Whats wrong with these heads?

[El_Mecanico]

I just pulled the exhaust manifolds and this is how the exhaust ports look. The car burns oil at idle could this be from the valve guides? Leak down results were 2% across the board. Only 115k miles suppposely.


6


5


4


3


2


1

[cgarr]

guides or an old lady was driving it? I have seen worse.

[shrtshck]

Here is what my 3.2 looked like at 100k miles. After a Top end refresh it has never run better, oil consumption is down to about a litre every 1500 miles.

[porterdog]

Originally Posted by cgarr

...an old lady was driving it?

I'm saying. Give it an Italian tune up; mebbe try the Redline fuel injector cleaner.

Good pictures, though!

[Flat6pac]

3.2, in the last year I ve done half a dozen and they all needed 12 guides. All were between 80K and 130K miles.
Bruce

[db_cooper]

The leak down test sounds good. How about the compression numbers too. The reason I ask if the valve guides are worn, you may get some uneven compression test numbers. Not likely, but why not?

How much oil does the engine use in 1000 miles? Maybe the valve guides are OK but the stem seals are shot.

With the valve covers off..is there any appreciable movement when you try and rock the valve once there is clearance with the rocker? If they move around a lot..the guides are worn...interesting they get a good seat and it will give good leak down numbers..they just wander around when open..not good. No heat dissipation through the guide, especially the exhaust.

[El_Mecanico]

Here is a pic of the engine using the questionable yoke. Overall the engine looks pretty good...crossing my fingers that I don't need a center section overhaul.

[KTL]

That black pile-up of carbon is typically bad valve guides. Craig's also right though, that putt-putt driving can produce some carbon buildup in the exhaust ports. The telltale sign of bad guide wear is if the port is wet/oily. If you're getting oil burning at idle, I suspect the wear is high.

You can clear out that buildup pretty easily with fuel treatment. When I first got my '87 in the summer of 2000, I had taken off the exhaust system to replace the oil return tubes. I noticed some carbon buildup in a few of the ports but it wasn't too bad. The engine didn't consume oil, so I know the valve guides were still good at that time (around 65K miles).

I got the recommendation of Berryman B12 Chemtool here on the forums (Early_S_Man RIP) and the stuff worked great in just one tankful. I only did the treatment once and it removed all of the carbon. I took off the exhaust again in the winter to do a thorough cleaning/restoration (and a lot of other stuff) and I was really surprised how clean the ports were with just one treatment of Berryman B12.