[etzel]

Hey everyone...

So as some of you may remember me, I have an '84 L-type (bring it malloy :twisted: ), currently with about 146k miles.

Last year I thought I blew the HG. White smoke out the exhaust, blue smoke from the manifold, which was caused by oil dripping from the head, the works. Also, my valve seals were shot.

This week I finally got around to pulling the head. The verdict? the HG looks pretty good -- no issues that would cause the symptoms I described.

My next thought is that the head is warped. When I pulled out the head bolts, in 3 passes over the appropriate pattern given by the Holy Green Book, some of them were noticably looser than the others. I know the car was overheated before I got it, 2 or 3 times. I'm afraid that this may have warped the head, causing this unevenness in the bolts, and allowed coolant to leak into the cylinders.

Thoughts?

If anyone's interested, I've posted pics of my tear-down process. Don't laugh at my cam bolt removal "SST"... I needed to get that off and didn't want to buy another tool.

http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/r/a/rae125/supra_work/

Oh yeah did I mention my power steering rack's shot too? That won't be replaced until I know if the head's salvageable or not. :roll:

See ya,
Ryan Etzel
84 MKII L-type

 

[Junkie]

For starters,get a good metal straight edge,clean the gasket surface of the head,and take a look.Run the straight edge corner to corner,and just lengthwise.If the head is warped at all,you will see it.
Also clean the head fairly well,and look for visable cracks,from any hole to another,and in the valve seat area.
Unless it's a drastic warp,most machine shops can "dust" the surface.If the head needs milled too much,you may need adjustable cam gears.Also,have the machine shop pressure check the head before any millwork is done.

 

[evilc]

Hopefully your head isn't warped, but if it is, it's not the end of the world. In my neck of the woods, these aren't used much and salvage yards will get rid of them pretty cheap. A long straight edge can be picked up at any tool store or you can take the head to a local machine shop and they will look and tell you pretty quick for not much money. If you have had work done there before, they may even do it for free!

 

[etzel]

Wow... been a bit since I've posted here. I wonder if anyone will even see this post

Anyways, bringing everyone up-to-date on my car:

The head was warped, badly. The machine shop (which does a ton of local sprint/dirt track work) was able to salvage it, but had to scrape off 17 thousanths of head. As a result they had to re-work all of the valve geometry, etc. Very nice, very top-notch work.

After getting my car back together, and spending a day on the distributor itself and getting the timing set right, the car was finally running. As soon as that happened, I was off to Oregon for another three months with Intel... so the Supra sat in the garage. After Intel, I came back to PA and finished my college degree and got a Real Job... while the Supra sat.

A few weeks back I finally drug her back out of the garage to give her much-needed TLC. I replaced the steering rack and wiper motor, as both had failed at some point in time over the past 2 years.

A few days ago I found that hatch rust was allowing water to get into the trunk area, so I'm going to clean it up, put some POR-15 on it and hopefully have the car on the road within a few weeks.

Oh yeah - I'm also going to tag it as a classic, so NO emissions tests in PA! Woo Hoo! (If that car ever had to undergo a sniffer test I'd be screwed.)

Peace,
Ryan

 

[Tanya]

that's great! how high is your compression now? LOL good the head was salvageable, get that Supra back on the road man and good luck w/ everything else

 

[etzel]

Compression... we won't go there for now. I think the rings are on the way out...

I'm just going to drive it until it's time for a new motor.... then it'll be a 6M The car is just a secondary one for me now, as I actually picked up an '04 Subaru Legacy a few months back. _that_ car should last me for a while :wink: