Reply to "Excessive oil consumption"

We in the west have recently had a couple of 'professionally' built stroker Clevelands in POCA member Panteras, that were assembled WRONG. With stroker cranks & rods, if you don't choose your components very carefully, the combination will have the ring package in the piston with the wristpins passing thru the bottom of the oil control ring grooves. So to fix this, a 'bridge' in the kits is inserted at the bottom of each oil ring groove to bridge the wristpin cutout and allow the oil control ring to do its job. The removable bridge-ring is locked in position by various means so it doesn't rotate in the piston like all the other rings, to prevent it from rotating to the wristpin cutout, an end bending down from combustion forces and again wrecking the ring seal. The bent end of one or more bridge rings may also cut a small groove in that cylinder wall. This can scrap a block.

Some kits do not have the bridge ring installed. That means the bottom of the oil control ring assembly does not seal to the piston, nor to the cylinder.

One one of the above engines, two bridge rings WERE installed while 6 were left out. One the other, NO bridge rings were found. It's also conceivable that the bridge-ring anti-rotation system was not installed. So pulling ONE piston & rod may not define the problem. Pull ALL 8 pistons and visually check each assembly for:
-A- a bridge ring
-B- an anti-rotation system for the bridge ring

On both the engines I'm familiar with, they ran well but burned approx. a qt of oil per 100 miles from start up. And no- there's no way to check this except to pull the engine and disassemble, because the problem is buried inside the engine cylinders and is not visible from top or bottom of the short-block.

This may not be your problem, but in any case the engine should be pulled, stripped and visually inspected, then at least ball-honed for a new set of same-size rings, on the same pistons (if they check OK).

It's also possible the rings never seated or that detonation broke one or more rings. This also can scratch the bores. A stroker-Cleveland is a completely redesigned engine and is not simple. Good luck-