fstenuf

well here's the low down on the busted spring...took the valve cover off and found a lot of lil aluminum shavings in the corner of the head....and i also found a chunk of aluminum with a rubber peice mushed into it(i think its the oil seal that sits on the bottom of the springs, don't know for sure, please help) the rocker arm is positioned at an angle, like the top is to the left of the push rod and the bottom is the the right of the valve, almost as if its holding the valve up...

what i'm wondering is what should i do? take off the head to see if the valve hit the piston adn to check out the valve guide? or if i should just buy new retainers and the oil sealer(or whatever they call it) and put in the new spring...but also make sure that the pushrod isn't bent either.

its really dissapointing when i've only driven the car only like 1000 miles and now this happens to it...oh well, live and learn

fstenuf

if its too much of a hassle there might be a 396 Z for sale real quick...

fstenuf

Anyone have any input?

zhevy-1

You could have the wrong lenght pushrods as the cause for this.
What you may want to do is grab the stem of the valve and pull it up to see if it travels freely thru its guide. If it gets stuck, it may either be bent or broken, in which case a damage to the pistons is a sure bet.
You need to check the geometry of your valvetrain. If you've had shorter pushrods installed, you need to hang the culprit who did it. A good way to see if your pusrods are too short, is to check the top of the retainers for any evidence of the rockers hitting, by the same token, go and check underneath the rockers where they sit above the retainers for any markings or indentations.

fstenuf

thanks for the info...anyone else wanna give their .02 worth...i'm up for suggestions

zhevy-1

What kind of suggestions do you want?
If you follow what I just said, that should answer all your questions. You can't just buy a retainer, and new springs, put it on, and call it good, can you?
Try what I said, and post your findings, and we can go from there.
Even if you remove the head and do all of that, you still need to know what caused it to break so soon in the first place. My money is still on shorter pushrods.
-Goose

fstenuf

sorry man didn't mean to get ya goin... , well i just don't know why when the motor has like 10k miles on it and just that one spring busted adn tore the hell outta everything, that would be cause by shorter pushrods...they are AFR heads i'm not sure if why the pushrods would be shorter. i'm also not sure if the guy that built the motor put in the right size ones as well. but they are AFR heads so wouldn't AFR send the right size push rods to go along with the specs of the motor? i'm really sorry but i bought the car like it and the spring broke. i don't have the motor info yet. but i appreciate your help.

also if the valve guide is messed up, is it fixable or will i have to buy new heads?

what if the valve hit the piston can i just buy one piston and replace it? idk if they sell just one though? well thanks for the info.

97WS6SCharged

You should be able to replace one piston as long as no damage was done to the bore and you know what the weight of the other pistons are so the new one can be balanced. More than likely, if the valve did hit the piston it probably only damaged the valve (maybe a small mark in the piston). I'd say pull the intake and the head and see what you've got.