not productive.

Keep up the pix and notes. Enjoyable reading.

Danny
Post Reply