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Hal Beatty · 12-12-2017, 05:41 PM

I'll agree with Gosfast, something looks fishy with those valve springs...

All this brings up something I dealt with 45 years ago; I assembled a freshly rebuilt later model Ford engine and even though I was a punk kid I knew enough to double check the cam/crank timing before I put the front timing cover on. The two marks on the gears lined up correctly so I bolted everything up and put it back in the car. Only problem was that it wouldn't start, did some farting and popping but wouldn't run. Over the next week I checked everything, including ignition and fuel. When I checked compression it was low, just as you've found. My first guess at that point was that I had messed up the cam timing, but I knew that couldn't be the case. So I tore it down and sure enough... the marks lined up just as I had installed them. Then I blamed the cam grinder; so pulled that, and found all the lobes to be in the right place. Decided to put the stock cam back in it and when re-installing the timing gears and chain finally discovered that I had originally installed the cam gear backwards and had been timing the cam off of a small balance hole on the back side of the gear. Now that is a "learning experience"...

12-12-2017, 05:41 PM	#65
Hal Beatty Senior Member Join Date: Jul 2012 Location: Bellingham, WA Posts: 213	Re: Rebuilt Flathead Problems. I'll agree with Gosfast, something looks fishy with those valve springs... All this brings up something I dealt with 45 years ago; I assembled a freshly rebuilt later model Ford engine and even though I was a punk kid I knew enough to double check the cam/crank timing before I put the front timing cover on. The two marks on the gears lined up correctly so I bolted everything up and put it back in the car. Only problem was that it wouldn't start, did some farting and popping but wouldn't run. Over the next week I checked everything, including ignition and fuel. When I checked compression it was low, just as you've found. My first guess at that point was that I had messed up the cam timing, but I knew that couldn't be the case. So I tore it down and sure enough... the marks lined up just as I had installed them. Then I blamed the cam grinder; so pulled that, and found all the lobes to be in the right place. Decided to put the stock cam back in it and when re-installing the timing gears and chain finally discovered that I had originally installed the cam gear backwards and had been timing the cam off of a small balance hole on the back side of the gear. Now that is a "learning experience"...