John,
If you are "extremely lucky" (which in this case is highly unlikely) the
valve did not damage your cylinder or anything but the piston. If you
were doing any kind of speed whatever, it probably scored the cylinder
wall as well. This could mean that the block is beyond repair and you
will be shopping for a rebuildable one. Usually the kind of damage done
to a cylinder with shrapnel bouncing around in it is not correctable by
boring.
Perhaps it is possible to have that cylinder sleeved, and then bored to
match the other ones.
I'll keep my fingers crossed for you.
Regards,
Joe Curry
John Weale wrote:
>
> Well, my Spit took offense at my recent obsession with emissions
> stuff, and dropped a valve to remind me that there is worse than a high CO
> reading. A valve spring broke and the valve dropped into the cylinder.
> The engine is solidly jammed. Has anyone had this happen to them, and if
> so what repairs did you require? I ask because if it is likely just a
> piston replacment, I'll dive in and fix it in my apartment parking lot.
> If it is probably going to require a rebore and a new head, I'm going to
> have to find a place to store my Spit for a few months (long term parking
> in the Bay area -- there's a fun thought) until I get the money and time
> to attack it properly (in the form of a full rebuild -- if I gotta rebore
> one cylinder...).
> Needless to say, I'm a bit unhappy about this. I have a reciept
> showing the head was replaced professionally 10k miles ago (in '92) with a
> $300 'rebuilt cylinder head', so I was *not* expecting a $3 spring to
> disinegrate and kill the poor girl. In the unforseen future when I again
> have a running spit, how often should these %$#! springs be replaced
> (in miles or years?)?
>
> Arg!
>
> John Weale
> 1980 "British Racing Orange" Spit-fireless
>
> ---======================== John Weale(tyre@u.washington.edu) ==========---
> The world does revolve around engineers... they pick the coordinate system.
--
"If you can't excel with talent, triumph with effort."
-- Dave Weinbaum in National Enquirer
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