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Reply to "RoadKill Garage 351c Build"

FWIW, I agree with Larry. We both know a POCA member that had a stock Cleveland bored 0.040"-over, and a year later, the rings were still not seated. Due to 10:1 compression and thin walls, there was always blow-by from flexing cylinder walls. Please do not scrap more increasingly rare 351-C blocks by boring without first sonic checking cylinder walls! The 351-C is NOT a 350 Chevy!

Note also that in N. Nevada in the past year, we have had two separate examples of semi-pro built 427 stroker 351-Cs  that incessantly burned oil. With a 4" crank and stock height block, the wrist pin is forced to go thru the oil ring grooves, and both builders did NOT use a ring support rail (or the alternative- piston pin plugs). Without support, three piece oil rings will bend down at the big pin-hole from compression pressure on both sides, and open direct paths for cylinder wall oil leakage.

The result was a decent running engine that burned a quart of oil per 100 miles. After I found the ring support rails missing on one engine, the second owner pulled his engine and found the same thing (different shops did the work). Rebuilds with proper parts resulted in far more power, better gas mileage and oil use of a qt/2500 miles for both. Both owners are very pleased with their big engines correctly fixed by shops familiar with 351-C engines. I can't stress this enough- even if 351-Cs are from the '70s, they are NOT simple engines!

If your stroker burns lots of oil, look for that necessary oil ring support rail at the bottom of the piston ring oil grooves- they're really necessary for a 351-C with any crank over about 3.75" stroke!

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