Latest oil change/ oil filters

[Larryjb]

I got started on it earlier this week. I now have the passenger side head off. As luck would have it, all the exhaust manifold bolts came out nicely from the cracked head. 2 bolts are broken below the surface of the good head. I will try a left handed drill bit and see if it comes out.

It's taken me two evenings and an afternoon to get this far. Part of the time was
used to meticulously baggie 16 rods and rockers. I am also noting down every thenm & take off along with the socket used. I don't want to forget anything. I'll have enough to worry about installing everything correctly.

The shop manual uses torque angle specifications forthe head bolts. In some case a torque angle guage doesn't fit, such as for the rears. I did note that my 1/2" ratchet has 16 clicks for 90°. I think this may be just as accurate and easier.

 

[Rocket Man]

following

 

[Larryjb]

I just love it. For the DS head, step one is remove alternator bracket. That sounds easy enough. Oh wait, now I have to remove the pulley just to get to the last bolt. Why do they do this to me?

 

[iamdub]

I just love it. For the DS head, step one is remove alternator bracket. That sounds easy enough. Oh wait, now I have to remove the pulley just to get to the last bolt. Why do they do this to me?

No holes in the pulley to stick a socket through?

Can you get an open-end (or better yet, a box-end) wrench on it from the side?

 

[Larryjb]

No holes for a socket. I might try the open ended wrench. That is going to be a pain because I'll have to balance the bracket as it comes out. Might be easier than removing the pulley.

 

[Larryjb]

Okay, I was being dumb. The bolt that must be removed is just below the pulley. It's off to the side now.

 

[Rocket Man]

I was gonna say, I don't remember that bracket being hard.

 

[Larryjb]

DS head is now out. I'll remove the lifters tomorrow and send the heads in. The head that is cracked is scrap for sure.

I did discovered one dumb trick. I'm not a big strong guy, so lifting heavy objects isn't so easy for me. If you remove the upper and lower rad shroud, and the fan/clutch, you can stand inside the engine bay. This is not hard to do. The last firewall bolt isn't bad either. Pull it out a little before lifting the head, then remove the head with the bolt together. I'm not sure what installing will be like. Because these bolts are stretch bolts I may be able to insert all bolts with the head in place. There is a demo somewhere about how much these bolts actually stretch. It's quite amazing, and after seeing the stretch I would never reuse a torque to yield bolt.

 

[Larryjb]

I just left my heads at the machine shop.

The machinist showed me how to dismantle a lifter. When he couldn't get the plunger out, he told me I might as well get new lifters. We also concluded that the bearings in the rockers were going. It appears that the previous owner neglected oil changes. He did say that as long as the rollers move smoothly, the cam is almost certainly okay.

I have two broken exhaust bolts. I decided to let them take them out.

 

[jarydM]

Following

 

[Larryjb]

ACDelco lifters especially, are crazily overpriced at Rockauto. I can get a set of ACDelco lifters from Amazon or Ebay for cheaper, but I don't know the source.

My other option is going aftermarket. Rockauto sells Melling, Enginetech, and Sealed Power. Are they any good? I'm staying bone stock on this Tahoe. I'm not interested in increasing power or anything like that.

 

[Larryjb]

Finally started getting things back together yesterday.

The machine shop had the heads for the longest time. It's a small shop and they're busy. I hope that's a good thing. Keep in mind, up here in Canada, especially on the west coast, it takes longer to get parts in. Sometimes they're just not available locally, and sometimes they're ridiculously expensive. Also, my crack leaked while it was torqued down on the block. When they tested it, they couldn't get it to leak. I showed them pictures of the leak, and they wouldn't have believed me if I didn't have pictures. We can only surmise that the clamping force of the head bolts opened up the crack and allowed it to leak.

I didn't make too much progress yesterday. I spend the afternoon chasing threads and removing the valley cover to replace the gasket and knock sensors.

 

[iamdub]

ACDelco lifters especially, are crazily overpriced at Rockauto. I can get a set of ACDelco lifters from Amazon or Ebay for cheaper, but I don't know the source.

My other option is going aftermarket. Rockauto sells Melling, Enginetech, and Sealed Power. Are they any good? I'm staying bone stock on this Tahoe. I'm not interested in increasing power or anything like that.

Wix/NAPA Gold (same thing) and Mobil1 are my filter recommendations.

 

[Larryjb]

I think you misread my post. I was looking for quality lifters. For filters, I use WIX or AcDelco.

 

[swathdiver]

I think you misread my post. I was looking for quality lifters. For filters, I use WIX or AcDelco.

Is it your judgement that they are superior to Mobil One and say K&N?

 

[iamdub]

I think you misread my post. I was looking for quality lifters. For filters, I use WIX or AcDelco.

LOL

I did! Now your mentioning of Sealed Power, Melling, etc. and "staying bone stock" and not increasing power makes sense.

 

[swathdiver]

LOL

I did! Now your mentioning of Sealed Power, Melling, etc. and "staying bone stock" and not increasing power makes sense.

I missed it too!

I believe Melling makes GMs LS7 lifters and the oil pumps.

 

[iamdub]

I missed it too!

I believe Melling makes GMs LS7 lifters and the oil pumps.

The thread title mentions oil changes and filters so my mind was expecting to read "filter".

Yeah, Melling supplies a few parts as OEM equipment. So, Larry, if you can get Melling lifters cheaper than "OEM"- go for it.

 

[Larryjb]

The thread title mentions oil changes and filters so my mind was expecting to read "filter".

Yeah, Melling supplies a few parts as OEM equipment. So, Larry, if you can get Melling lifters cheaper than "OEM"- go for it.

Yeah, this all started with a concern about my oil filter sludging up. After a few tests I confirmed I had a head leak so the direction of this thread changed.

I've got Melling rockers now.

 

[iamdub]

Yeah, this all started with a concern about my oil filter sludging up. After a few tests I confirmed I had a head leak so the direction of this thread changed.

I've got Melling rockers now.

Yeah, buuuuut... That was all so 5 or 6 pages ago. You're just gonna have to accept that we own this thread now.