Mystery Solved!!

[T_Raven]

That's a sweet suburban

[hotroddr]

Here is the latest resting place for the suburban, and a picture of the reason there was a knock in the engine. Apparently the pistons were working on self clearancing themselves on the Vortec heads, oops! Lesson learned, check all clearances before bolting heads on and starting the engine. It appears that the metal debris in the oil were probably from starting the engine without priming the oil pump after it sat a while. The crank looks great, but the bearings are a little worn. The bores measure out great so I guess I lucked out there

I'm planning on throwing a new set of bearings in, clearancing the piston domes and going for it. Since I will be running about 11:1 compression, I will smooth all sharp edges on the pistons and in the combustion chambers, and will run the biggest cam the heads will support. I realize a tiny small block with short stroke and a large cam with an automatic transmission with a stock torque converter in a heavy vehicle will most likely be a dog, but the budget on this one is zero. I'm hoping it will get decent gas mileage and run for a few years without burning to much oil so I can finally drive this thing. 7 years is way too long to have a project sit!