1G New build. Big problems in head.

[Geeb]

Just finished rebuilding my 6 bolt and figured while I had the head apart I would change the valve guides and reseat my valves etc.

Obviously I had to remove the valve springs to do all this and I heard countless people say just reinstall the stock keepers. So I did that and I went to start it and it wouldn't start, but it cranked a few times then made a funny noise. I figured my timing was out of whack maybe so I went to remove the timing belt off the bottom to rotate the crank and realized the crank wouldn't turn past about a half turn... Odd?..

I took out a spark plug and noticed something stopping the #4 piston from going all the way back up. It was a valve. I took off the valve cover and noticed 2 rockers came off and one roller on the next was broke to pieces. I went to take the bolts out to remove the intake cam to see what was up and once I got the last bolt out the whole thing shot up from the spring tension as if there were no keepers watsoever.

Has anyone had this happen at all before? Or am I just special.

I'm 99% sure I set all the roller rockers lined up right and not crooked, I checked like 4x, but the one that broke was slightly out of line, I don't know if it was out of line before I bolted it on or if it broke then went out of line... Either way that's how it ended up..

But if the rocker was straight to begin with would any of this have happened? Has anyone seen or heard of this happening? Now the 1 rockers scratched, ones broke, all the keepers look like they been squashed with a hammer (on 7 out of 8 springs, one actually held together..) but the retainers look okay which is weird.. Oh and the cam has a scratch in the lobe where the broke roller is too. Awesome.

I have to look at the valve too that's now stuck down that stopped the piston from going all the way up and hope it didn't screw up the piston as well.

Hell of a domino effect. Should I rebuild Or just get a new head? How much do they usually go for?

I didn't even take the exhaust cam out yet. Wanted to save some fun for tomorrow.

 

[jakk220]

It sounds like maybe your timing was out of wack and caused your issues. Or the keepers were not in right. The closest issue I had to this was when I put my cams in backwards when I installed my crower 272's. I picked one cam up, saw it was notched for the cam sensor, and just assumed that it was the intake cam. Well they were both notched and I had them wrong.

I ended up having some crazy shit happening where the lobes would compress the spring as normal, and then after I kept spinning the crank, they would not even be touching the rocker anymore, yet the spring was still fully compressed. After you spun it a little more it would snap back up and hit the cam. I never understood it. I have it on video somewhere. It was weird as hell.

I guess if you installed upgraded cams it wouldn't hurt to check and make sure you didn't make the same mistake.

 

[Geeb]

They weren't upgraded cams but I did have the cams out... Ugh if that was it that would be the worst...

 

[jakk220]

If you have stock cams then you couldn't really have screwed that up.

 

[donniekak]

How did you install the keepers?

 

[wrencher]

I always tap on the the tops of the valves With a rubber mallet to ensure everything is seated .
Once & a while the keepers you thought where in there give you a surprise.