5. Pre-Lubing an LS

Pre-lubing an LS engine has always been a hassle, thanks to the front-mounted oil pump. In the past, we’ve used a small-block Chevy oil pump bolted into a bucket of oil to pre-lube them. That works, but building this tool is a hassle, and then you have to find a place to store the bucket and its accouterments.

A ready-made solution is available, consisting of a small aluminum tank that contains several quarts of oil, which is pumped into the engine with compressed air. This is an elegant, compact solution, but it is also expensive if you’re only going to use it once or twice.

Summit Racing now offers a new tool (P/N: SUM-900-330) that can make pre-lubing a new LS engine a little easier. This oil pump drive socket is used to drive an LS oil pump with or without the front cover in place. This tool will only work if you are using an aftermarket timing set that uses a separate oil pump drive-collar. Factory gearsets use an integral collar on the crank gear that prevents the use of this pre-lube tool.

With the harmonic balancer off the engine, remove the oil pump gear, and slide the Summit tool in place to engage the oil pump. Spin the oil pump with a 3/8-inch-drive drill motor — we used a 1/2-inch electric impact with an adapter. The usual approach is to spin the oil pump until oil appears out of all 16 pushrods. Then remove the socket, re-install the oil pump drive collar, and install the harmonic balancer.

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6. To Advance or Not To Advance

Did you know that most camshafts intended for the street are machined with built-in advance? There’s an easy way to determine this by studying the cam card. If the intake lobe centerline — expressed in degrees After-Top-Dead-Center (ATDC) — is the same as the lobe separation angle, then the cam is not advanced.

For example, a COMP Cams mechanical-roller for a big-block Chevy (P/N: 11-851-9; left cam card) lists the intake centerline at 108 degrees and the lobe-separation angle at 108 degrees. This means this cam is ground “straight-up” without advance.

But looking at a COMP small-block street cam (P/N: 12-468-8; right cam card), it has an intake centerline of 109 degrees ATDC, but the lobe-separation angle is 113 degrees. This means this cam is machined with 4 degrees of advance already built-in. This also means the engine builder should install and degree this cam “straight up” — with no advance — because the intake lobe has already been advanced. Adding more advance would only hurt power.