Mission acomplished:Rail pan area thickness
Well it took a while looking for a block to cut open, did not find one so i decided to use my own web cracked 98 506 block.
against diesel dummy's and others advice i used a 7" x 1/8 zipdisc on a 7" angle grinder to cut a wedge out of the rail area adjacent to the center web. i started with a angle cut 2" out and 2" deep towards the web, and than straight down beside the web till within 1/8 of the angled groove, and pryed the pieceback and forth till it broke free. the whole operation took less than 2 min to do. piece of cake, nothing to be scared of, no kick back occurred.
but I am NO amateur with a grinder to start with.
thickness of the metal from the surface of the panrail till the waterjacket is minimum 1 3/16 on the inside to 1 1/4" against the outside of the block, wich leaves enough meat in my opinion to drill a hole 1" deep staight down or at an angle for the outerbolt of a splayed cap or full girdle. It baffles me wy in the world GM decided to put the outerbolt holes in the place they are.
I would put some pics on if i could find a way to do so, but for some reason they are to big and i can't get them smaller.
Simon