How your valvetrain parts SHOULDN'T look!
11-05-2008, 10:51 PM
#1
How your valvetrain parts SHOULDN'T look! Check this stuff out. I am working on a '96 WS6 for a guy. He brought it to me saying it ran but he thought the motor was blown and knocked. Well it made noise and had no power but it sounded like valvetrain noise more than anything. He assumed it needed rebuilt but having 110k on it I wanted to check it out before just pulling it out and rebuilding it.
I pulled the driver's side valve cover to find one rocker arm, nut, and stud just laying there, still all together but not screwed into the cylinder head. The rocker arm next to it was loose and had no pushrod under it. I took it off and the bottom of it was all broken. Once that was out of the way both pushrods were laying there and I was able to get them. Checked them out and they were not bent. I went to put one back in and the lifter was still there for it. When I went to put the other back in, there was no lifter there (or so it felt). So I took the intake manifold off and found this, exactly as you see it. I did not touch a thing before this pic
Here is a pic of the rocker arm and stud as it was laying in the cylinder head
Here is a pic of the broken rocker arm
He did say that before he bought the car 3 weeks ago the previous owner had blown a head gasket and both head gaskets were replaced by a shop. True story it appears. They however obviously messed up on setting the valve lash among other things and also did not put the steam tube back on. They just plugged the holes. I am going to talk to the owner and see what he wants to do now, we may just end up putting it back together the right way replacing the damaged parts if that is how he wants to go about it.
I pulled the driver's side valve cover to find one rocker arm, nut, and stud just laying there, still all together but not screwed into the cylinder head. The rocker arm next to it was loose and had no pushrod under it. I took it off and the bottom of it was all broken. Once that was out of the way both pushrods were laying there and I was able to get them. Checked them out and they were not bent. I went to put one back in and the lifter was still there for it. When I went to put the other back in, there was no lifter there (or so it felt). So I took the intake manifold off and found this, exactly as you see it. I did not touch a thing before this pic
Here is a pic of the rocker arm and stud as it was laying in the cylinder head
Here is a pic of the broken rocker arm
He did say that before he bought the car 3 weeks ago the previous owner had blown a head gasket and both head gaskets were replaced by a shop. True story it appears. They however obviously messed up on setting the valve lash among other things and also did not put the steam tube back on. They just plugged the holes. I am going to talk to the owner and see what he wants to do now, we may just end up putting it back together the right way replacing the damaged parts if that is how he wants to go about it.
11-05-2008, 11:25 PM
#5
This car is bone stock down to the muffler and the paper air filter.
I didn't notice this at first glance but cylinder #1 had some issues too.
I pulled the drivers side valve cover to find this
So she was only running on 6. No valve action on cylinder number 1 or 6.
I didn't notice this at first glance but cylinder #1 had some issues too.
I pulled the drivers side valve cover to find this
So she was only running on 6. No valve action on cylinder number 1 or 6.
11-05-2008, 11:36 PM
#7
The car only has 10 minutes or so of run time on it since all this happened. He quit driving it and had it towed when he heard the noise. The oil is kind of grody though and there is some sludging. I would like to see him stick to the original plan and freshen the motor.
