Contrary to some advice I received on the net, I went ahead and replaced my
burned exhaust valve and the car now runs well again. We'll see how long it
lasts...
I examined the head and didn't see any obvious cracks. The seat didn't look
too good where the valve was missing a chunk. I put in the new valve and it
took quite a bit of grinding to get the seat looking clean again. I was
using pretty fine paste so maybe that was the problem. Once I thought the
seat and valve looked OK, I put it all back together. I wish there had been
an experienced person around to tell me if the seat and valve REALLY did
look good, but I went for uniformity and smoothness.
Once the head was on, I decided to go ahead and put it all together and
see how it ran, foregoing a compression check. It ran fine! I'm going to
do a compression check this weekend when I have time. I drove it last night
and there was obviously a hose clamp or something left loose, as there
was a bit of steam coming from under the hood...I'll check it as soon as
I can.
I went ahead and replaced the one valve because this head had been totally
rebuilt only 11 months ago, about 9000 miles. I couldn't believe it needed
to be completely reworked so soon. So I assume the exhaust valve was a fluke,
and simply replaced it. If it fails again, I'll have a machine shop go over
it.
Anyway, if I need to get it done later, I think I can now remove the head in
about an hour.
Happy driving!
Larry
lesnyd@monsanto.com
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