Yes.

 

Very few Clevelands had adjustable rockers from the factory: Boss 351 and a 351 Cobra jet. All others, 2V and 4V had positive stop rockers from the factory.

 

yes but you need to have both valves closed.
easiest way i do it is to rotate the motor by hand until the rotor points to the terminal on the cap to the cylinder im working on

 

Okay.. to me it doesn’t make sense that anything other than tightening down the rockers here for non adjustable arms works.. there’s a bolt, a square spacer/washer that seats the rocker arm on the blocks rocker mount and that’s it …no adjustment no locking nut etc.., I don’t see the point of turning the crank to insure open close etc..unless the lifters loaded and won’t allow you to tighten the rocker bolt down but I’m not seeing that.. . it’s a seated rocker mounted into a fixed mount without any adjustments, and that’s it. Bolt down that’s it me.. I don’t see any way you can damage anything or
Need to do more.. by just Torquing each bolt down to 25 foot pounds each ??? So anyone…. give me the logic here otherwise…

 

No.
a. The camshaft must be on the base circle for the valve being tightened.
b. The bolt is tightened to "zero lash".
c. The bolt is then SLOWLY tightened to 20 lb./ft., counting the rotation of the head. If it takes less than 1/4 turn of the bolt to reach 20 lb./ft., you need longer pushrods. If it takes more than 1 full turn to reach 20 lb./ft. than you need to shim the pedestal. Since the rocker bolts are 5/16-18 you can calculate 1 turn of the bolt to equal .05555" and a hex nut having six sides means one wrench flat of movement equals .00925" to determine the extra pushrod length or shim thickness needed.

 

No.
a. The camshaft must be on the base circle for the valve being tightened.
b. The bolt is tightened to "zero lash".
c. The bolt is then SLOWLY tightened to 20 lb./ft., counting the rotation of the head. If it takes less than 1/4 turn of the bolt to reach 20 lb./ft., you need longer pushrods. If it takes more than 1 full turn to reach 20 lb./ft. than you need to shim the pedestal. Since the rocker bolts are 5/16-18 you can calculate 1 turn of the bolt to equal .05555" and a hex nut having six sides means one wrench flat of movement equals .00925" to determine the extra pushrod length or shim thickness needed.

This ^^^^

 

Okay.. to me it doesn’t make sense that anything other than tightening down the rockers here for non adjustable arms works.. there’s a bolt, a square spacer/washer that seats the rocker arm on the blocks rocker mount and that’s it …no adjustment no locking nut etc.., I don’t see the point of turning the crank to insure open close etc..unless the lifters loaded and won’t allow you to tighten the rocker bolt down but I’m not seeing that.. . it’s a seated rocker mounted into a fixed mount without any adjustments, and that’s it. Bolt down that’s it me.. I don’t see any way you can damage anything or
Need to do more.. by just Torquing each bolt down to 25 foot pounds each ??? So anyone…. give me the logic here otherwise…

im by far not a mechanic. Im mechanically inclined and follow instructions to the letter

this procedure came form the shop manual and the holy bible- the Tom Monroe 351C book

you can do it any way you want i guess but doing per the book has not let me down yet- and i been working on this 351C since 1982

 

Yes, that's how they were originally designed to be assembled. The engines moved down a line and the workers installed X number of rockers and pushrods and ran them down with preset tools.

Now, 50+ years later, it would be wise to check your preload given that there are too many variables to account for, and we are well outside of the factory tolerance controls.

 

The Cleveland non-adjustable rockers must be torqued down to spec. You can't "back them off". They will loosen resulting in valve train failure.

However, that doesn't mean you can just tighten all the rockers without rotating the engine. As mentioned above, the lifter must be on the base circle or it will put too much stress on the lifter.

It's weird, but you should follow the procedure for an adjustable valve train, but torque the rocker bolts instead of going 1/4 or 1/2 turns beyond zero lash.

 

Counting your turns is something you do when you are assembling an engine you just had rebuilt. It is needed to verify that you have enough and not too much pre-load on the lifters. Things like grinding valves or installing different valves, grinding seats, re-surfacing the heads and decking the block can affect the pushrod length that you need to run. Otherwise you get the cam onto the base circle and torque the rocker arm down to the torque spec. Make sure that the block on the bottom of the pedestal goes completely into the slot on the rocker arm boss and isn't edgewise or crosswise. Also make sure that all those slots in the heads are dirtncrud free. Do not pump up your lifters before you torque the rockers. Do it after.

 

I took the pushrods and lifters out of my 351C and checked and cleaned them. Everything was in good shape. I put it back together and tightened the rocker nuts when the lifter was on the base circle. The engine was all original so no changes were needed. But if the engine or heads have been rebuilt or the cam changed then it might not be so easy. On the assembly line, the parts are new and in spec. I'm sure they were assembled as fast as possible.

 

Agree and this is my point.. I did some research and found that ford assembled these motors on the assembly line by simply tightening to spec.. nothing else no adjustments, no turning the motor to TDC etc nothing more than tightening the rockers down to spec… so if I’m running everything factory stock no mods etc bone stock and everything is factory stock !! why wouldn’t I do the same!! Lol ..

So I copied Fords way and she’s fine runs great. I put her back to together just like Ford did on the original assembly line and she’s fine..

Man!! How confusing opinions can n how to do things can be.. when I concourses my 65 FB I always ran into the same things.. lots of bad suggestions and misdirections.. until I went directly to the source.. Ford!! Original materials etc.. I knew this was a weird senario.. and as an engineer it didn’t make sense to have to do anything to a stock setup except what Ford did oritingally to make her and I kinda trust Fords way vs others so I’ll stick with that.. thanks all good bye!!

 

So what I’m hearing from those who say to make necessary adjustments rather than simply torquing each bolt the same is that on the ford assembly line they did the same thing suggested here and didn’t just torque down each bolt the same on the assembly line …yes???

I take that claim with a grain of salt. On the "assembly line", the engines were already assembled, painted and run. I can't say I've ever heard someone who worked in the engine plant describe the steps of engine assembly for a 351C and, for all I know, the rockers may have been installed and torqued according to spec at assembly, at which point everything was new and if a bolt reached torque before 1/4 turn or after 1 turn it's possible the lifter, pushrod or rocker was tossed in the "scrap bin" and replaced... can anyone say for sure? The only thing that CAN be said for certain is that the Shop Manual shows the procedure for installing rockers when servicing the engine and that's where we are...not on the assembly line.

 

I didn’t get here not knowing a thing or two about mustangs

Agree and this is my point.. I did some research and found that ford assembled these motors on the assembly line by simply tightening to spec.. nothing else no adjustments, no turning the motor to TDC etc nothing more than tightening the rockers down to spec… so if I’m running everything factory stock no mods etc bone stock and everything is factory stock !! why wouldn’t I do the same!! Lol ..

So I copied Fords way and she’s fine runs great. I put her back to together just like Ford did on the original Wngine assembly line and she’s fine..

Man!! How confusing opinions can be on how to do things…when I concoursed my 65 FB I always ran into the same things.. lots of bad suggestions and misdirections.. until I went directly to the source.. Ford!! Original materials etc.. I knew this was a weird senario.. and as an engineer it didn’t make sense to have to do anything to a stock setup except what Ford did oritingally to make her and I kinda trust Fords way vs others so I’ll stick with that.. thanks all good bye!!

I take that claim with a grain of salt. On the "assembly line", the engines were already assembled, painted and run. I can't say I've ever heard someone who worked in the engine plant describe the steps of engine assembly for a 351C and, for all I know, the rockers may have been installed and torqued according to spec at assembly, at which point everything was new and if a bolt reached torque before 1/4 turn or after 1 turn it's possible the lifter, pushrod or rocker was tossed in the "scrap bin" and replaced... can anyone say for sure? The only thing that CAN be said for certain is that the Shop Manual shows the procedure for installing rockers when servicing the engine and that's where we are...not on the assembly line.

yeah, I went to think there was some adjustments pre-adjustments. If it wasn’t for two flat metal meeting surface is just simply coming together, since that’s not the case, and these rockers are not adjustable and everything’s bone stock I’m gonna go with common sense to meeting surfaces torque it down make sure everything fits correctly and it’s done and I’m not saying that the engines were assembled on the assembly line. I already know they were preassembled, I’m saying how Ford assembled them, thanks to All! end of discussion, how many use common sense and Ford

 

It still pays to check everything carefully. Ford did not always do a perfect job. The reason I took the intake manifold off was because it seemed to have a crack. And it did have a crack. From the bottom, I could clearly see an imprint of the corner of another intake manifold. It looks like another manifold fell on it before the metal was cool.

 

Yeah always makes sense to double & triple check the correct way to do important things like this..

Also, If anyone can prove that Ford didn’t just torque down,, the non adjustable rockers n 1970 351c engines etc.. to spec.. LmK .. show me the proof, otherwise I believe everything will be fine here.

Everyone.. thanks for your input ..

 

Yeah always makes sense to double & triple check the correct way to do important things like this..

Also, If anyone can prove that Ford didn’t just torque down,, the non adjustable rockers n 1970 351c engines etc.. to spec.. LmK .. show me the proof, otherwise I believe everything will be fine here.

Everyone.. thanks for your input ..

Wouldn't the proper assumption be that Ford didn't just torque them down? Then, the correct action would be do follow the accepted procedure to ensure the preload is to specification instead of "winging it"? Is there some underlying reason why you don't want to do it properly?
I'm contused....

 

You don’t take advice much do you?

 

If you don't do it properly your rocker arm bolt torques are going to be wrong and toward the loose side. Running the engine that way may lead to some unhappy results with rocker bolts coming loose. Why risk that?