Hi guys,

So I made a thread a month or two ago regarding some modifications I was considering for my 360 in my 01 Ram. The last week I've been on vacation so I was able to get a bunch of things done.

First things first, taking off the heads to find that you can still see cylinder crosshatch at 150,000 miles is a great experience Ignore all the flakey gasket material on the piston head.


Here is what I ended up doing

Mods:
El Cheapo Stainless Shorty Headers
Kegger Mod (I did it a bit differently than anyone else I've seen)

Repairs
Plenum Repair (fixed my pinging)
Complete valve job with new valve seats
All new gaskets above the shortblock
New water pump - Stock was OK but I was already there
New Tensioner - fixed my cold start belt squeal
New timing set
New NGK plugs

Random notes

Plenum - So this is interesting. I have performed the Mopar test for a blown plenum several times (as seen here: ) and the truck has always passed. I've also never seen oil on the pan through the throttle. That being said, I had experienced several of the symptoms such as pinging, oil consumption, and poor economy.

I wish I would have taken a photo, but when I removed the belly pan, the gasket was stuck only to the pan, and not at all to the intake manifold and the inside of the intake was coated in oil mist. There was also some pooling on one end out of sight from the TB. What this indicated was that the gasket was not actually sealing against the manifold at all...and since I didn't see any indication that the intake had been off...it may have actually been leaking since new. This was likely caused by the belly bolts being too long and not putting enough clamping force on that gasket and holding it against the manifold. It's also possible that the gasket bonded better to the steel pan and during the first few heat cycles, broke it's connection to the manifold due to differing expansion/cooling rates between the aluminium intake and the steel pan. I honestly don't know. What I do know though, is that mine was leaking, and now it has an aluminium pan and grade 8 bolts holding in a fel-pro gasket so it should not leak again.

Kegger - I did my plenum mod a little differently than others. By differently, I mean my runners are cut further down and at a different angle. This wasn't entirely intentional. I started out doing the cutting with a pneumatic die grinder and when I went to knock part of the runner divider out of one of the sections, it broke off further down than I had intended. In an effort to keep everything symmetrical, I cut the others in the same fashion. If I were to do it over, I would have started with a sawzall, and went straight across like others have done. It would be more symmetrical and likely better for the motor. Here's the pics of mine anyway.



I should say, I don't really condone this style of kegger mod. The truck certainly runs stronger than it did before teardown, but I can't necessarily attribute that to this mod, and especially not to this runner length. It may have helped, it may have hurt, I honestly have no idea. All I know for sure is that the truck runs better now than ever.

Timing Set - The OEM set had a considerable amount of slack, happy to have the new set on there.

Headers - Gotta admit, I'm regretting cheaping out of the headers. First, I had to do quite of bit of grinding on the flange to get them to clear the spark plug protectors. I expected this and if that was the only issue, I would be happy with them. The biggest issue is the change in sound. I'd read that going to headers with the thin tubing walls like the cheapies can really increase valvetrain noise that you hear...boy were they right. I'm not sure how to describe the sound change, but I don't dig it. Should have stepped up to quality or re-used the manifolds. I've still got the manifolds so I may put them back on at some point.

Pics of headers and newly repainted heads and valve covers (used Rustoleum engine enamel)



Heads - First and foremost...they aren't cracked. My 150,000 miles OEM magnum heads aren't cracked haha. I was loosing coolant slowly but never saw a puddle so I thought for sure if was heads, but it was actually a timing cover gasket failure. The coolant would evaporate before hitting the ground because it leaked onto the block. Amazing.

I thought I was going to get away with just cleaning up the valves and lapping them back in, but I ended up needing a valve job. A few of the intake valves were warped (able to be repaired) and a few of the exhaust seats were not good enough to reuse. Ended up having to fork over $270 for the valve seats and valve job. Honestly though, that was kinda a deal, especially considering they got done in 2 days the week of Christmas. At least now I know what I've got.

I considering doing head porting, but the schedule didn't really allow for it unfortunately. I had limited garage time.


Torn Down:
Almost back together:


On the road:

Well, we fired the truck last night and put the finishing touches on it this morning. I put about 50 miles on the truck today and here are my thoughts.

First, it is far more responsive in the middle of the rpm range, and seems to pull a little stronger everywhere.
Second, it SEEMS like I have to use just infinitesimally more throttle to slowly pull away from a stop light at the same speed. This might be the placebo effect and me just expecting to have lost some torque from the intake mod.
Third, at WOT, the truck gets from 20-50 or 30-60 a good bit quicker than I remember it doing. Granted, I haven't been WOT in the truck in some months because it had been pinging under heavy throttle.

It's been a long week and we ran into several snags (broken exhaust studs, needing valve work, etc) but I've now got a truck that's in good shape, with a new top end on the motor, a bottom end that appears to be in great shape, a new transmission, all new moog front end, newer Cooper AT3's, and countless other things. I've basically got a new...2001 Ram at this point haha and I've got less than $10,000 in the truck. To replace it would cost what? $30,000, $40,000? I'm a happy guy.

Truck:

 

Awesome.

A fair bit of your increased performance, and certainly where you are feeling it, is from the keg repair, and mods. Timing chain was also a major contributor for me on the engine running MUCH better. (and that was a standalone change...... my timing cover started puking coolant, so, new water pump, and timing set while I was there.)

I am flat out STUNNED your heads weren't cracked.

 

my personal opinion on the kegger mod performance increase isnt necessarily due to a shorter runner length, but, its because your getting the inlets farther away from the belly pan, the stock setup is so close to that plate, it has to be causing a restriction...

 

Kegger mod doesn't really give you 'more' power, it just moves the power band up a few hundred RPM.

 

Haha you and me both. The funny thing is, the machine shop called to ask me if the truck had ever been hot because of the warped intake valves, so I'm guessing it was overheated a time or two before I bought it and they're still not cracked!

Since I changed so many things, I can't attribute any of the performance increases to anything in particular. On the whole though, the butt dyno hasn't registered any LOSS anywhere, but only gains.

The thing with the timing chain is, I would have only seen a performance boost with it if the slack had moved base timing far enough out that the computer couldn't correct for it. I have no idea if that was the case or not, didn't measure slop, I just know I could flop that chain around a good bit and the new set was very taut.

My coolant leak was in the same place. Passenger side of the gasket next to the coolant passage. It wasn't a major leak, but certainly was leaking.

I'm not so sure about this. The steel pan is recessed away from the runner inlets so there is a decent bit of room for the air to turn the corner. If you were running a flat aluminum pan without a kegger mod, then it might be more restrictive.

I also don't completely agree with this. From what we have seen in other threads where guys were able to do before and after dyno tests, we do see a loss in the bottom and a gain in the midrange, however, we see a net average torque gain over the entire curve. It's not huge, but it's there, so technically it does give "more" power.

 

good work and good write up.