October 16th, 11:15 AM, life breathes from the Chalon! Wow, what a rush, the sound of a small block chevy on its first run is one hell of an adreneline rush. It is extremely responsive however it is no where near dialed in yet. But it does sound very sweet. Joe is on his way over now to help me get the last few things hooked up so I can run it longer. Seems there is an oil leak at the filter somewhere. The filter is tight so I am not sure why it is pouring out of there. I will find out though soon. In any case, It Lives!! Yes I took a video of it firing up the first time. Not sure how to post it though.

Scott

Thats Great news. Hope my startup goes as well

Dave

Congratulations It's great to see the light at the end.

SWEEEEEEEEEEEEET! Congrats! What did you do to resolve the clutch issue?

must see video!

way to go scott!!!!

Well, I must have a lot of air in the system cause it got up to 210 and I shut it off because the front hoses were cold. Infact, all the hoses were cold. Its not flowing at all. We are going up to get some more stuff and we will try it again. But it does sound awesome.

Awesome news Scott!! Must be a real rush. I was so excited the first time I got my 75 running that I scraped the whole rear right fender on the garage backing out.

Can't wait to see it run!

Stevo

Thats SIR Scott...to you....

Way cool Scott!

Send me the video, I'll post it for you.

If you have FTP software, you can transfer it that way.

So, what did you have to do to make it work?

Scott,
That must be a great relief and joy! Congratulations!
Felix

I have saved my 100th post for this thread........
CONGRATS Scott!

Finally, your dream is coming true!
Can't wait to hear it...or better yet,
go for a drive

Lisa

WOOOOO HOOOOOOO!

Way to stick with it! Great job! Pics! Pics! Pics!

Scott,

Congradulations!!!!! I know the feeling hearing a healthy V8 rumble in a 914 for the first time. You must be carrrying serious wood about now.

Your at a critical stage where the cam needs to be broken in and the cooling system needs to be purged of air. The air can be removed easily by having at least one hole (1/8") drilled in thermostat with fill point left open during the initial warm up. This allows circulation of water prior to t/s opening and provides a easy path for air to escape. Get it up to 2000-2500 rpm with radiator cap handy. As temperature reaches 170F or so, you'll need to install the radiator cap. You'll see this necessary as the water begins to expand. Do not reduce engine rpm to idle speed until the cap is installed or turn engine off...........you'll have a real mess on your hands.

It takes two people to do this right. I'd also jumper across the radiator fans to have them "on" during the initial warm up. Burp it a couple of times after cool down J(engine off) by opening upper radiator petcock when coolant temperature reaches about 170F and plenty of coolant in overflow tank. This allows air to escape and be replaced by water.

Oil leak: I believe there is a plug (3/8" or so) that needs to be installed right above where the oil filter is installed.

Keep us posted.

John

Mazeltov!

pics!!!! scotts busy busting his balls makingit work!!!! go scott!

Well, it ran out of gas during the break in, will that make much difference? I just went up and got a 5 gallon can filled and am in the process of putting it in the tank. The temp seems to hold around 190 until it ran out of gas. It sure is responsive. The radiator and cooling system seem to be working ok, So far I have put about 5 gallons of antifreeze in the system and the recovery tank. There still may be some air in the system. I will get it all out eventually. I hooked up my gauges and the oil pressure stays around 75 and drops to 45 when it idles down. I can hardly wait to drive this thing. The throttle response is amazing. If it goes like it sounds, I am in for a hell of a ride. The first video I took of it at initial firing is about 17 meg, Joe came over and we did it again and its about 14 meg. If you have a site I can FTP these to, PM me and I will send them over.

Open house at your place tomorrow?

Scott,

Your numbers look good. If it went above 190F after you ran out of gas, that is normal. Your oil pressure looks good.

It will take some driving to get all the air out but just burp it like I explained after every drive for the next week or so and you'll be fine.

If your running a carbon fibre clutch, baby it for the first 100 miles. As the guys at RH said, "drive it like grandma" during breakin. If not, you'll experience chatter. This one is hard to do with so much power under your foot but wise to follow.

Sounds like a cold beer night!

John

Sure, come on down. I will be working on it to get it road worthy.

Here is a pic of the gauges at about 2500 RPM during break in, This is right before I shut it down. The fans ran for about 10 minutes after I shut it down, is that normal? I am glad they at least kick in when it gets up to 190. The temp gauge is connected to the engine, the fan thermostat is on the radiator. I wired it so the fans would stay on and cool after shut down. Should I do it differently? The oil leak from the filter is intermittent, sometimes it leaks, and sometimes it doesnt. I am going to have to get underneath it and figure this one out. The clutch is Kevlar from Kennedy as is the flywheel.

how did you fix the clutch problem??

I am not 100% sure if I fixed it or not, it was loose so I tightened it up till it cleared the pressure plate. I will install the front brakes tonight or tomorrow and install the front ball joint bolts and then try the clutch and see if I can get it into gear. Tomorrow will tell the rest of the story. I dont want to rush it and want to make sure everything is right. Everything is new on this car from the brakes to the brake lines, suspension, everything. Even the gas tank was removed and cleaned and painted with new fuel line ran. I hope I got everything right.

Yes!!!! Way to go Scott!!!

Scott sent over the video. It's on the following website.

Scotts startup video
then select either the large version 15mb or the smaller version 5mb.

Andrew's doesn't work yet. (the car does, the video doesn't)

Dan

I'm getting a "file not found" error...

I think it's fixed now.

But just in case here are the direct links.

bigun
http://www.teamgracer.com/cars/videos/chalon.mpg

smallun
http://www.teamgracer.com/cars/videos/chalonsmall.wmv

Thanks Dan for hosting that for me. The smoke towards the end had me worried till I found out what it was. I knew it would smoke a little due to everything being new and the cosmoline burning off, but apparently something plastic or rubber had fallen into the joint where the headers all come together and it was melting. It will eventually burn out of there and stop smoking. I hope. Today I will be trying to get all the little crap done to make it road worthy. I can hardly wait to drive it.

Whoo, sounds nice! I can't wait until I get to that point. Haven't heard my engine run since I pulled the firebird into the garage to yoink the engine.

Hey Scott,
Sounds great. What are your motor and clutch specs?

Dan,
Do you know why the "bigun" link has pauses when I play it? I have DSL but my PC is a few years old.
Felix

You might have to right-click on it to save it to you hard disk. Then play it from there.

FYI, The small one is almost the same with a couple little hickups. The program I used is new to me, so I didn't convert it correctly, but basically, if you've seen one, you seen both.

Cool Scott! I saved it to my desk top!

I built the engine to the specs that Rod Simpson told me except I went with a little higher compression heads, he said it should be around 330 HP but I am guessing it will be closer to 300. The clutch is the Kevlar 228 MM from Renegade/Kennedy. I am hoping to take it for a drive next week once I get the license for it.