engine rebuild kits

cool man thanks i think i might just do that for now

If it's also just plain not running right then hit us with the symptoms. The Vortec 7.4's are prone to fuel pressure regulator and injector leaks that will make it run rich, and hard to start when hot; there's a thread in here about replacement injectors that are a big improvement. Also some of the distributors seem to wear out really bad, I had a 96 7.4 that was around 200K and I could grab the rotor and shove it side to side like almost half an inch. It had poor idle and lack of power. Replaced the distributor took care of that.

Just be sure if you're going to remove the distributor on a first gen Vortec (in other words the 96-up, before they went to the coil-pack LS-based engines in the new body style) that you read up on the subject very carefully. They use a cam/crank sensor arrangement and you must, must, do not fail, mark the distributor body AND the rotor position before removing it and stab it back in as close as possible to the same so you can get it running again. Then you fine-tune it with a scanner that can read the cam retard number. GM's Tech II can do it, some of the Snap-On scanners can if they're updated to be new enough, or the somewhat cheaper AutoXray 6000 is supposed to be able to do it. Some people get lucky by moving the distrib around until the check engine light goes away (P1345 code, cam/crank correlation error) but it can still be up to 14 degrees or so off. It really needs to be within a 5 degree window, +/- 2 degrees from 0.

Richard

cool man sounds good but when you say the distributer your talkin about the spider right?
so once i remove the cap i need to mark the direction it is pointing on the intake?

thanks man i appreciate it

Let's be careful not to mix up terms, by distributor I mean the ignition distributor, yeah that sucker that is under your distributor cap. When you remove the cap, note the position of the contact on the rotor and mark it. If it's not lined up somewhere that you can make a very clear mark, bump the starter a few times until it lines up with something, preferably the firewall, I know of more than one person that marked on the intake then forgot and cleaned up the intake while they had it off the truck. Also don't forget you're making TWO marks, one for the rotor position, and the distributor body position too.

The reason I mentioned the "spider" term is usually when people say spider in reference to the Vortec engines they mean the fuel injection setup on the small block. The small block has a central injector with plastic lines going to poppet valves for each cylinder, usually it's called the spider.

Richard

alright yeah that is what i thought as far as marking the position.
but when you say the body position what do you mean by that?
the hole shaft or something?
and the spider thing i did not know i have talked with mechs and friends down here and they knew that i was talkin about the cap but that is good to know.

thanks man

The body of the distributor. What the cap attaches to.

Richard

ok so i have the whole plenum and what not takin off but you have to take off the distibutor before you can take off the intake right?
and you also need to take the fuel rail off to right?
so how do you take them off?
i seem to be having trouble may sound stupid but ohwell.
thanks

haha so scratch the last comment i got it all ripped apart and this is what i got


now someone told me those clogs were normal
is this true?

ichy

yeah it is.
what i want to know is how does rat crap get in there? haha
na but anyone know the cause of this buildup?
and what can be done to fix it?