It's finally running!

Got the Ford 3.8L V6 running Sunday. Finally.

I got back from taking a friend flying at noon and finished up
buttoning it up.

Here's the background: This is a modified 3.8L V6 with a Northwest
Aero PSRU. The engine was completely rebuilt with the block baked,
bead blasted and scoured, then bored and honed to fit new 9 to 1
compression ration pistons from Wiseco. The crank was sent out to be
turned and new bearings were installed for the crank and con rods.

The heads were planed and I needed four new intake valves. New seals,
new guides, valves lapped in and 1 to 8 ratio roller rockers with new
lifters.

New cam per David Blanton's original specs. Regardless his
strangeness with horsepower claims, no one found fault with the
camshaft specs. No reason to, the design was spec'd out to one of the
premier camshaft engineers in Detroit and he got it right.

The cam was milled from a solid billet rather than regrinding the
original so the original, standard length pushrods could be re-used.

New stock Ford valve springs were used. I fabricated a test stand on
casters that I can drag into my Tacoma and drive it up into the woods
for testing away from civilization. I built it tall enough so that
the engine could run with the prop installed.

But it wouldn't run. I spent three weeks fooling with it trying to
get it running with no success. Finally someone asked if I had any
intake suction. That's the one test I had not done. Carb removed,
hand over intake opening, crank the engine and nothing. No vacuum at
all.

I used to be a certified auto mechanic and never misstimed an engine
in my life, but I'd misstimed this one. I pulled the timing chain
cover off and stared in disbelief. The camshaft was at least 5 teeth
away from where it should be.

So I reset it and double and triple checked that it REALLY was correct
now, scraped off the old gaskets, installed new and buttoned things
up. Cranked it with my hand across the intake manifold opening and it
tried to suck my hand through the opening. Even after I'd stopped
cranking, the suction remained. That was an encouraging sign.

By Sunday afternoon I was pouring in hot water (to make the engine a
little easier turning over) and ready to try it.

Starter switch to on, ignition on, fuel pump on, instruments on and
start! Row row row row row... nothing.

Flip the throttle in and out a few times: Row row row row... nothing.

Recheck timing by cranking the engine with the ignition off and finger
in the no. 1 spark plug hole till it blows my finger out indicating
it's on compression and then hand turn the engine to TDC and check
where the rotor in the distributer is pointing. Hmmm, it's actually
off some so I twist the distributer to align it better.

Try checking the timing using the timing light and no flashing. Could
that be the problem, no ignition? Recheck everything with a test
light, all is functioning properly, what's going on here? Oooops,
timing light clip has fallen off the battery. I re-attach it and
crank the engine and now the timing light is flashing properly. I can
now fine tune the distributer to get the timing at 8 degrees BTDC.
Obviously, the ignition is working.

Ready again, hearing protection on: Row row row... nothing, not a pop.

Ok, time for auxiliary starting fuel. Grab the acetylene torch and
crank up the acetylene and stick the tip into the carburator with the
butterfly valve half open to allow the gas in to the intake manifold.

Row row row row... **BAAAARRRRROOOOOOMMMMMM**BRAP BRAP BRAP, it's
running. I pulled the tip out and slammed the throttle shut and
darned if it didn't continue to run, albeit somewhat roughly, and very
VERY loudly.

I spent the next half hour fiddling with various adjustments and
finally got it running reasnably smoothly, at least at idle and up to
2,000 rpm. But man that thing is *L*O*U*D* loud, and mean sounding.
It sure doesn't sound like grandma's Plymouth.

I need to quiet that down or I won't be able to take it into the woods
and run it without upsetting folks for miles around.

Perhaps "Supertrapp" mufflers?

Anyway, it's running, the psru is tracking smoothly and this is a
milestone. It has a little leak of oil from the front crankshaft oil
seal, not sure what's going on with that yet but it isn't severe.

I also runs a bit rough when revved up past 3,000 but I'm not sure
what's happening there either, I haven't check to see if the timing is
advancing. That's another test yet to do.

So I'm fairly pleased right now. Next step is to bolt on the prop and
run the engine in and then do some long term testing at various power
settings. I spent a lot of time modifying the intake manifold per
Ford V6 STOL suggestions and specifications to have an engine that
will run smoothly at 4,800 rpm but that's with the prop installed. I
also custom fabricated the exhaust headers, making each tube exactly
40 inches long precisely to prevent a rough running hard to tune
engine. More testing to follow.

These tests need to be carefully documented so that the DAR can verify
that the engine has been tested. It's important for me too. ;-)

Corky Scott