History
I bought the car in January 2001 at age 16, and quickly got into modifying it. What teen can resist? I drove the car for about 25k miles before I did any extensive engine work to the stock 305 TBI. Vortec heads, LT4 production cam, Edelbrock intake, and a Holley 670cfm TBI sat on the stock shortblock. This combo lasted me about 8k miles before I spun a rod bearing, locked up the engine at 2000 rpm, and blew up three rods. The engine was a near total loss. Pistons hit the heads and left indentations on the combustion chambers. Rods gouged the camshaft. I didn't see the full extent of the damage until I tore it down. I guess 6500rpm is too much for a stock bottom end.That spring the car underwent Project Nifty 350, where I yanked out that broken 305 and put an L98 shortblock with some other goodies on top of it. I had a new set of modified Vortec heads again, a Comp Cams XE305 cam, and I switched to carburetion instead of that TBI mess. The engine was in known perfect working condition, so I didn't bother to replace any parts on the bottom end. I should have taken my advice from the previous build, but I was broke. And that engine was about to be. You can see what came next below.
Fired the Firebird up this spring on one of the first nice days, to take it for a drive. Ugly knocking noise, very audible. It wasn't there last summer. Time for another rebuild? You bet. That totally scrapped my plans to get a new car. I recently started tearing apart that engine in class to find out what I did wrong this time. Simple mistake turned my engine into a paperweight. When I disassembled the shortblock, I found six broken piston rings (all top) and every rod bearing was wiped to the copper color on all of the top shells. The main bearings were all ruined on the bottom halves. Too much timing advance. Too much stress on the piston and rod as it traveled up to TDC. The occasional detonation (which muffled under engine and exhaust roar) was what killed the rings.