Dodgeb4ya Posted July 4, 2016 Report Share Posted July 4, 2016 Last one I did (251) 1950 Windsor..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 4, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 4, 2016 Happy 4th everyone! Sondra is working the ICU/ER today so I got down into the garage early. The '49 is so darn close quarters that I had to pull the right tie rod to get up between the tire and frame, even when on the ramps, to get at the valves. I also had to pull the radiator and fan to get my big 3/4 wrench on it to turn it. Not a bad thing as I can use a small mirror from the front and see # 1 lifters and the rod sticking out of # 6 and use the remote starter and the wrench to turn the thing around. So, I get the thing up to #1 TDC by turning it clockwise (standing in front) watching the Exhaust valve open then close (end of 4-stroke cycle), then watching the Intake valve open then close and then advancing the pulley to TDC. I get under to check the valves, using the method in the tech section of this forum, and guess what? I cannot get anything under the #1 Exhaust valve. I can only get the lifter to spin using the wrench. I backed up the pulley in both direction some 60 degrees and it did not help. It appears for reasons yet not known that the valve is setting deeper that when I assembled the engine. I took my spring compressor tool and lifted up on the spring to see if the valve retainers were cracked or the valve grooves had failed. The whole thing lifted up just fine. The only thing I can think of was that the valve was "right at the edge" after the valve was ground and the seat was ground. Once it started it "set-in" just enough to not close all the way. That is odd, even if one considers that the cam was ground and so there should be more room from that. I have decided to call it a day and think about what to do next. It may be a valve issue as opposed to a chain issue. In any event, the head will have to no doubt come off. I may have to buy some new valves and then have the ends dressed a bit in the event that the machinist took to much off of the seats when he ground them. So much fun! Time to go have a drink and toast to the fact that I get to play on such things free from worry and want! All the best to all on this 4th of July. James. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dodgeb4ya Posted July 4, 2016 Report Share Posted July 4, 2016 New seats should have been installed if you find the machinist did have to grind the seats excessively down into the deck surface. Regardless as long as you adjust the valve clearance correctly, the valves /valve face margin and the seats don't leak the engine will run properly. The valve job might not last as long if the seat width,, valve face location to the seat is incorrect etc. A good machinist will know all this.. The valves should NOT sink into the seat right after a valve job and close up the adjusted clearance.. Before tearing deeper into it I would first recheck valve clearances on all six cylinders... correct any that need it and start the engine again to see how it runs. Valves held open will of course cause the engine to run poorly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Plymouthy Adams Posted July 4, 2016 Report Share Posted July 4, 2016 to add tot he valve issue on re-facing...the lip/edge must maintain x-thickness to ensure they will not burn from the edges inward..some folks overlook this.... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don Coatney Posted July 4, 2016 Report Share Posted July 4, 2016 Did you do a compression test? Or at best a starter motor compression test that I recently posted in another thread? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don Coatney Posted July 4, 2016 Report Share Posted July 4, 2016 Pasted below is my starter motor theory. 48 P-15, 1948 D-24 Members 20,171 posts 0 warning points LocationNorthern Indiana My Project Cars:1948 P-15, 1948 D-24 Posted Today, 09:14 AM As I said "In most cases a compression test is only to confirm what the starter motor tells you. With a healthy engine the starter motor will spin at the same speed. With a unhealthy engine the starter motor will spin faster on the low compression cylinders." I never said this replaces a compression test. I said this confirms that a compression test is required. If you listen to the first few seconds of this film clip you will hear the starter motor speed up and slow down as it spins the engine indicating at least one cylinder is down on compression.. I have used water down the carburetor to de-carbonize several engines in the past. As you know water in a vacuum boils and vaporizes at a much lower temperature. So as soon as the water droplets enter the intake manifold they change state from a liquid to a gas and effectively steam clean the combustion chamber. I have never experienced any damage to an engine when doing this. So that is my opinion on these subjects. You can agree or disagree or agree to disagree, your choice. JBNeal likes this Don Coatneyhttp://smg.photobuck...519373465134713 There are 3 kinds of people in this world. Those who are good at math and those who aren't. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 4, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 4, 2016 (edited) Hi Guys, There is ZERO doubt that the valve has dropped a couple of thousands. The question is why? There is no clearance on #1 Exhaust valve with the lifter screwed all the way down. I did the valve adjustment on the engine stand and checked it three times. The #1 Exhaust Valve was set at 14, just to be sure it would not bottom out and hang open. I will pull the head tomorrow and see what is going on. It may be that the valve is failing and stem is pulling out. I have seen that, but never in a flathead six. The valve face thickness was no where close to the minimum as listed in the shop manual. The only thing I can think of is a failing valve or the seats ground too deep. I may just order a new set of valves, the face's thereby having the thickest section, and trim the stems so that I have plenty of clearance going forward. The though of pulling the engine again is not one I want to think about. If I can fix it without pulling it, I will, even if I have to pour some more money into parts. Best, James Edited July 4, 2016 by James_Douglas Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave72dt Posted July 5, 2016 Report Share Posted July 5, 2016 Where was the timing mark on the crank pulley when the exhaust just closed and the intake began to open and how far did you have to rotate the crank to get the TDC mark to line up? When the exhaust valve is just closing and the intake just opening, the opposite cylinder should have the tappets off the cam eccentric and valve lash can be set. If you have to turn it to get to TDC, I think you are starting to come back up on the cam and taking all you valve lash away. It's looking very much like the crank sprocket was indeed marked incorrectly, putting the camshaft in the wrong position in relation to the crank. Where were the marks on your old sprockets? Did the cam sprocket mark on the old one match the placement on the new one? The new crank sprocket that's marked at 4 teeth from the key will only work at the mark if the cam sprocket is marked accordingly Cam sprocket marks are the same position, then you have to use .a crank sprocket set in the same place as the old one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 5, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 5, 2016 I got an email from Earl this morning. He said that some time back he had an issue with a crank sprocket that was miss-stamped with the "Dot" being slight off. It caused him a lot of grief. He got a new set of gears from Terrill Machine and the problem went away. I am heading down to the garage in a few minutes and I will be pulling the head, manifolds, and then the timing cover off and check basically everything. It may be an issue with the valve seats cut too deep and/or the cam-crank phasing. Time to go over it all to find the problem. James. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
suntennis Posted July 5, 2016 Report Share Posted July 5, 2016 (edited) Since it appears the mark on the crankshaft gear is off by 4 teeth, why can't you just remount the timing chain to where it should be? Take a marker and mark the crankshaft gear 2 teeth from the key and realign with the new mark. If this is done, you may also find there is no problem with your valve settings Edited July 5, 2016 by suntennis 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 5, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 5, 2016 Well, We now have something to sink our teeth into on this. I pulled the head off and #1 EX valve is SNAPPED OFF at the tulip. Nice thing about a flathead engine. It just stayed in the seat! No other damage. A look at all the valves and #5 EX valve had a mark in it and a small mark on the head. Any of you who have look at the combustion chamber real close know that the "ramp" of the camber by the outer area of the Exhaust valve is the spot with the least amount of space over the valve. That is where it hit. If it hits it will bend then bend back at the seat and then after some amount of cycles break like a paperclip by flexing it. I pulled the head off of the other engine I have, the one we took out due to the oil seep into the cooling, and set them side by side. You can visually see the difference. I placed a strait edge on the heads and measured the distance from the head deck to see how deep they were at that spot where the one was hitting. The difference was 0.117 ! That is almost a 1/8". I have never seen a mopar flathead cut so much. I guess this is a lesson learned. I am going to pull the timing cover tomorrow, since I have the head off and all the valves out, and double check that. I may pull the cam and inspect it to make sure that the valves took all the beating and not the cam. I may run it up to Earl after work on night in the next week and have him take a quick look at it to make sure it is ok. All new valves on the way from Vintage Power Wagons. With new spring retainers and clips. What a pain in the ass! James. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
knuckleharley Posted July 5, 2016 Report Share Posted July 5, 2016 Well, We now have something to sink our teeth into on this. I pulled the head off and #1 EX valve is SNAPPED OFF at the tulip. Nice thing about a flathead engine. It just stayed in the seat! No other damage. A look at all the valves and #5 EX valve had a mark in it and a small mark on the head. Any of you who have look at the combustion chamber real close know that the "ramp" of the camber by the outer area of the Exhaust valve is the spot with the least amount of space over the valve. That is where it hit. If it hits it will bend then bend back at the seat and then after some amount of cycles break like a paperclip by flexing it. I pulled the head off of the other engine I have, the one we took out due to the oil seep into the cooling, and set them side by side. You can visually see the difference. I placed a strait edge on the heads and measured the distance from the head deck to see how deep they were at that spot where the one was hitting. The difference was 0.117 ! That is almost a 1/8". I have never seen a mopar flathead cut so much. I guess this is a lesson learned. I am going to pull the timing cover tomorrow, since I have the head off and all the valves out, and double check that. I may pull the cam and inspect it to make sure that the valves took all the beating and not the cam. I may run it up to Earl after work on night in the next week and have him take a quick look at it to make sure it is ok. All new valves on the way from Vintage Power Wagons. With new spring retainers and clips. What a pain in the ass! James. James,I know this isn't much help,but you ain't the first one to hit roadblocks like this. Hang in there,brother The payoff is coming and when it comes you will be able to get into your car and enjoy driving it anywhere you want to go,anytime you want to go there. People that take shortcuts never reach that point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 6, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 6, 2016 (edited) Got the cam out. Nothing jumps out at you. However, there is an elliptical halo on the lobe tip on #1 and #5 Exhaust which are the two valves that definitely hit the head. The other lobes have the typical marks. Number 1 valve is the one that cracked off and while number 5 did not. The halo on # 5 looks more pronounced than # 1. I don't think the photos at low resolution would show anything here. I sent some high res ones to Earl for comment, but it may take a trained eye in person to tell if there is an issue. I will pull the pan and drop the lifters and check them out. James. Edited July 6, 2016 by James_Douglas Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Plymouthy Adams Posted July 6, 2016 Report Share Posted July 6, 2016 cam lobes has seen undue stress...this is the first sign of eventual galling and loss of metal at the lobe/lifter and wiping of the cam is the end result...I would not in any manner trust this cam without polishing and hardening process along with NEW lifters and broken in with molybdenum disulfide...but that is just myself....how did this engine get bolted together without interference checks being made first especially knowing the cam has been altered for lift and the head not even checked for possible past shaving to ensure clearance for added lift......this could easily have been prevented.. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 7, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 7, 2016 cam lobes has seen undue stress...this is the first sign of eventual galling and loss of metal at the lobe/lifter and wiping of the cam is the end result...I would not in any manner trust this cam without polishing and hardening process along with NEW lifters and broken in with molybdenum disulfide...but that is just myself....how did this engine get bolted together without interference checks being made first especially knowing the cam has been altered for lift and the head not even checked for possible past shaving to ensure clearance for added lift......this could easily have been prevented.. I have never seen a head that has had 1/8 inch shaved off of it. Yes, I should have checked it, but I did not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 7, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 7, 2016 I have been communicating with Earl and he wants to see the Cam in the AM. So, I am going to drive it up for him to look at. I have a spare stock cam and can always use that. The lifters look fine. I have some extra's around if I want to swap out the two that their valves make contact with the head. James. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 9, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 9, 2016 I want to say a public Thank You to Earl (www.edgyspeedshop.com) for making the time to take my cam and check it and re parkerize it in a few hour span. I dropped it off in the AM and by 2:30 PM it was ready to go. He would not even take any money for the trouble. The #1 and #5 lobe was a little suspect after the valves hit the head. What a great guy. When this project is done, I will have him do another cam for me and put it in storage. I got that cam in yesterday and this morning I will double check the tappet cold static clearance then do a final check of the head for clearance. At that point I will start to button up the engine. James. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff Balazs Posted July 9, 2016 Report Share Posted July 9, 2016 Was there actually a valve timing issue to go with this other stuff? Jeff 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dodgeb4ya Posted July 9, 2016 Report Share Posted July 9, 2016 Hope the valve timing and valve to head clearance will be good after all this extensive re-do work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 9, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 9, 2016 It does not appear to have been an issue with the timing gear. In the photos, it looks like there was...but...it was an optical allusion. I took out the gear and sprocket and matched them up with original parts. With the dots lined up, I can still get about 0.002 of piston movement on #1 before it tops out. That puts the dots a hair out of alignment. However, this may be due to clearances stacking up (Piston Pin, Rod bearings, chain clearance, etc.) and it may not be the dots themselves. I cleaned, ground, the inconsistencies in the exhaust pocket area of the chambers. I looked at three heads I have around. In some chambers the floor drops away from the edge nicely. On some it starts to drop and then there is a slight bump or rounded ridge before it drops away. Some chambers had it and some did not. It is on the bump that 2 of the valves made contact. The new exhaust valves have less of a rounded top them the old ones. The spare head, with cleaned up chambers are now not hitting. I used plastic gauge and none of the strips got compressed. I painted the valves with red fingernail polish and none transferred. I felt the head and nothing. So, lets hope everything now works like it is supposed to. I will clean up part on Sunday and start bolting things back on. James. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 14, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 14, 2016 Coming back to close the loop on this topic. I got new valves put them in the engine. I did a little work on the combustion chambers to help insure that the head did not get in the way of the valves like the other head did. It is interesting to note that some of the chambers have a little "bump" or "Hump" in them and some did not about 1/4 inch from the edge of the chamber. That is where the edge of #1 and #5 exhaust valve hit. Now all the chambers have a smooth transition. Earl, the great guy that he is took care of the cam and I installed that as well. I got the car running over the last 2 days. It ran ok, but had a terrible stumble while trying to accelerate. I pulled the car apart and everything looked fine. I pulled the distributor and it looked ok...but...the advance plate "moved" a little as the point rub block rode over the pint of the cam lobe. Hummm So, I pulled the spare distributor I have and point in a set of points and a capacitor. I stuck on a NOS rotor and a NOS Cap I have. I set eh points to 20. Fired it up and it idled better and no high speed miss. So, I took it out for an extended drive and the problem went away. When good and hot the idle is a little off (accounting for Earls cam) but I think it may just be tight as it still has only about 12 miles on it. The only bad thing is the compression seems a little low at 110 across the board. One cylinder however is VERY low at 50. May be a valves I screwed up on? With oil it only goes up a very little to like 55. Both #1 and #5 Cylinders are the ones that made head contact. The valves are new but I wonder if the guide took some sort of hit and a valve is sticking. When I put them in they dropped right in. I just had coincidences. I will drive it for a week and then re-check it. Best, James 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dodgeb4ya Posted July 15, 2016 Report Share Posted July 15, 2016 50 is the same as a dead cylinder or soon will be. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James_Douglas Posted July 18, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 18, 2016 Well, With about 1 hour on the engine running around the block, we jumped in the car at 7 AM on Sunday and drive south of San Francisco to the 60th annual Hillsborough Concours d’Elegance. We went roaring down the Interstate 280 while I listened to the engine on pins and needles. The car ran fine. At the end of the afternoon we took home Second Place in the post WWII class. The award made the 7 days of back busting work worth it. Thanks all, James. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
knuckleharley Posted July 18, 2016 Report Share Posted July 18, 2016 Well, With about 1 hour on the engine running around the block, we jumped in the car at 7 AM on Sunday and drive south of San Francisco to the 60th annual Hillsborough Concours d’Elegance. We went roaring down the Interstate 280 while I listened to the engine on pins and needles. The car ran fine. At the end of the afternoon we took home Second Place in the post WWII class. The award made the 7 days of back busting work worth it. Thanks all, James. Congrats! It's nice to get a little payoff after all that time,money,and frustration. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
55 Fargo Posted July 18, 2016 Report Share Posted July 18, 2016 Well, With about 1 hour on the engine running around the block, we jumped in the car at 7 AM on Sunday and drive south of San Francisco to the 60th annual Hillsborough Concours d’Elegance. We went roaring down the Interstate 280 while I listened to the engine on pins and needles. The car ran fine. At the end of the afternoon we took home Second Place in the post WWII class. The award made the 7 days of back busting work worth it. Thanks all, James. Where are the pics of the car, the award and your 7 days of work?? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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