I've begun daily driving Rex to work. She now has 36 miles on the clock. I'm gonna have to remember to go easy on her at first. The first 1k miles or so is the critical break-in stage. How you treat them in the beginning can dramatically change the overall power and reliability. I've done more research into breaking procedures and it's possible that my break-in after the first rebuild directly affected the cause of the failure. The first time I let it idle for about an hour at the very beginning. However, sitting at the same RPMs for too long can induce vibrations. The previous engine blew due to seal chatter on the housings (think washboarding, but inside the engine ). The extended idle may have set the initial point that started the 'washboarding'. I'm pretty impressed that it lasted 60k miles though, considering I just threw it together in my dad's garage.

Here's to the hopeful beginning of another 60k miles.