The stock length pushrods and rocker system were the next items to be removed. Since the test car had a lumpy 236/236 duration .590/.590-inch lift cam, the stock 7.400-inch length pushrods still work well even with the cut heads. Those using smaller aftermarket or stock cams may need to go with slightly shorter pushrods like the 7.375-inch Manley variants available through SLP (PN 53106). | 
The intake and wiring harness are removed in one piece after being unbolted and detached from the heads and block. | 
The AFRs are unbolted, and even with the coolant drained, quite a bit of coolant still sits in the heads.... |
...Since GM bolts are torque-to-yield, the head bolts cannot be reused. | 
Besides the usual scraping and cleaning of the block surface to facilitate the best seal possible with the new head gaskets, heads, and block, Daniecki Sr. also likes to use one of the old head bolts to clean out the bolt holes in the block.... | 
...First he sprays Brakleen into the hole, then compressed air; screwing in the head bolt grabs the remainder of dried Loctite. |
The new heads sandwich the fresh GM MLS gaskets, and are then torqued to 22 ft-lbs. Since SLP uses GM bolts, the bolts are cranked 90 degrees on the first pass and 70 degrees on the second, instead of increasing the torque on the next trip around.... | 
...Daniecki Sr. uses the brand-new Snap-On electronic torque wrench to do all of the calculating for him, otherwise he would have to use Wite-Out to mark the bolt head and eyeball it. | 
Since this was the first time SLP ever installed the new L92 heads on one of its high compression blocks with this particular cam, Daniecki Jr. first made sure there was adequate piston-to-valve clearance. Since this cam has considerable duration, the valve hangs open longer as the piston is closer to the top of the cylinder. After cylinder one was brought to TDC and rotated to least clearance (approximately 10 percent BTDC), it was determined that .0945 clearance on the exhaust-side occurs with this cam/head combination. This is not ideal for a daily driver (and neither is this cam for that matter), since valve float could cause a problem. For a race build or Sunday driver such as our test car, however, it's no problem. The intake is somewhere around .160, which is more than adequate, and when the heads were tested with a 224/228 duration cam, the same could be said for both intake and exhaust. |