Hello.
I am a new member. Name is Dan.
I just finished a rebuild on my olds 350 motor inside my 69 Cutlass S.
I have 250 miles on the motor now and I am taking it nice and easy on the break in.
The motor is a stock rebuild except it has a Edelbrock performer Cam, double roller timing, and intake. The top is fitted with a 600cfm holley (single feed).
It is running great!
However....
It is ticking on the drivers side. I can't hear the sound at 60 miles an hour but that could be because the drone of the flow masters at that speed drowns out the sound. I hear it at idle, while accelerating, and decelerating with the foot off the pedal. The sound is the same when I first start the car in the cold morning and after I drive it for 30 min. on the freeway. It doesn't seem to change at all.
When I had the machine shop do the heads (hardened exhaust seats, 3 angle valve job) I also had them install the edelbrock springs and retaining clips. The lifters came with the edelbrock set too and they are installed.
Any thoughts on how I should go about figuring this out?
Thanks for the advice.
-Dan

 

Well it could be a rocker assy, a lifter not pumping up, or exhaust manifold/ header.

 

If its an exhaust manifold I should be able to isolate the sound with tube to my ear to something, right?
-Dan

 

If its a lifter or rocker, you can do the same thing!!

 

If it is a lifter or a rocker is the any danger or damage I could be doing driving it like that?
-Dan

 

If it's a light ticking, no! If you pull off the valve cover on the offending side, you can usually find the problem. I would swap rocker assy's from a known good one to the bad one. The problem will either continue, which would lead you to believe a push rod or lifter. It will move, or in some cases go away. The exhaust manifold would be a loose bolt or you just need a gasket.

 

oldscutlass, when I pull the offending valve cover off can you walk me through what I will be looking for exactly to know where and if a problem exists?
-Dan

 

Run the motor and listen for which one is ticking, swap the offending rocker assy with an adjoining one to see if it goes away or moves. If it goes away, then don't worry about it. If it moves then its the rocker assy. If it stays in the same place its a lifter or push rod.

 

Are you saying run the motor with the valve cover off? How much of a oil splatter mess should I be prepared for? haha
-Dan

 

What I do is use some cardboard box flaps down both sides and across the bottom of the top of the head. That will keep the oil from spattering all over the place. Yes, it may be messy, but it should not take long to isolate the offending area. Just don't rev it up to high.

 

Dschallock if you want i have a spare valve cover you could cut the top off of..i don't know how far vacaville is from me but its yours if you want to pick it up..i'm in the san fernado valley about 15-20 minutes north of LA

 

Jeremy that is really nice of you to offer! I fixed the problem over the weekend. Will explain in the next post.
-Dan

 

Ok, so thanks to your advice here is how I went about fixing it.

1) I took off the valve cover and inspected. Unfortunately nothing seemed overly obvious.

2) I started to motor and braced myself for the oil bath. It wasn't bad at all. The oil was weeping out of the correct holes but it really wasn't making a big mess. With it off I was able to identify the sound coming from the 3rd set of valves back on the drivers side from the front.

3) I placed my thumb on the left rocker (Intake I think.... can't remember now if it was intake or exhaust side) and pressed down on it firmly. The sound went away!

4) I removed the bolts from the rocker arm pivot and took the pivot and both rockers off as a set. I could see on the bottom of the rockers that one had the normal wear pattern (as per the manual) and the other had more wear. Looking at the valve stems I could see that one stem was tiny bit longer than the other based on wear pattern.

5) I switched the position of the rockers so that the one with more wear was now on the valve that was a little bit longer.

6) torqued the bolts down to 25ft pounds (as per the manual) and started the motor. SOUND WAS GONE!!!

So, best possible outcome. If the sound comes back I will just replace that set of rockers and pivot arm... I think Napa sells them as a set for 12bucks. But for now it is running really smooth with absolutely no tick whatsoever.

Thanks to everyone for the tips that helped me solve this!
-Dan

 

Glad u got it fixed!!!

 

Great troubleshooting, Dan!

You had a problem, asked a general question, got some direction, asked a specific, practical, experience-based question ("Will I take a bath in oil if I run it with the valve cover off?"), then read the manual and found and fixed the problem.

It's a personal thing of mine, but I like it when people use the manual .

Oh, and... Welcome aboard!

- Eric

 

no problem, just glad you got it fixed!, now im kinda curious as to what exactly the manual says for adjusting the rockers lol..i don't have a manual yet(i know).

 

Olds rockers are not adjustable.

- Eric

 

sweet. Thanks!

 

But there are afermarket ones that are!!!!!

 

True, but I was answering this question:
in the context of a thread on this engine:
In the context of a discussion of a stock engine, and in answer to a question about what the manual says, there is no question that stock rockers are not adjustable.

The manual does not discuss aftermarket performance components, and we were not talking about a hot rod motor. I felt the meaning was clear under the circumstances.

- Eric

 

well said, and thanks for the info, sorry for the thread jack