What heads are you running stock iron or aftermarket aluminum? Do you have the drainback tins in place? On the rockers are these the iron Crane's or the aluminum? I run the iron one's and the clearances are on the large side. Edel heads commonly use a .060 restrictor as the feed holes are pretty big. Are you running a stock pan?

 

FFR428, I'm running stock heads with the Crane cast iron rockers. The drain back tins are in place. I'm thinking about pinching the end channels in the tins to force more oil to go back the center grooves and into the lifter galley under the intake manifold. At the present time I'm running a stock pan which is risky with so much oil staying up in the engine. I replaced the two rear head bolts with ARP reduced shank studs to promote better drain back at the rear drain passages. This held off the flood for about four or five minutes! Thanks, Dick

 

HELP! ! I just put .060" oil restrictors in my heads and the engine still floods oil! It takes about 4 to 5min. to start smoking while I stand there with open top valve covers and watch the oil accumulate.

 

Wow..... Have you double checked your rocker clearances again? Like I said before I use the same Crane rockers and found them on the loose side. These are for my 452" engine but before I take out the 390 im going to install them and compare flow and clearances. I'll check some of them later and post the specs and see where your are. What kind of valve seals are you using? You can also open the drainback holes in the heads a bit. Are you using synthetic oil or dino? And what weight? Tell me more about the rocker shafts your using. How old or new and from whom did they come from? And the drain back tins are they the fingered style? Also how far does the oil go up on the springs?

 

Went back to a stock melling M57 pump today. My rockers are new my shafts are new and are exactily the same diameter as the Ford shafts when I miked them. I am just using stock valve stem oil seals. I use 15-40 diesel oil in all my flat tappet engines because of the higher zinc content. The oil pours out the discharge orifice in the rocker arms just behind the shaft. Oil doesn't flood from the clearance between the rocker arm and the shaft. It's as if Crane has too large of an orifice in this location on these rockers. Oil comes halfway up my springs only on cyls. 4 & 8. since my engine is in at a slight angle on '67 Shelbys. We will have to see if the stock volume and pressure pump solves the problem. If not the rocker arms will have to go. I did not have the problem until I went to the high pressure pump and the Crane adj. rocker arms. The problem is that I changed both at the same time. Now I get to go back and change one at a time to find out which is causing my problem. Thanks for your help FFR428! By the way does FFR stand for Factory Five Racing??

 

I don't know in all cases but using 15-40 diesel oil in your gas engine is not recomended. I've tryied it and it hardend my seals and I had to replace them all. The same might be happening to your 352, the seals get hard and more oil gets passed through possibly causing your flodding. Just a suggestion...install new valve seals and use regular motor oil for gas engines, and see if that doesn't stop your excess oil flow.

 

My apologies....428 not 352

 

Good points on the seals KD.

Forgive the next Q but the holes in the rocker shafts are facing down right? And do you remember how many oil holes are in the rocker shafts? 8 or 16? And your running a solid cam correct? I hope you have better luck with the std volume pump. I've run the Crane rockers on a few engines. While they seem loose clearnace wise they have run good and are pretty durable. Over oiling has not been a problem. Do your drainback tins have the 3 fingers that direct the oil back into the lifter valley? Or are they that later 66 and on non fingered trays? Sometimes with the later and aftermarket intakes they have not been machined to fit the fingered drains. The new non fingered tins came out in mid 66. What's the head casting number and type of intake are you running? Stock Shelby 2x4 version?

 

Oh and yes FFR is Factory Five Racing. No professional affiliation just a customer.

 

I'm running a hyd. cam. Yes, the rocker shaft oil holes are facing down. This whole thing is crazy. The stock pump @ 45psi. with .060" restrictors still puts a ton of oil to the rockers, but the flooding has stopped. The oil level is now at the valve cover gasket level. By the way, I have the fingered trays that direct the oil back under the intake. Now for the bad news, As soon as the engine warmed up it started smoking again. Before, it would smoke after about 3-4min. now it doesn't smoke until it reaches normal operating temp. Looks like there might have been 2 problems. By the way, there is no blow by, just enough blue smoke out the tail pipes to kill every mosquito within 10 miles! FFR428, my son and I bought the coupe manual last year and planned on ordering a kit after the Shelby was finished. Now it looks like we may never build the coupe. Guys, Thanks for your help. I'm going to do a compression test, a cyl. leak down test, check my valve stem seals, and change oil. Never had anything like this in 30yrs. of working on fords!

 

There has been a lot of stuff on various Forums about using diesel oil on non roller cams & no one has mentioned buggering the valve seals. It is recommended by at least some of the oil companies for older engines. Higher than stock pressure oil pumps are usually not a good idea. Did you say these were stock heads or Edelbrock, maybe? I've heard early Edelbrock FE heads having drainback problems.

 

I'm running a hyd. cam. Yes, the rocker shaft oil holes are facing down. This whole thing is crazy. The stock pump @ 45psi. with .060" restrictors still puts a ton of oil to the rockers, but the flooding has stopped. The oil level is now at the valve cover gasket level. By the way, I have the fingered trays that direct the oil back under the intake. Now for the bad news, As soon as the engine warmed up it started smoking again. Before, it would smoke after about 3-4min. now it doesn't smoke until it reaches normal operating temp. Looks like there might have been 2 problems. By the way, there is no blow by, just enough blue smoke out the tail pipes to kill every mosquito within 10 miles! FFR428, my son and I bought the coupe manual last year and planned on ordering a kit after the Shelby was finished. Now it looks like we may never build the coupe. Guys, Thanks for your help. I'm going to do a compression test, a cyl. leak down test, check my valve stem seals, and change oil. Never had anything like this in 30yrs. of working on fords!

I would try a std recommended oil and see what happens , cheep test and will tell you a lot

 

are you 150% sure that your head to block oil drains line up properly and that there is no restriction of the drain back passages, i have come across rebuilt engines with sold hardened sludge blocking drain backs and i have also seen pieces of old head gasket or valve stem seals blocking the drains, triple check it, especially seeing the FE engine has pretty small drains as it is. even a .040" rocker oil feed restrictor will give you more than enough oil to the top end. diesel oil is perfectly fine to use in a gasoline engine and the 15/40 will be ok if you are in a cool climate. it wont harden your seals! (i love all these myths and old wives tales!) is your intake sealing properly? as the oil warms and thins a bit you could be drawing some thru the intake manifold gaskets, especially now you are directing more oil into the valley past the intake gasket. does your engine run a PCV valve that runs into the rocker cover?, if so does your rocker covers have baffles under the PCV valve fitting? hopefully for you your smoke problem is not in the bottom end. thanx.

 

I don't know in all cases but using 15-40 diesel oil in your gas engine is not recomended. I've tryied it and it hardend my seals and I had to replace them all. The same might be happening to your 352, the seals get hard and more oil gets passed through possibly causing your flodding. Just a suggestion...install new valve seals and use regular motor oil for gas engines, and see if that doesn't stop your excess oil flow.

Not true on 15-40 Diesel oil! And no matter what oil you use, that wont stop the excessive oil flow! JMHO

Here you go:

http://tds.econocophillips.com/cata... Motor Oil/Fleet & Commercial Engine Oils/Ken Super-D 3 Multigrades TDS Web.pdf