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| You’ll need pullers to remove the front engine pulleys and damper. | This is what “dot-on-dot” alignment of the cam gear and crank gear looks like. Ensure this before extracting the camshaft. |
Fuel Pump
Because the Chevy’s mechanical fuel pump is activated by a pushrod driven off a lobe near the front of the camshaft, the pump and this pushrod have to be removed before the cam can be pulled from the block. You may have to remove some accessories before you can remove the fuel pump from the block and wire it aside, still attached to its fuel lines. It might take a magnet to pull the pushrod free, but usually it will come out easily. Do not misplace the fuel pump pushrod, and make note of which end rode on the cam and which on the pump.
Next, start labeling and removing any accessories and parts in front of the timing chain cover. It may improve your access by removing the car’s hood.
To get the camshaft out, you’ll need plenty of clearance in front of the engine. In some cars, this may require removing grill support braces, hood latch brackets, or parts of the grill. Many years ago as a kid, while looking at drag car photos, I saw square holes cut out of a center grill of a Ford Thunderbolt.
This puzzled me for years until I was helping a friend with a cam swap and we found the cam banging into the front bodywork on a passenger car – that hole made sense then. You’ll just have to see how much clearance you have when the cam is coming out of the block before you start disassembling the bodywork, or loosening the engine mounts so you can jack the engine up a few more inches for clearing the camshaft.
Water Pump & Accessories
Drain the cooling system and remove the fan shroud, radiator, fan, hoses, and remove any belts and the accessories like an alternator, A/C compressor, or smog pump. Lay these aside so you have access to the water pump; then remove it. Now is a fine time to consider replacing or upgrading your water pump, depending on its condition. At the minimum you’ll replace its gasket on re-assembly. Although I will tell you I always replace the water pump with a new one when I get this far just because it is so critical to engine operation.
Intake/Carb
After you’ve labeled all the hose and linkage connections to the carb and manifold, it’s time to disconnect and remove them as a unit. Extract all the intake manifold bolts, and make sure you find them all and store them so that they can be re-installed in the holes they came out of. Then, remove all the valve cover bolts and lift off the valve covers. They may resist your first effort, so a light tap with a rubber mallet along their edge can help free them.
Get an assistant, make one more check for intake manifold bolts, and lift off the carb/manifold. This sounds easier than it usually is. Sometimes some careful prying will be necessary at the front of the manifold seam where it meets the block valley -- to break this cork or silicone gasket seal of the manifold edges. If you meet strong resistance to lifting off the carb/manifold assembly – STOP. You likely have a stray intake bolt still holding it down. You do not want to force the manifold and break it. Don’t make me tell you how I know this.
Once you have the manifold off, line the lifter valley and stuff the intake ports with clean shop paper towels, and clean off the front and rear block rails and intake manifold of any stray gasket material.
Removing Lifters
The hydraulic lifters have to be removed for the cam to come out of the block, so start at the top of each cylinder and loosen/remove the rocker arms and pushrods. Prepare your work area so that you can keep exact track of what nut, ball seat, and rocker arm and pushrod attaches to what cylinder.
Use a tie wrap to hold each nut, ball seat, and rocker arm together, put them in a plastic bag or equivalent with their pushrod, and label which cylinder they came from. You CAN NOT mix and match used rocker arms and pushrods – they have to go back in the cylinder they came out of. Now take out each lifter.