You pull the head off your new, second hand, "ran great" 1.8VVT engine and find the following. What do you do?



So, first, Cylinder #1, Ex side:


Cylinder #1, In side:


Cylinder #2: Ex side:


Cylinder #2, In side:


The culprit was the little blob next to the red arrow. He came off and disappeared (probably into the water jacket) while I was cleaning.


It does look like it's been stationary for a while though, which is .... an observation.

First 2 cylinders after some cleanification:


Top of the piston:


The options I've come up with are:
1) pretend it's not there, likely detonate engine once it's built and boosted (not a problem for the time being)
2) new head, sell this one to someone who wants to try their hand at port work.
3) get someone that knows what they're doing to machine it out, get 11:1 pistons.
4) deck the block a ****-ton, hope it solves the problem, get 9:1 pistons.

So, on a scale of one to "sucks to be you", how bad is it?

 

If it were me, I'd just Mill the head and keep on trucking

 

That's exactly what I was thinking, right before thinking, "People are going to rage and neg-cat me to death if I post this."

What are your plans for the car? Boost? N/A? Build motor? If you spin the cams over is there any visible damage to the valves?

 

The odds that the debris did not get between the valve and seat is pretty low with all that damage. An engine will still run with slightly bent valves. It will just be down a little on power. Minimum I would pull valves to make sure there true. Probably cheaper to just put on another head.

 

For a customer, I'd reject the core and source a different head.

For a shop car, I'd mill the head, smooth off any sharp edges left behind, and send it.

 

Cheers guys!

The plan for the engine was to replace gaskets and seals and put it in my '90 chassis, get all of the bits working with the MS, and then throw some money at a turbo setup, running SOMEOFIT for a while until I had more spare dollary-doos to put forged goodies in it.

The edge of the valves looks a little bit chewed up, but I haven't pulled & cleaned them yet, it could just be uneven carbon build up. The actual projectile ended up embedded in the head, and then covered in carbon, which tells me the motor ran fine in the original car with it in there for a fair time before I came along and pulled the head.

I think the plan is to see if I can find a long block for not-many dollars, or a head and then build the bottom end - at least that way when the turbo comes along I can run MOREOFIT.