It served me well this engine. The little 290 Rambler engine, punched out to just over 309 cubes has embarassed quite a few cars over the years and surprised a few non-believers.

It looked like this for a number of years. Silver two pack paint on the block and rocker covers, chrome air cleaner and hammertone silver on the pulleys and brackets.

I then scored a set of finned Offenhauser rocker covers from a mate up in Newcastle, Stewart Campbell. I thought they looked pretty hot in their purposeful sandblasted finish.

i.e. they were pretty stuffed, so Stewie cleaned them up.

As you can see from the previous pics, she was starting to look a bit tired. Time to pull her out and fix a few oil leaks.

By the way, time between this pic and the last, just under three years.

While I had it apart I figured I would throw a bit more at it for the never-ending pursuit of horsepower.

These are Comp Cams 1.6 ratio roller rockers. They're meant to fit, but you need to get longer pushrods. I ended up using 8-inch long Manley units.

I'd read on the Internet (it's a wonderful thing isn't it) that AMC V8s had a tendency to starve the rear main bearing journals. One way around this is to fit this oil bypass.

Of course, I've since read it's not really necessary for a street engine, but it can't hurt I guess.

Looks cool but, even if you can't see it.

Yep, no points for guessing this one's a 290. Heads on the old engine were pretty stuffed, so the mechanic sourced another set.

They're same 343 units I had on it before. Seems like a good combo with factory fitted 2.02 and 1.60 valves, although the later 360 heads have a much better exhaust port design and flow a lot better.

They're not a bolt-on fit like these though. Maybe next time.

I'm an impatient bastard and couldn't wait to see what it looked like with some shiny stuff on it.

Intake is an Edelbrock Performer (more on that later) and I polished the rocker covers for that show car look.

I've since discovered I suck at polishing stuff, so I took my stuff down to Mirrorfinish and they did it properly.

Noice!