well I came up with some options after blowing my motor and I think im gonna by a used 420 from a wrecking yard and run 5 psi out of it for my daily driver and build the one thats blownwith howellautomotive's bottom end kit.. http://www.howellautomotive.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=374 And full gasket kit,My question is when you purchase the bottom end kit you have to decide what size rod bearings/main bearings you want but how do you decide wich size to choose since you have the crankshaft and they got the connecting rod how the heck do you decide what size rod bearing you want when you cannt plastigage?can i just get the crank journals specs with a micromiter and tell them the specs and let them decide what size bearing is apropriate?Im stuck between a wall and a hard place ugh....

You need to take your crank to a machine shop and have them check it over. If the journals are ok then you get standard sized bearings. If they find something wrong with the journals, they will machine them 0.010" or 0.020" and then you tell howell that you need that certain size bearing.

+1
take everything to the machine shop and have the work done, THEN order the parts base on the specs the machinist gives you.
good machine shops will understand this, and should give you a spec sheet of what they did.
i tried to preempt my machinist and by the parts . . . yeah i ended up with 2 sets of bearings :(

Those guys are both right.

If you plan on buying a complete bottom end kit from a company do some research on it. A lot of people have had problems with Howell while others don't.

Originally posted by McFox
A lot of people have had problems with Howell

Tell me about it. :twitch