Starting on the engine

Like I said earlier I got a used 351 Windsor engine block and had it machined.  It's a '91 truck block probably out of a Ford van or a pickup.  There are 'better' 351Ws but they're harder to find, more expensive and I like this one because it's set up for hydraulic lifters.

I uncrated it, looked it over, cleaned it and prepped it for paint.

I think it turned out pretty good.

I had hoped that I'd put the engine together and get lucky with all of the clearances.  I started with the camshaft.  It's easier to put in if the crankshaft isn't in the way.

I used the camshaft timing gear as a handle to make the installation easier.  BTW, the machinist installed new camshaft bearings for me.

Next I installed the main bearings and laid the crankshaft in place.  I used plastigage to check the bearing clearances.  It's not very precise, especially for the tight clearances on the crank and connecting rods but everything checked out.

Next I installed the wrist pins in the pistons.  They have these crazy spiral locks to hold them in.  They're really hard to install but once I got used to them things sped up a bit.  All of the piston rings had to be gapped a little bigger.  That took awhile.  Then I ringed the pistons and installed them.

BTW, I ran into a problem.  I bought these connecting rod stud 'condoms' to keep the studs from scratching the cylinder walls when I installed them...but my connecting rods have bolts - not studs.  So the condoms wouldn't fit.

I didn't want to scratch my cylinder walls so I hunted around the garage looking for a solution and BAM...the answer was right there in my hands the whole time.

Yay for gloves!

The pistons all went in pretty nicely but once I tightened down the mains the crank seized up.  I checked and re-checked my clearances.  Everything looked good using plastigage so I measured with my cheap micrometers (still looked good) but the crank still seized up when I torqued the mains past 75 ft-lbs (they need to be torqued to about 95 ft-lbs).  My two running theories are A. the clearances are incorrect and my cheap tools aren't precise enough to catch it or B. the webbing on the crankshaft is big enough to ride on the main bearings keeping them from seating properly and seizing the crank.  I decided to take the block, crank and connecting rods to a local machine shop and have them check all of my clearances.  There are bearings made to compensate for smaller crank journals and bigger mains but I have the opposite problem so I'll probably have to get the crankshaft journals polished to shave a couple thousandths off if the clearances are actually too tight.  If the problem is the crankshaft webbing interfering with the bearings I'll just chamfer the bearing edges for clearance.

I'll keep everyone updated.