So with my car tuned and running correctly I would say my engine build is 90% complete. I want to finish it off with a better intake, but that will have to wait until next season. Anyway, I wanted to post up somethings I learned over the last 6 months. Some things I learned from you guys (thank you) and others I have learned the hard way.
1. Have a goal in mind for your build before you start buying parts and research it. I took a lot of people's advice on this site and ended up with what I wanted; A fun street car. It's fast enough and could handle daily driving if I wanted it to. If I researched a little more, however, I could have stroked it for the same price it cost to build a 306.
2. Aluminum heads. I originally was on the other side of this argument and wanted to go gt40s and stock cam with 1.7s or tfs cam. I know many have done this and they have loved it. If I was just throwing a top end on I may have done it too, but it really did not make any sense for me to put old tech on a brand new forged bottom end. I have a lot of room to grow now and quality parts that will work well with a power adder or more cubes. I priced it out and the cost savings would have been around $600 if I went with irons. Money well spent to me.
3. Quality parts. I skimped in only two areas the intake and the clutch and sure enough I'm paying for it. Crappy Chinese intake; I fixed the oil consumption through the pcv, but found another headache today. Oil pooled down by the distributor, oozing nicely from a crappy sealed lower. I can't wait to get another intake. The clutch is a zoom stock replacement, just not enough for the power and has a nice chatter now after some spirited driving today.
4. Longtubes
5. The little things like proper spark plug gap and replacing fouled ones can make a big difference. Replaced mine tonight and widened the gap and it really smoothed everything out.
6. Have fun and be patient. If it's a toy, enjoy it.
Ok this turned into a ramble, most of you guys know all of this anyway. I just wanted to say thanks to those of you who helped me, your advice really made a difference.
1. Have a goal in mind for your build before you start buying parts and research it. I took a lot of people's advice on this site and ended up with what I wanted; A fun street car. It's fast enough and could handle daily driving if I wanted it to. If I researched a little more, however, I could have stroked it for the same price it cost to build a 306.
2. Aluminum heads. I originally was on the other side of this argument and wanted to go gt40s and stock cam with 1.7s or tfs cam. I know many have done this and they have loved it. If I was just throwing a top end on I may have done it too, but it really did not make any sense for me to put old tech on a brand new forged bottom end. I have a lot of room to grow now and quality parts that will work well with a power adder or more cubes. I priced it out and the cost savings would have been around $600 if I went with irons. Money well spent to me.
3. Quality parts. I skimped in only two areas the intake and the clutch and sure enough I'm paying for it. Crappy Chinese intake; I fixed the oil consumption through the pcv, but found another headache today. Oil pooled down by the distributor, oozing nicely from a crappy sealed lower. I can't wait to get another intake. The clutch is a zoom stock replacement, just not enough for the power and has a nice chatter now after some spirited driving today.
4. Longtubes
5. The little things like proper spark plug gap and replacing fouled ones can make a big difference. Replaced mine tonight and widened the gap and it really smoothed everything out.
6. Have fun and be patient. If it's a toy, enjoy it.
Ok this turned into a ramble, most of you guys know all of this anyway. I just wanted to say thanks to those of you who helped me, your advice really made a difference.