My problem is solved, but I wanted to share my story with the hopes that it will help someone else. When I bought my '81 C-10, it had a tired 350 which I swapped out for a newly rebuilt 355 with a mild cam. I put everything back together and it worked. My starter had always "clicked" every once in awhile and I had a guy tell me that I needed to replace the starter at some point. 8 months ago, I decided to do that. So I do what most of us do, I go down to O'Reilly and I pick up a replacement. I get the new starter in, everything is great, or so I think. A few days later, I kill my truck when at a drive through because it's really loud. Go to start it again, and it's grinding like you wouldn't believe. I do some research and find out that it's likely a shim issue so I start shimming it. Get it running good, or so I think, a few days later, same thing. So I begin to notice that it only 'grinds' when it's hot so I started researching heat soak. Long story short, this plays out for the next 8 months, is it really the starter or is it the flywheel? 2 starters later, I am getting lots of good advice about both and I am not sure who to listen to. Last week, I decided to swap my TH350 for a 700R4 and while it was out, I had the flywheel(or flex plate if you're being technical) replaced. They put everything back together, grind grind grind just like before. Finally I went back to the original guy who built my engine and he told me that the cam meant higher compression and higher compression meant higher torque needed to start it. This is beginning to make sense. I looked at ordering a high torque mini starter online and then I talked to a guy at Autozone. He told me that he had a customer who built performance Chevy engines, small blocks, big blocks, etc... He said that he used the same starter on all of them. It's the starter from a '98 model Chevy truck, Autozone P/N 9990S, O'Reilly P/N 03-0485X. So I got O'Reilly to warranty out the original one again and I purchased their re-manned one. Got it installed and the truck and I am happy to report that it is starting great now. It doesn't matter whether it's cold or hot. It turns over and sounds really good. Thanks to the guy at my local Autozone and my engine builder for putting me on the right track. It's frustrating to have problems like this. You go down different roads. You think that you have it fixed over and over again. It's such a relief to have it solved. Hopefully this helps someone else in my situation.
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