Hemi gurus - am I about to suck a valve?

This is the number 1 intake and it is clacking. The valve stem is sunk into the retainer more than the one next to it - if you can see from the pic.


We were at the track and I ran it 4 or 5 more times then in the morning after corking up the headers I could hear it a lot louder. We were 170 miles from home so I drove it easy all the way home. I thought at the time it was a lazy lifter or something. Now I am wondering it the valve guide is worn out due to driving it home.

This is where I think it happened. It spun up way too far after the water box - I don't have a rev limiter hooked up yet. Then after this run you can hear a tick starting.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUOZMf5YL1w

 

I wonder if its a bent valve, cant really tell from the pic.

 

Before you take too much apart check your pushrod. I have the same adjustable pushrods and one broke between the adjuster nuts. The push rod never fell apart and stayed in place but made lots of noise. You never know.

 

hard to say if its bent valve,guide coming out or valve seat. when you pull the intake you should be able to see if the guide is any longer than the rest of them.

 

maybe to many carbs?

 

sounds awesome! thanks for the ride, hope the fix is an easy one.

 

just watched the video very cool!!!! did you retire the truck? the car is bad ass man i love it!!!

 

What it looks like to me is YES you are about to suck a valve..Looks like the spring retainer is moving up the keepers; either the retainer is expanding or the keepers [which should be hardened] are squashing or combo of both..I compared it to the next valve over...As the retainer moves up the valves the spring return pressure starts to go away and if and when the valve starts to float and pounds back off the seat it aggrevates and progresses the problem till the retainer starts hitting the rocker arm and if the keepers make it all the way through the retainer the valve will drop far enough for the piston to make bad contact..I think you be lucky...

 

Ditto that

 

The keeper is getting ready to suck down thru the retainer.. Stock retainers? get a set of hardened chromoly ones, hot heads has em. Same shit happened with my 354 in the beginning. Better than turning the piston dome into a moon crater




TH

 

X2 on sucking a valve- VERY good that you made it home without any big damage.

rick

 

No I still have the Stubby Truck. I plan to sell it, just haven't got around to doing it yet. I been meaning to catch up on your build - I'll take a look!

I had hardened seats put in, but those are on the exhaust side (right?) The pushrods are adjustable and still fine. I'm with the rest of you in that the retainer is about to let go. I will got on the phone to Hotheads today.

So do you think the spring is ok? I have heard if you over rev and float the valves that it weakens the spings. I can push this valve off the seat with my 2 thumbs right now. Seems a bit light, but then it is about 1/4" less compressed than it should be.
Thanks for the advice!

 

Posting these to maybe save someone some trouble in the future. Looks like new retainers should be a required item on these 50 year old engines. My plan is to go through and replace all of them with new ones.

 

You were blessed.

 

i just got my heads back from the machine shop I'm going to double check and make sure there not the stock ones. glad thats all it was for ya

 

Wow..close call

 

I can't believe you made it home.... That was a close call. It's time for some GOOD valve train and a rev-limiter.

Glad it was just a close call.

 

Glad to see it got resolved... thats EXACTLY what happened in the ones in our coupe... And the same thing happened to do it, missed a shift at the HAMB drags and over revved the hell out of it, and it ended up sounding like a stovebolt engine with not enough oil in it.... happy to see it work out...



TH

 

Wow! You are a lucky duck! Glad nothing catastrophic happened!

Question or two, not directly related to what's going on...

Are you running stock valves? Didn't see you mention it. Also, was curious about the washers between your rockers and the heads of your head bolts. Did those come as a set? I bought some head bolts like that awhile back before switching to studs, and the very first round of torqueing the bolts down I broke virtually every washer. Don't think I even made it to 40 pounds. Just curious. Stock head bolts didn't use washers.

 

OH! And fun ride! Thanks! I hear that valve...

 

Yeah call that lucky! I won't use stock retainers ever again.

Hey Scooter - they are stainless steel valves. The valves, the locks and the springs are all new - why oh why didn't I run new retainers?! Those bolts and washers are a Hot Heads set. I never had any washers crack. I have blown head gaskets once and had the head gasket flipped the wrong way once. So those blots and heads have been on and off 3 times at least. No problems with the bolts.

I blew a head gasket because I found a NOS set from the 70's or the 60's and ran those. They didn't hold very long. Then put some Best Gasket head gaskets in and so far so good.

Hemis - always something.

 

Interesting. Those are the same ones I had with the washer that cracked.

Was just curious.

 

close call ......you better play the lottery !

 

I still wouldn't be real certain you didn't kiss a valve and bend it. The Hemis ,if I remember correctly, will get hung up on the other valve when they float . As in the one valve will be held open by the other.If this happens the valve that supposed to be open is pushing the other valve further in the cumbustion chamber than it is made to go. Because it is further open it bottoms out the valve retainer on the guide, collapsing the spring and causing the kind of damage you see there. I hope you don't have that problem but I think I would pull the head ,check for marks on the piston and have someone spin the valve to see if its still straight. Best of luck.

 

I finally got into it and swapped all the retainers - what a pain. I found 2 more on the other head that were about to suck in . Odd thing - only the intakes were doing this. Weird. The springs are stock pressure and the cam is a regrind.

 

dude just my 2 cents-change out all of them-just to be sure

 

Oh yeah I changed all of them out. I just thought it odd that only the intakes showed visible cracks like that.

 

I had the same problem and went with stainless valves, the good retainers and keepers.
Never realized Hemis had this problem with the retainers, until it happened to me.
HemiDeuce.

 

Good save Dog Patch. That could have been disasterous. I used all new keepers and retainers as insurance when I rebuilt my Chrysler. After seeing this, I'm glad I did.

 

a bit OT but have you checked your ackerman? in the vid it looks like your outside wheel is turning in way sharper than your inside wheel. i doubt it's a big deal but it might make the car go down the road better, ya know?