Dear Esteemed Colleagues,

I just completed a total rebuild of a 400 CID 4 bolt Main, Small block engine. I took my time and had the block vatted and cam bearing pressed in at a local machine shop. New valve job, although...the maching shop guy told me he did not mill the heads. The engine had overheated and blown a head gasket in the no. 7 cylinder. Upon cranking the motor for the first time....I heard a loud metalic sound and the motor would not turn over. I removed all the spark plugs and the engine spun freely with no metalic sound...however WATER was gushin out of the no. 7 plug hole !!Stock pistons and cam...no real trick parts. Any Ideas ?? Thanks.

Blow a gasket, no matter what, skim the head....EVERYTIME
And check the deck...if u dont, Murphy will be sure to blow it again, be it 1 mile or 10,000 miles
If it got over heated (red light means stop be it on a pole or the dash) then u can expect warping, and even worse, a crk...So if overheated into the bagan..Also crk test.
If getting block done...get it skimmed....thu if a matching numbers car, make them very well known that u dont want to loose the engine number
Currently the last letter on my engine # can now only be seen under a magnifing glass..the rest of the numbers are still OK.

The heads should never come out of the machine shop with at least crk testing and planed....Std proceedure.