Hi, I recently purchased a VC Valiant with an aluminium block 225 slant motor. I’ve cruised it and now believe it has done a head gasket. I have purchased the copper head gasket from Olsens Gaskets which arrived in Australia within 2 weeks ( great service). Is there any gurus that can help with a rebuild kit for the motor. Also does anybody know or have a aluminium head that I may be able to purchase to fit the block? Can somebody tell me how to find out where and what this block from? Thanks in advance.

Regards
Ryan

Hello, And welcome,

A Moderator should move this into the engine section and I am sure folks will give you support there.

No aluminum head is needed with an aluminum engine as there were maybe only 5 aluminum heads made ever out of the millions of Slant 6 heads produced. Most if not all production Aluminum engines in '60-62 had an Iron head on them.

Dan, Lou, and Stan should be able to help you our more here.

Good Luck,

Greg

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http://www.youtube.com/hyperpack

Wow, that's a rarity even up here where there were about 50,000 of them. Down there, there might be four of them.
Good luck for you they let it into Australia, where there are very strict rules against importing asbestos, even in things like head gaskets. Count yer lucky stars on that one!
Only different bits, aside from the head gasket, are the head bolts (reusable), the rear main seal holder and its holder-to-block seals, and you have to make sure the main bearings have the oil hole drilled in the correct location; it's a little different than for the iron block. Up here, main bearings are double-drilled. Down there, maybe not. All the torque references can be had for the asking on here. Maximum overbore is 1mm. Check the block very carefully for corrosion damage, and when truing the deck surfaces the (freestanding) cylinders should be just barely proud of the block itself.
There were no production aluminum heads. There were a literal few prototypes in 1960 and another literal few prototypes in 1976. Maybe five of these, total, escaped Chrysler and are out in the world, virtually never for sale. All of the production aluminum-block engines had iron heads. You will want to spend time carefully checking that your head's combustion chambers are fastidiously centred over each cylinder, adjusting by grinding the locator pins and making index marks on all four sides of the head/block junction.

It's from between the middle of 1961 production and early 1963 production. Check the engine ID pad just outboard and below the frontmost spark plug, just inboard of the alternator's bottom bracket. It's on the block deck, facing the sky. Clean it up and you'll find a stamping like RA22, SA22, or TA22 followed by other figures; lettuce know what they are and some additional clues can be provided.

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一期一会
Too many people who were born on third base actually believe they've hit a triple.

Congrats on your purchase.
When you said you got a copper gasket, did you mean the sandwich copper asbestos aluminum block gasket?
Or a solid copper gasket?

Could you take pictures as you disassemble the block of the rear main seal retainer?
Some questions about the specifications on that part and the end seals.
The bolts are different length that is known.
They are a little longer for the aluminum block.

And Welcome to the Forum!

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Hyper_pak

Hi guys , thanks for your responses. After pulling the head off i found that cylinder 5 was cracked. is there any way to fix this or is my block a bin job?

Not sure what you mean by "bin job" but sadly it's probably junk

Guessing a bin job is the recycle bin.

Didn't DD do some some creative sleeve work on an aluminum block in an attempt to save/develop a way to use aluminum blocks that had excessive erosion at the head gasket mating surface? I don't remember if it was successful outright, but thought the process gave him new insights on how to do it next time?

I also seem to remember some mention that DD had found a way to sleeve an iron block so that 300cu in was possible with stroking.. but I have not been able to find that thread recently so maybe I was dreaming...

I've never heard of one stroked that big. Have heard of a /6 being bored/stroked to around 260-ish CID about the biggest I can remember hearing about

Yes I don't think DD actually put one together, but figured out how a " 300 cubic inch Is possible" if I remember the statement accurately.. now to go find where he said such..

I guess it was 298. https://www.slantsix.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=59128

I am not finding anything about the creative aluminum block work that he did.. that I seem to think I remember reading

I think I remember that Doug took an aluminum block and filled it with aluminum. He planned to then bore it out (Big) and put pistons in it. With a big overbore and stroker crank I thought I remember it could be over 280". I don't think it ever got finished because everything warped badly from the aluminum poured in the block.

My son has the stroker engine that is 260". Others do as well.

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2 Mopars come with Spark plug tubes. One is a world class, racing machine. The other is a 426 CI. boat anchor!

12.70 @ 104.6

Can you post a picture of the crack?
Is it in the steel sleeve or the aluminum column that supports the cylinder?
If the crack is in the steel sleeve, I would think that could be repaired.

Don't give up yet!

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Hyper_pak

My guess is that if you find just the right machinist, and pay them well, they could put a cylinder sleeve in there to fix it.

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988

Twiggy is accessible by going to the Engine FAQ and clicking on the link to The Best of Doctor Dodge. This was the closed deck aluminum build I believe.

https://www.slantsix.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=23948

The Buster build is in there too.

Ceej

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Part of Tyrde-Browne Racing

I do not believe Twiggy was the fully closed deck deal, but I think he pressed some stepped bore liners onto the tops of the existing cylinders and butted them up to the block perimeter - snugly but not fixed. Someone will have to read through that thread... At the level of HP he was trying to make, the MLS gasket we made would likely work fine. I may put some boost on mine at some point and see how much it can take.

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988

Hey I have uploaded a pic of no5 cylinder the crack is the whole way through.