283 rebuild

[Steve66]

Well it's been a few months since I did it and I thought I would post my results here. I have a 66 C10 that had a very tired 283. It still started and ran but compression was down to about 50% and oil consumption was up to a quart every 300 miles. So here is what I did. It's a fairly standard and mild build and my goal was to have a peppy daily driver and not a street machine.

The cylinders cleaned up at .030 and I used sealed power flat top pistons, moly rings, Edelbrock Performer camshaft, intake (with oil fill tube) and 500 cfm carburetor. I had a crack in the original powerpack heads and scored a set of early 80's 305 heads (416 I think) and had them rebuilt. I painted it with some 2K ceramic engine paint from Eastwood and I'm well pleased with my results. It's hooked to the original powerglide transmission and 3:73 rear end so it's no racecar but power is good and it revs freely. At about 2500 rpm the secondaries open and the thing really comes to life. Mileage is around 12-13 but with the engine revving at about 3000 at 60 mph that's to be expected. The paint is holding up well and seems to be very scratch resistant and durable. And I have yet to see a sign of a leak anywhere. Which amazes me lol. The machine work and rebuild kit came to $1800 and that includes balancing the rotating assembly. The Edelbrock stuff was extra and all assembly was done by me. I'm really pleased with my results and I love driving it now. I think if I upgrade to the TH200 transmission I will be even happier. I would post pics but they are on my phone and I'm on my laptop right now but I can do it later if interested. Like I said at the beginning my goal was to not have a radical street machine and to retain the original engine as much as practical. I'm probably turning out somewhere around 230 hp and for a daily driver that's working just fine.

If you have a question about what I did just ask.