bear with me, still havin probs, rebootin between each post.... aaarrrggghhh!!!
It's a wonder, considering the problems we had with the car, that the 200 mile round trip went without a hitch.
Back home the tinkering continued, trying different combinations of octane booster/additive, even fitting a new electronic dizzy kit didnt seem to improve things.
Before we turned our attention full-time to the engine's problems we had a little matter of no brakes and the wobbly 1/2 shaft attend to. The brakes just seemed to need a bit of adjustment. Although they'd just passed an MOT a month previous? With them adjusted and set as best we could, they were still lethal! so started looking at front disc conversions... $$$ the list gets longer. But this is only the start of it.
A new pair of Moser shafts was ordered thru Geof Hauser, and arrived just into the new year, 2005. After a bit of jiggery-pokery by Geof to get the bearing in the correct position (rather than where Moser stuck it) we fitted the shafts and set about getting the engine sorted.
Still stumped and disheartened by previous attempts, we called for some professional help!
Luckily for us, someone we'd got to know thru our local MMA meets, Paul Knight
www.paulknightracing.com likes a challenge, so said to take the car down to his garage in Acton, London so he could do some checks for us (compression, vacuum etc).
The plan was to leave the car with him for a few days and, with a bit of luck, take it, all fixed, to the Mid-Summer Mopar meet at the Ace, 3 days later.
As it turned out, that was a bit optimistic as we needed a bit more than a tune up.
After a few weeks of expert tinkering and a drum of 113 octane, Paul just got it running strong enough to consider a trip to the 05 Nats but all that new-found power trashed the trans!
So, trans out to give to Blue, and engine out for a proper inspection. Here's what Paul found
![Shocked :shock:](./images/smilies/icon_shocked.gif)
........
Wrong gaskets under the carbs, causing major vacuum leaks.
Inlet manifold not seated properly in valley (something else that our US friends were battling with before the car was despatched. Delayed shipping by a week or two an' all).
Pushrods different lengths.
Piston rings loose (0.009" clearance instead of 0.002"), some of the gaps lined up.
Valve seats "awful" and "hammered to hell" (to quote Paul), so valves not seating properly. More compression/vacuum leaks.
Spring retainers loose.
Worst leakage on cyl 7 (97%), best on 8 (16%)
Cyl 6 bad too, bore is 0.009" out of round, ie oval. So looks like a 30 thou re-bore's on the list too.
1 piston in a bad way cos of some back-yard fix to reduce piston-slap (centre-punched around top land).
However, valves, rods, crank, block & heads seem ok. Woo-hoo!
Although the aim is/was to keep it all as stock as poss, we decided to change the cam for hydraulic for lower maintenance (to take the pass-side rocker cover off, the exhaust manifold needs to be loosened & tilted back, so dont fancy doin the valve lash every 1000 miles, thankyou!).
And as no one makes .30 over pistons for the 426 wedge, gettin custom replacements allowed us to set the comp ratio a bit lower than the stock 11:1. Gone for just over 10:1 so should be good for pump gas. At last. We hope.
Back in September we checked out the progress and Stu got these pics....