I was doing my springs and dropped to valves. What do I have to do now take off the head? I can see the top of them is there a way I can get them without removing the head?

 

take out the spark plug and see if you can something stiff yet flexible inside the cylinder bore. if you can, see if you can push up the valves and grab them with a magnet.
you said you can see the valve stem, can you touch the tip in the head-as in-is the tip of the stem above the surface of the head? if it is, SLOWLY turn the motor over pushing the valve up.

 

yeah it's technically impossible to drop the valve completely out of the guide, isn't it? since the guide is brass / non-ferrous alloy you should be able to pull it back up with a small enough magnet. I wouldn't turn the engine; that's very risky and you may end up damaging the valve. Do that if all esle fails and you really don't want to pull the heads.

If a magnet doesn't work, try relying on the fact that that's a virtually sealed area. If you can get something down in there (like another valve backwards) and create a vacuum and enough velocity you could theoretically pull it back up by yanking on your "syringe plunger."

 

like i said SLOWLY turn the motor AS A LAST RESORT if and ONLY IF the valve stem is above the plain of the head. Personally, I wouldn't recommend this because there is always the risk of bending the valve, but you have to visualize what is going on inside that motor.
I would take my first suggestion in combination with narczm's suggestion. Try to find something to fish into the spark plug bore and push up the valve-at the same time try to pick it out with a small pen magnet.

good luck

 

i vote for getting the strongest magnet you can find!

 

Yeah I am going to see if I can find a magnet that will fit down in that guide. maybe the spark plug trick will get high enough where I can grab it with the magnet I have now. Give it a try tomorrow.


Thanks guys......

 

I do not think the magnet will work. Try this, its an idea from Narcszm but with an added mod. Get a hose out of a compression test kit. You should already have this if you were changing the springs. If you don't then get it from any of your local auto parts store. Now make sure to remove the valve in the bottom of it. Install it into the spark plug hole. Install two valves with oil on the tips into the valve guides, both at the same time. Attach the hose to a good air compressor and let it start blowing air into the cyl. It might shut the valves for you. As soon as you start the air to the cyl, pull both valves up and out of the guides, trying to catch the stems of the valves in the cyl. I think with a large enough volume of air and trying to suck the stems back up the guides, you can get the valves back to the top.

DO NOT ROLE THE ENGINE OVER IN AN ATTEMPT TO PUSH THE VALVES BACK UP!!!! I believe you will bend the valves and or scratch the crap (lack of a better word) out of the bore. Once you have the valves back up, leave the air on the cyl. Install the parts for that cyl. Then use the air for all the cyls. DO not do the top dead center method. If you had air on it and it dropped the valve, then turn your air pressure up higher. Some people say 60 psi is good, but I do this all the time on industrial engines and we use 150 to 180 psi air for this. I used the same pressure when I did mine and at times while pushing the springs down to remove the keepers, the valve would start to move down then pop back up. I like the 150 psi for this job. Just make sure everything like wires, fingers, or other petruding body parts are not anywere around the belts. The engine will role over until that cyl is at Bottom dead center.

Good luck.

 

What I meant was the valve guide is sealed. If you could simply get suction on that you could lift the valve right back up.

it'll be very hard to seal the combustion chamber with the valve dropped. Any airflow supplied through the spark plug hole will go right out the intake or exhaust port.

Maybe use a power bleeder or some other pump to create a vacuum on top of the valve guide / valve seal. Once you get the valve(s) up there, then apply pressure to the spark plug port and you can release the vacuum to the valve guide.

 

Yes, thats what I ment. I think if you do both at the same time, you will fix the problem.

 

Well I got them.. I had to turn the motor and they popped right up. Now is there a trick to getting these retainer locks in? What a pain in the butt. Thanks for you advice guys

 

Yes, I push the retainers down until a lock will just slip in. I then take a rod or screwdriver and push the top of the retainer down and at the same time spin the lock around the valve stem until the lock is now at the top. At that point I put a nother lock in the bottom. I push on it with my finger and crank the retainer down some more until it snaps in. I then release the retainer and both locks are in. The way my tool works, the retainer does not go down square with the valves stem. This works with my tool very good.

Glad to here you got it back up. Hope you are using air now.

 

Wow, you got really lucky with getting that valve to come back up by turning the motor. I did the same sort of method that Texas_WS6 did for getting the locks on. Once you get the hang of it it's a piece of cake.... but the first ones are definitely tedious until you do so. I would advise that you have a few extra locks on hand in case one falls or pops off. That has happened many a time to me but I've thankfully found them all. It set me back a while though in searching for them, I was just too stubborn to go pick up some more from the dealer

 

Thanks guys for your help. The driver side kicked my *** cause it was a learning phase. Today I got the passenger side done in about a hour.

 

There is no risk of dropping a valve completely into the cylinder on an LS1 -- they'll hit the cylinder wall AANNNDD there's no problem with turning the motor over BY HAND to push the valves back up either, there's not enough resistance there at all. They won't bind, they'll just push right back up with absolutely zero damage.

 

I kinda was thinking that because they are sittting in the guide. So I figured how would it mess anything up. Well it worked out for me anyways and I learned something new.

 

Really?!? What youre saying makse sense, and its not that i dont think youre a trusted source... But why then are there so many stories about people having to pull heads to retrieve dropped valves? Also, there would have to be a good ammount of valve stem left in the guide to avoid being pushed back up crooked thus ruining the valve, guide and possibly the head.

A wise man once said "when theory and results dont match, throw out the theory". I guess if youve experienced this before, what more could we ask for.

Thanks, This is a little extra piece of mind when doing valvesprings now.

 

Its not the valves that people have had to pull heads off to retrieve,its the lifters.

 

naah, im aware of the dropped lifter horror stories. Ive read about dropped valves many times before. Even jmX's cam swap howto has this to say:

Well, honestly, its better that everyone err on the side of caution, but its nice to know we have a safety net now.

 

Yeah, I turned my motor by hand when I dropped a valve doing my springs last June. No adverse effects

 

I actually tested my theory with an extra motor on an engine stand. I put a head on a block with no rotating assembly, and pushed both valves down as far as they would go. I felt the satisfying thunk against the cylinder wall