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Captain_Ronnie's avatar
Nov 20, 2013

New crate 454

Last month I broke the crank in my 1988 Winnebago Super Chief. It had only 57,000 miles on it. I located a GM crate engine 454. I took my time and installed the engine piece by piece. I went with a new 4 row core aluminum radiator. Everything on the engine is new, fan clutch, water pump, hoses, everything. The engine fired right up on the first try and I set the timing, 4* BTDC. I had the carb rebuilt by a professional and tuned to the new engine.My issue is that this new engine runs hot, 220 all the time, 230+ going up hill. My old engine never ran hot at all, not even in Death Valley at 110* in the shade. I am running a 50/50 mix on the coolant with 2 bottle of cool water additive. The weights on the distributer are great and move freely. I did a muffler clog test and they are clear. I have 12 to 18 on the vacuum gauge. All my VACUUM switches are new and operate, including the EGR and the valve at the header exhaust on the left side (forget what it is called) I am no novice to Chevy engines and Big Block issues, but this one has me dumb founded. The tranny has it,s own cooler, as well as the oil. In fact, when the engine is running hot at 230, the engine oil is only at 140/150. All my gauges are mechanical. Now, the engine temp sensor is located on the right side head just behind cylinder number 4. The other temp sensor in located on the left head just behind the number 3 cylinder. I have redundancy with all the gauges. Tranny is a turbo 400 and runs cool. Any ideas or help would greatly be appreciated .....