I talked to my other consultant, Reggie Jackson, and we decided to go on with removal of the intake.
Removed the intake and found a small hard piece of what feels and looks like Ultra Black gasket sealer on the bottom of #8 intake port. It was across the seal at the bottom on the valley side of the gasket and had made a small dent in the gasket at the same spot. I did not see any sign of oil leakage. there was no water leakage over by the blocked off back water jacket port. Although the hard piece of sealer (about .010-.015″ thick) could be the source, I am going to keep looking.
I have decided to put a Fel-Pro 12755 thick (.120″) gasket under the intake manifold. The standard gasket is .060″ thick. At one time, with my old Dart Pro-1 heads, that was what I had to use. This was my mistake. I thought the new heads I installed in 2018 would seal.
All of the intake ports look fairly even in color, except #8, which is darker and the plug is soot black. The other plugs are just real dark. Since I ran the engine at the track in July 2019, it has been started up several times and warmed up to around 170 degrees F.. Valve lash has been set at least 3 times. I know that is the source of a lot of the soot buildup.
I am going back with some NGK-7 (hotter) plugs. I was using NGK-8’s, on the cold side of the chart.
I have decided to put my 1150 Holley back on with 98 jets all around.
All of the valve train equipment looks very good. The oil that came out of the engine looked good too.
My parts should be here this week. I will get everything cleaned up and be ready to install everything.
Now all I need is to pray away this Covid-19, get out of lock-down and have ANY track open so I can do some testing!
God Bless America and All the world.