MLS head gaskets are all I use. Peel ‘em off, wire brush them, and spray copper spray on them and reinstall! Never had a failure on reusing MLS gaskets!
Another excellent video Graham! Thanks for looking after the rebuild of my V8 engine - first class job! 👏Now need to reinstall into my 1971 Zircon Blue P6 Automatic (GAN 340J) when it comes back from the spray shop 👍
Thanks Graham. This is a big help to me. First time building an engine, want to replace my 3.5 in my SD1 VDP EFI with a 4.6 which I have already bought and want to rebuild. Great video
Hey if your in the USA and your 3.5 is ok and rebuild-able I'd be interested in buying it! I'm building a trike and want a smaller displacement Rover Aluminum V8.
Cant believe land rover dished these out with less than 100bhp in the stage 1 v8 albeit with restrictors in the air intakes. Would love a stage one with this engine though...
Good video Graham. I was looking for a Rover V8, but not so often found here, and if then some good money asked for a SD1 3,5 I think these are good engines, expensive in tuning as i have read in the past. For fuel i use Shell V-power ( my engine Ford 4 cyl. ) wich we have at the pump in Nethrlands and Germany just 2 miles away, it seems differences in in what country you buy gas at station. Racer told me Shell V power in Germany was better then in Netherlands... I don't know myself. But they are 5 star rated, at least have 102 Octane. For now i have leaded racing fuel for testing running in at 104 octane but at 6,5 euro/liter rather expensive fuel.
Another option that is considerably less expensive is water injection. Look for a David Vizard Powertec 10 episode that is labeled something like; run 17:1 CR on pump gasoline, 87 octane. Water has an infinite octane. You can use a MAP sensor or a pressure switch that closes at a manifold pressure. Manifold pressure is opposite of vacuum. So you may want the switch to close at 6 to 7PSI manifold pressure. Using a MAP sensor with an ECM you can vary the water injection volume to about half the fuel injection volume. Doing this you can lean the engine and advance the timing 2° or 3° as the water slows and cools the burn. Detonation is not an issue at small throttle opening which gives low manifold pressures. Another thing to consider is that water when it changes phase from liquid to gaseous, expands 1,600×. It also aids in keeping the combustion chamber clean.
Great! Please keep on showing dyno footage with Sound and data - really nice. Could you maybe talk a little more about different needles and springs for the carb - maybe some dyno runs? And How to check if ignition advance works properly? Request: if I do a couple of flowed/ported heads using David Vizard technique and the IOP software - would you be interested in dynoing them? Best regards - Peter Lundorf - Denmark
genereally the origonal springs will be correct, and if you get full power mixture correct part throttle is usually ok. easiest way of doing timing is start retarded and keep doing power runs adding advance each time, if the advance curve is wrong your will find adding timing will give more power in some parts of the rev range and loose it elsewhere. if you really want to get in involed, use a locked distributor to find what the engine wants at each rpm. im up for testing heads, you just have to bare in mind dyno time is at a premium so i can only do it when i have a gap when i can put a V8 test mule on the dyno
Regarding the fuels; it is a matter of burn rate. Yes leaded fuels burn slower which requires more ignition lead, timing. For the neophites, we need to explain. Best power is generally achieved when maximum cylinder pressure occurs at about 10° to 15° ATDC on the power stroke. So if we have a faster burning fuel we can back the timing up a couple of degrees to get that maximum cylinder pressure at the correct time ATDC. Now another wrench in the monkey works pops up. This is oxygenated fuels by the addition of a percentage of ethanol or methanol. With the extra oxygen in the fuel, stoichiometric fuel ratio is now not 14.7:1. Max power fuel ratio is not around 13:1 Stoichiometric becomes closer to 14.1:1 depending on the percentage of alcohol in the fuel. Max power fuel ratio will be more like 11.75:1. The power loss comes from a too lean fuel mixture. Another David Vizard Powertec 10 video to look up is the one that describes combustion chamber modifications on 289 Ford heads for power. Now a person does not want to get hung up on the emblem on the bonnet. What you want to look at is what David Vizard calls a "scavenge plateau". First thing is to use a felt marker to "paint" the deck surface area where the cylinder wall is. Then stick the heads on the bare block to scribe around the bores. This is the maximum area you must not cross. Pull the heads off and using a die grinder, round off the edge of the quench pad to the exhaust valve on the side opposite to the exhaust ports. This aids the exhaust to follow the head shape and exit the valve instead of skipping over the head of the almost closed exhaust valve.
Then you need throw in the fact fuel distribution is less than ideal some cylinders will be leaner than others so unless you run 8 lambda sensors you will probably never really know, although plug reading can help here
@@PenguinMotorsDefinately, so you do not want to run on the extreme while reading an average. Rich is not as serious as lean. A temperature gun reading individual ports can give a quick indication confirmed by reading the plugs.
I would’ve left the compression at 10.5, you have aluminum heads, use a slightly lower thermostat temp and make sure the heads are smooth and you’ll be fine. If not, you need better gasoline. Even the worst 87 (lowest octane) in America will handle 10.5/1 comp with aluminum heads.
Hi Graham, I've seen that you've done a few Rover V8s on here and I'm looking at swapping out the tired diesel in my 1990 Land Rover Disco for a V8 with ~200hp. Based on your experience, would you recommend a 3.5 or 3.9 engine as a used base? I'm wary of the issues these engines have with cracked blocks and with liners, I'd like something that will last. Or would running on carbs be a better option for simplicity, assuming you can get that kind of power from a 3.5 on carbs? I've been looking at Canems distributorless ignition systems to stop it coughing in the wet, with either the EFI or carbs.
dependant on exhaust etc, 3.5 on su's wont do 200 bhp without a lumpy cam, in injected form with a mild cam a 3.5 will. put a 4 barrel on it it will end up somewhere between what su and injection will do. Given a disco is about the size and weight of a small barn your probably should be prioritising torque over bhp, in which case 3.9 is the way to go, it wont give a lot more bhp than a 3.5 as the bigger capacity moves torque down the rev range but it does noticably increase torque. A piston and liner kit to turn your 3.5 into a 3.9 is cheap and possibly better than starting with a factory 3.9. im drowning in fords at the moment but there is some more v8 rover testing in the pipeline
Graham these videos are so helpful to get an understanding as what is important and what is myth! I'm hopefully running up my V8 SD1 3.5 on SU carbs when it gets a bit warmer. At present I have a single AFR and sensor which I was planning to fit int the exhaust where the two branches turn into one but as there are two separate carbs should I fit a welded boss in each down pipe and maybe two sensors?
Having two O2 sensors doesnt help much, I run two on the dyno, but that doesnt hep a lot, as the carbs feed two cylinders on each bank, so even with two senors your are seeing and average mixture from both carbs. For max power under load i tune each carb based on torque output
2:08 Yeah unleaded burns faster than lead fuel but the whole point of having ignition advance is to get peak cylinder pressure occurring at around 14-20 degrees ATDC, The likes of Ricardo Engineering worked this out many years ago. So retarding the ignition for unleaded fuel is a perfectly acceptable way of achieving this, it won't burn out the exhaust valves because the burn rate is still high enough to allow all the fuel to have burnt before the exhaust valve lifts off its seat. Now if the BTU figure for unleaded is higher than leaded then that will be another kettle of fish! 6:15 I spotted that you have 14 bolt heads and I wondered whether you were going to fit the outer bolts, good idea to just 'nip' them up! In fact my friend and I are working on one of the 50 experimental engines that Rover built many years ago, It was fitted to William Martin-Hurst's P6 car, (his name on the log book), the engine number for memory is 'EXP19', the guy that owns the car and engine wanted to use the later 10 heads as they have decent stem oil seals, better valves and better valve seats, he wanted the heads to look like 14 bolts heads so so drilled the holes in the head so that we could cut the outer head bolts down so the shanks were about 20mm long, they were then knocked into the tight fitting holes in the head, they do not even go into the block at all! If someone in the future removes the heads they will be in for a shock when they fit a wrench to those 'bolts' 30:51 You are running 27 degrees of timing at 3k RPM, is that your 'all in figure?' if so its quite a lot less than the 36 degrees that most people seem to think is than ideal 'all in' figure for the 3.5 engines. Having said that clearly it likes that figure because 160BHP out of a 3.5 is not bad at all (I guess the engine is 'stock'). My best is 315 BHP, but that was a 4.6 🙂
I try not to theorize too much, i have a friend who bounces stuff off me, usually theorzing why i have done something, I then point something else out and the reply is often " oh, i never thought of that" Theroy is great but it doesnt take into account what you dont know! The engine wants what it wants, but generally 36 degress on a mechanical distributor is way too much timing for anything on roadgoing unleaded. yes i fitted the outer head bolts but torqued them to just 20lbft, so enough to stop them falling out on there own.
@@PenguinMotors I agree, if you have a dyno then there is no need to just follow 'theory'...just run the engine with different amounts of timing and set it to where the engine runs best, I was just quite surprised that it only wants/needs 27 degrees. Generally I remove all of the dizzy internals and rebuild it with an MSD pickup, no bob weights or anything like that, I then run a fully programable MSD 6230 6AL-2 ignition system along with a MAP system so I can use a vac advance system.
Hello!! I'm about to build a LR v8 3.9 engine!! And I have a question!! The brand of the pistons on the left side point forward and those on the right side point backward? (LR V8 3.9) thanks
Just buy a manifold and holley 500cfm carb edelbrock,offenhauser quite a few others to all made for an American 4barrel carbs of your choice big difference from my stock tr8 manifold carb setup
A V6 would have a slight advantage due to less friction and more valve area which is why the Buick 3800 (V6 variant of the Buick 215/Rover V8 with bigger bore and stroke) made a tad more power than this in stock form and significantly more when built. Even though the bores are small, it's still a great engine and the last versions have the displacement needed to make good power.
@@honkhonkler7732 They are fairly good engines in small cars as you get a low to the ground profile, they only weigh 200kg. Also as they are in off road vehicles you get good ground clearance under them. With a hi lift cam and fuel injection they do 250 HP and the same block can go up to 5 liter by changing the liners and do 320 HP and ft lb torque right up there too....similar figure. These still weigh pretty much 200kg too! So they are very versatile. Thanks for doing the video.
MLS head gaskets are all I use. Peel ‘em off, wire brush them, and spray copper spray on them and reinstall! Never had a failure on reusing MLS gaskets!
V8 rover head steel gaskets are not MLS. They are a single shim
Please Sir.. What year is this motor? and what years are the most reliable best engines to build?@@PenguinMotors
Another excellent video Graham! Thanks for looking after the rebuild of my V8 engine - first class job! 👏Now need to reinstall into my 1971 Zircon Blue P6 Automatic (GAN 340J) when it comes back from the spray shop 👍
Thanks again......really informative....confidence inspiring to work on these engines.
Thanks Graham. This is a big help to me. First time building an engine, want to replace my 3.5 in my SD1 VDP EFI with a 4.6 which I have already bought and want to rebuild. Great video
Hey if your in the USA and your 3.5 is ok and rebuild-able I'd be interested in buying it! I'm building a trike and want a smaller displacement Rover Aluminum V8.
Excellent again, as stated, the steel headgaskets are fine as long as all is straight and true, the composites mask issues for a little while.
"why have you just been staring at a bloke talking, then looking at an engine, for half an hour"
wimmen, they just don't understand...
Cant believe land rover dished these out with less than 100bhp in the stage 1 v8 albeit with restrictors in the air intakes.
Would love a stage one with this engine though...
music to my ears!
Good video Graham. I was looking for a Rover V8, but not so often found here, and if then some good money asked for a SD1 3,5
I think these are good engines, expensive in tuning as i have read in the past.
For fuel i use Shell V-power ( my engine Ford 4 cyl. ) wich we have at the pump in Nethrlands and Germany just 2 miles away, it seems differences
in in what country
you buy gas at station. Racer told me Shell V power in Germany was better then in Netherlands... I don't know myself. But they are 5 star
rated, at least have 102 Octane. For now i have leaded racing fuel for testing running in at 104 octane but at 6,5 euro/liter rather expensive fuel.
Another option that is considerably less expensive is water injection. Look for a David Vizard Powertec 10 episode that is labeled something like; run 17:1 CR on pump gasoline, 87 octane. Water has an infinite octane. You can use a MAP sensor or a pressure switch that closes at a manifold pressure. Manifold pressure is opposite of vacuum. So you may want the switch to close at 6 to 7PSI manifold pressure. Using a MAP sensor with an ECM you can vary the water injection volume to about half the fuel injection volume. Doing this you can lean the engine and advance the timing 2° or 3° as the water slows and cools the burn. Detonation is not an issue at small throttle opening which gives low manifold pressures.
Another thing to consider is that water when it changes phase from liquid to gaseous, expands 1,600×. It also aids in keeping the combustion chamber clean.
@@daledavies2334 i am watching this episode right now, thank's
Thank you for sharing.
Great! Please keep on showing dyno footage with Sound and data - really nice.
Could you maybe talk a little more about different needles and springs for the carb - maybe some dyno runs?
And How to check if ignition advance works properly?
Request: if I do a couple of flowed/ported heads using David Vizard technique and the IOP software - would you be interested in dynoing them?
Best regards - Peter Lundorf - Denmark
genereally the origonal springs will be correct, and if you get full power mixture correct part throttle is usually ok. easiest way of doing timing is start retarded and keep doing power runs adding advance each time, if the advance curve is wrong your will find adding timing will give more power in some parts of the rev range and loose it elsewhere. if you really want to get in involed, use a locked distributor to find what the engine wants at each rpm. im up for testing heads, you just have to bare in mind dyno time is at a premium so i can only do it when i have a gap when i can put a V8 test mule on the dyno
Thanks for another good video😊😊😊😊😊😊
Regarding the fuels; it is a matter of burn rate. Yes leaded fuels burn slower which requires more ignition lead, timing. For the neophites, we need to explain. Best power is generally achieved when maximum cylinder pressure occurs at about 10° to 15° ATDC on the power stroke. So if we have a faster burning fuel we can back the timing up a couple of degrees to get that maximum cylinder pressure at the correct time ATDC. Now another wrench in the monkey works pops up. This is oxygenated fuels by the addition of a percentage of ethanol or methanol. With the extra oxygen in the fuel, stoichiometric fuel ratio is now not 14.7:1. Max power fuel ratio is not around 13:1
Stoichiometric becomes closer to 14.1:1 depending on the percentage of alcohol in the fuel. Max power fuel ratio will be more like 11.75:1.
The power loss comes from a too lean fuel mixture.
Another David Vizard Powertec 10 video to look up is the one that describes combustion chamber modifications on 289 Ford heads for power. Now a person does not want to get hung up on the emblem on the bonnet. What you want to look at is what David Vizard calls a "scavenge plateau". First thing is to use a felt marker to "paint" the deck surface area where the cylinder wall is. Then stick the heads on the bare block to scribe around the bores. This is the maximum area you must not cross. Pull the heads off and using a die grinder, round off the edge of the quench pad to the exhaust valve on the side opposite to the exhaust ports. This aids the exhaust to follow the head shape and exit the valve instead of skipping over the head of the almost closed exhaust valve.
Then you need throw in the fact fuel distribution is less than ideal some cylinders will be leaner than others so unless you run 8 lambda sensors you will probably never really know, although plug reading can help here
@@PenguinMotorsDefinately, so you do not want to run on the extreme while reading an average. Rich is not as serious as lean. A temperature gun reading individual ports can give a quick indication confirmed by reading the plugs.
I would’ve left the compression at 10.5, you have aluminum heads, use a slightly lower thermostat temp and make sure the heads are smooth and you’ll be fine. If not, you need better gasoline. Even the worst 87 (lowest octane) in America will handle 10.5/1 comp with aluminum heads.
unless you have a stout cam, 10.5 they tend to pink and need the timing retarded, lower compression and more advance works better
Pink like a poofta wear's
Cheap water injection system would mean no need to drop compression without using expensive fuel.
Excellent video!
Hi Graham, I've seen that you've done a few Rover V8s on here and I'm looking at swapping out the tired diesel in my 1990 Land Rover Disco for a V8 with ~200hp. Based on your experience, would you recommend a 3.5 or 3.9 engine as a used base? I'm wary of the issues these engines have with cracked blocks and with liners, I'd like something that will last. Or would running on carbs be a better option for simplicity, assuming you can get that kind of power from a 3.5 on carbs? I've been looking at Canems distributorless ignition systems to stop it coughing in the wet, with either the EFI or carbs.
dependant on exhaust etc, 3.5 on su's wont do 200 bhp without a lumpy cam, in injected form with a mild cam a 3.5 will. put a 4 barrel on it it will end up somewhere between what su and injection will do. Given a disco is about the size and weight of a small barn your probably should be prioritising torque over bhp, in which case 3.9 is the way to go, it wont give a lot more bhp than a 3.5 as the bigger capacity moves torque down the rev range but it does noticably increase torque. A piston and liner kit to turn your 3.5 into a 3.9 is cheap and possibly better than starting with a factory 3.9. im drowning in fords at the moment but there is some more v8 rover testing in the pipeline
Graham these videos are so helpful to get an understanding as what is important and what is myth!
I'm hopefully running up my V8 SD1 3.5 on SU carbs when it gets a bit warmer. At present I have a single AFR and sensor which I was planning to fit int the exhaust where the two branches turn into one but as there are two separate carbs should I fit a welded boss in each down pipe and maybe two sensors?
Having two O2 sensors doesnt help much, I run two on the dyno, but that doesnt hep a lot, as the carbs feed two cylinders on each bank, so even with two senors your are seeing and average mixture from both carbs. For max power under load i tune each carb based on torque output
Thanks Graham that's very useful info, save me duplicating stuff.
Your videos are very informative. Do you have a video for installing the duel carb intake manifold to the Engine?
Thank you
i did cover it in one of the rover V8 videos.
2:08 Yeah unleaded burns faster than lead fuel but the whole point of having ignition advance is to get peak cylinder pressure occurring at around 14-20 degrees ATDC, The likes of Ricardo Engineering worked this out many years ago. So retarding the ignition for unleaded fuel is a perfectly acceptable way of achieving this, it won't burn out the exhaust valves because the burn rate is still high enough to allow all the fuel to have burnt before the exhaust valve lifts off its seat. Now if the BTU figure for unleaded is higher than leaded then that will be another kettle of fish!
6:15 I spotted that you have 14 bolt heads and I wondered whether you were going to fit the outer bolts, good idea to just 'nip' them up! In fact my friend and I are working on one of the 50 experimental engines that Rover built many years ago, It was fitted to William Martin-Hurst's P6 car, (his name on the log book), the engine number for memory is 'EXP19', the guy that owns the car and engine wanted to use the later 10 heads as they have decent stem oil seals, better valves and better valve seats, he wanted the heads to look like 14 bolts heads so so drilled the holes in the head so that we could cut the outer head bolts down so the shanks were about 20mm long, they were then knocked into the tight fitting holes in the head, they do not even go into the block at all! If someone in the future removes the heads they will be in for a shock when they fit a wrench to those 'bolts'
30:51 You are running 27 degrees of timing at 3k RPM, is that your 'all in figure?' if so its quite a lot less than the 36 degrees that most people seem to think is than ideal 'all in' figure for the 3.5 engines. Having said that clearly it likes that figure because 160BHP out of a 3.5 is not bad at all (I guess the engine is 'stock'). My best is 315 BHP, but that was a 4.6 🙂
I try not to theorize too much, i have a friend who bounces stuff off me, usually theorzing why i have done something, I then point something else out and the reply is often " oh, i never thought of that" Theroy is great but it doesnt take into account what you dont know! The engine wants what it wants, but generally 36 degress on a mechanical distributor is way too much timing for anything on roadgoing unleaded. yes i fitted the outer head bolts but torqued them to just 20lbft, so enough to stop them falling out on there own.
@@PenguinMotors I agree, if you have a dyno then there is no need to just follow 'theory'...just run the engine with different amounts of timing and set it to where the engine runs best, I was just quite surprised that it only wants/needs 27 degrees. Generally I remove all of the dizzy internals and rebuild it with an MSD pickup, no bob weights or anything like that, I then run a fully programable MSD 6230 6AL-2 ignition system along with a MAP system so I can use a vac advance system.
Hello!! I'm about to build a LR v8 3.9 engine!! And I have a question!! The brand of the pistons on the left side point forward and those on the right side point backward? (LR V8 3.9) thanks
We used to modify these inlets to take a holly 4 barrel. they worked very well, have you had one of those conversions on the dyno?
Just buy a manifold and holley 500cfm carb edelbrock,offenhauser quite a few others to all made for an American 4barrel carbs of your choice big difference from my stock tr8 manifold carb setup
If skimming heads and or block faces, would it be worth checking that the remaining combustion chamber volume is still adequate?
very little was taken off
I suppose going to a considerable thinner needle will worsen fuel consumption figures to an extent?
its a balence, run it too lean and you use bigger throttle openings and burn more fuel any way
I was looking at that airbox inlet and thinking that doesn’t look large enough and the sharp edges on the trumpet seems less than ideal
its not big enough!
interesting on the SU, what was the final needle?
Can’t remember but i will look to see if I recorded it
I have one of the it says mondellos on it can anyone help
Never understood why the made such tiny v8s when a 6 or 4 cylinder would be way better on power and mpg torque
Makes as much power as some of the USA 350ci plus engines of the smog period made. Plus sound.
A V6 would have a slight advantage due to less friction and more valve area which is why the Buick 3800 (V6 variant of the Buick 215/Rover V8 with bigger bore and stroke) made a tad more power than this in stock form and significantly more when built. Even though the bores are small, it's still a great engine and the last versions have the displacement needed to make good power.
@@honkhonkler7732 They are fairly good engines in small cars as you get a low to the ground profile, they only weigh 200kg. Also as they are in off road vehicles you get good ground clearance under them. With a hi lift cam and fuel injection they do 250 HP and the same block can go up to 5 liter by changing the liners and do 320 HP and ft lb torque right up there too....similar figure. These still weigh pretty much 200kg too! So they are very versatile. Thanks for doing the video.