Technical Sound of a burned valve or bad lifter?

Hi guys,

So I'll tell the whole story and hopefully this will narrow it down. Lost the motor in my 51 Ford due to broken piston rings in 4&8. Decided to have a motor built. New motor is a fresh machined block that has been decked, bored to .080 over, inspected for bore alignment, new cam bearings, new Schneider 260f cam, reds Johnson adjustables, reman'd rods, 4" mercury crank, egge pistons, hardened valve seats, 8ba heads, new valves, zephyr springs with shim, bob drake water pumps, fluidampr harmonic dampener, stock generator, 8ba heads and intake, 160 degree thermostats, stock distributor and stock carb, reds headers into 28" magnaflow glasspacks ending in turndowns.

I installed the motor, retorqued the heads, gave the came a moderate (10 minute) break in, using Rotella T 15w40 with an additional bottle of zinc cam break in additive, which was far beyond what my engine builder recommended. I base timed the engine by ear and eye, and with a little tweaking, it ran great. I had the radiator flushed and cleaned at a local radiator shop before I did the motor and with the new motor, all was well. The heads were retorqued before driving car. The engine builder recommended I run water for the first few hundred miles to clean out the block from any remaining solvents and cleaners, so I am running water and redline water wetter. I also jetted the carb to a 53 jet instead of a 51, figuring the cam, stroke/bore, and headers added up to a little more fuel demand. I had a very slight tip in hesitation, but otherwise, all was well.


Fast forward approximately 100 trouble free and completely noise free miles to Saturday, when it was 95 degrees out. With a hundred miles or so on the motor I wanted to check everything out so I looked at the plugs, reset the timing (or so I thought), and went off on a cruise. I notice immediately the car was steadily gaining in temperature and seemed a bit sluggish, so I pulled over and advanced the timing a bit, and off I went. The temps starting coming back down to around the midway/a little under/a little over, as to what I thought was reasonable for the temp outside. I hop on a short divided highway and ramp things up to about 55 (3 spd manual around 3.30 gears) and this is where things seem to go awry. The temp steadily started to creep past halfway and as I got off the divided highway and tried to make it to some country two lanes where she could cool off, she died while driving. Now, I want to point out that the car has a 7 lb radiator cap and it never boiled over or belched any steam. NEVER. The hottest the motor has seen while running was about 2/3 on the factory temp gauge and it still showed as full 50 lbs of oil pressure at RPM. I'm no dummy so I was very conscious of what was going on. So, I pulled over, popped the hood and began to poke around. I couldn't seem to find any sure signs of problems. I cleaned the points, nothing. I checked the timing, close enough. I pulled 2 plugs, they looked dry? Hmm. So I considered vaporlock, but what I didn't get was both my glass filter bowl at my pump and my carburetor (last owner was extra careful) were completely full. I had no way to check spark on the side of the road because I was alone and didn't let anyone who stopped stay to help (I'm one of the dumbest smart people I know), so I can't say if I did or didn't have spark. What I can say is this. After about 40-50 minutes, the car fired up, completely normal and ran seemingly okay, so I attempted to drive down the road and turn around on a side street and halfway up the side street it misfired badly and stalled and wouldn't restart. I coasted to a cool stop and got out my lawn chair to call AAA. I figured my side of the street diagnosis wasn't getting me anywhere so home would be better. Fast forward another hour, and just for shits and grins after half a pack of cigarettes, I checked the cylinder head temperature and it was cool enough to hold your hand on for about 10-20 seconds. So I tried to start it. Well it started right up, although it didn't idle as evenly or run quite as smooth and seemed to have a very random misfire under cruising load. I canceled AAA and milked the car home.

Yesterday, I got under the hood and checked the points, plugs, rotor, cap, and condenser. The points didn't look great, so I chucked them and replaced them with Autozone points (all I could get) and a condenser from shoebox-central, set them by the factory manual @ .016, and threw on a new rotor for good measure. I pulled the plugs and replaced them with another set of NGK B-6L. I attached pictures of what the plugs look like at the bottom. This time, I also busted out my handy old timing light and timed the motor. I disconnected the Venturi vacuum line to the distributor and went to town. I'll say this, I installed a westberg manufacturing Westach brand tach and it seems to read all over the place. I have this motor idling as low as it will go and it reads 800-900. From all my math knowing gear ratios in the transmission, tire size, and rear end ratio, and speedometer drive rations, I've made charts to map my speed/RPM in each gear. I even made a chart to show current speed:displayed speed/RPM because I put what I believe to be 3.31 gears in this car and my speedometer is off. I've verified my speedometer discrepancy calculations with my GPS and my speedometer does indeed read slower than I am in fact cruising. But the tach shows me to be running anywhere for 400-800 more rpm than I should be turning. The tach is connected directly to the coil. SO, I used my timing light to check the timing and the car best idled and responded between 4-6 advanced at idle, with the vacuum line disconnected. I revved the motor and the timing didn't seem to change much, which seemed strange. So I connected the venturi vacuum line back to the distributor (it was plugged) and revved the engine, and still, I didn't see much change, which seemed weird. The car seemed to run alright, so I left it and locked everything down. I reset my base fuel mixture by running each screw in until it nearly killed the idle and worked around 3/4 turn past that each until best idle quality was achieved. Car was test driven and it seemed okay, but ran slightly rougher than before and had a random misfire at cruising speed, especially the upper RPM range. Today, I got out be timing light and Harley battery and gave her another degree of timing to 6/7, and went for a ride. There was still a misfire although the overall character of the motor was much improved. I pulled over and gave the idle screws a 1/4 turn out each and then went for a drive. Well, I'll say it's almost all gone expect a very light random misfire as cruise/light trotte, a pretty regular misfire just revving it in the driveway listening to the exhaust, and the strangest faint ticking/knocking/mechanical noise that you can just barely hear from either inside the car of if you stick your head under the car. All sounds well and good up top. I'm super paranoid because I'm thousands into this engine project and am terrified I burnt a valve or smoked a lifter or something crazy. It's really hard to be objective when it's your money. I'm acting like the customer I hated but I have to ask.

Does this sound like doom and gloom and worry worthy potential damage, or should I just throw a coil on it, a small block Chevy distributor, a radiator, and call it a day? I want your honest opinions.

Sorry for 35 mile long post.

 

Next time put your hand on the coil and see how hot it is, sounds to me like you may have a coil problem.

Your cam break in was a little on the short side but if you heard it break in it is broken in. Not many I know can tell the sound but I am giving you the benefit of the doubt on this one. that said a flattened cam would always be bad not just when it is warmed up.

Anyway not being there and able to troube shoot the thing from her it sounds to me like your coil is getting hot and taking a shit on you.

 

Could be multiple problems. Quitting like it did may be a bad coil. The slight miss or rough running could also be a coil issue but if the distributor has a bunch of wear, that could contribute to the problem.

 

Some of those plugs look pretty black. What carb are you using? I think you might have to much fuel there. Maybe try smaller jets?

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I'd put lots of money on the coil. Quitting hot and firing when cooled is text book coil issue.
Decipher why it failed:
Mounting, ohms, China, old wiring.
Let's say it's wired wrong, it will work for a short while and self destruct. Just like you described


If it's not firing, missing or weak spark the plugs will get black. And if it's missing you'll hear all sorts of faint noises.

 

sounds like bad coil , the sounds are normal the lower end makes a mild thunking/ticking sound from the rods transmitting noises and change of inertia,
unless it sounds like a gnome with a hammer in the pan banging away and since you have good pressure ( not bouncing around ) you shouldn't worry , if it was a cam going flat it would be all across the rpm band and sometimes it will spit from the carb .

 

Thanks so much for the advice guys!

I just ran to Autozone (eek) and bought a coil. Cheap China junk but I'll tell you this, it fixed 80% of the problem. Basically I replaced the coil and retorqued my head bolts. The car runs as good as it did before the hot run, or close enough I can't tell the difference. I do suspect my loadamatic is part to blame for poor running and trust me, I've already been talking to Bubba. I actually have 3 deuces waiting to go on this motor, so I already knew the loadamatic was on its way out. I just didn't realize how crappt it would run with the cam. So as far as the dizzy goes, I emailed Bubba about an hour ago to ask one last question and hope to order my dizzy tomorrow.

As far as the coil and points, I installed cheap Autozone China crap to get me by, but does anyone know a good source for American made, high quality points, condensers, and coils? The Autozone coil is literally low on dielectric oil out of the box. You shake it and it sounds like a bottle of pepto bismol. Now, knowing the way inductors work, I would want to assure the coils were covered as to prevent any errant chance or arcing, but HEY, why would China care. I got points from shoeboxcentral but they didn't even fit. The swingarm that the movable point is on was so wide that it literally hit the mounting screw and wouldn't open properly no matter how I set it. The points I took out had an arm that tapered sharply toward the point and the autozone junk was similar. Also, the coil I removed was a prestolite, which I assume is ancient. Lol

 

And as far as the decking goes, the gentleman that built my motor has been building flatheads for somewhere around 50 years. He knew the build sheet before the block was even machines, so he was aware of the decking/camshaft combo. It's only a .355 lift cam, so there were quite a few thousandths extra as far as max lift before interference goes, but I am certain it's not a problem. I'm not terribly worried about it being decked because I never plan to run aftermarket heads due to low flow characteristics and the added strength provided by the cast iron heads. Basically, my entire remaining plans for the motor are 3 deuces and Bubbas dizzy.

OH, and a radiator to keep the pig cooler.

 

Try disconnecting the Tach and see what happens. This happened to me replaced factory tach in a 64 Chevy with a SW unit car would miss out under load. Unhooked tach engine ran fine SW replaced tach end for problem.

 

I'm not saying that this is your problem BUT.....
I have had on new engine rebuilds with new valves and guides found that the valves will carbon up around the stem and valve and stick open just enough to make a slight miss and it happens because the spring tension is under 70 lbs on most flatheads and cant pull the valve all the way back onto the seat with the carbon build up right at the guide. I find that using a top end oil added to the gas like Marvel Mystery Oil will keep the carbon build up cleaned off . This happens a lot with new and tight valve guides and I highly recommend you use at least 3 to 4 ounces per tank of gas for the first few thousand miles then 2 ounce per tank from there on ..I'm no pushing marvel mystery oil as there are several other products that do the same thing. Just use the one of your choice...

 

You are aware that you can buy brand name parts from the zone, correct? never buy the first crap that pops up, it is usually the off brand that that store sells, it like going to the pharmacy, they always want you to buy generic medicine. The biggest profit margin is in generic, well you are not generic and neither is your car. Name brand is always better for you and your car and the difference in cost is usually minimal.

 

The Pistons were custom made by EGGE for my motor. Guys, the engine is legit. The block was only decked a bare minimum. It was just cleaned up from sitting on the shelf and trued. Anyone who thinks it's responsible to build a motor without verifying the deck surfaces are true is an idiot. Stop trying to pick apart my engine and only contribute if you have something to add. BTW, please read the original post before jumping to your own assumptions. I have 8BA heads, which are a higher dome height than EAB or the other "high compression" heads from the 110 hp later motors. I specifically chose all components of this motor and worked with my engine builder to assure a reasonable buffer for all measurements. This thread is about some problems, that with the help of actual people who read and contribute, I'm well on the way to solving.

Hey, maybe some guy who is building his very first flathead himself (not hiring a professional), will benefit from the posts about motors with EGGE pistons and high compression heads, ill fitting valves and guides, and 70 lb valve springs.


BUT, again, if you read my initial post, I specified everything about my motor including the valve springs, which were recommended by the camshaft manufacturer and the place who sold me the cam and lifters. Even my engine builder recommended those springs and many internet articles agree that Zephyr springs with a shim are MORE THAN ADEQUATE for stock RPM range.


This isn't a parts motor. It was designed and built from day one knowing exactly what it would be. Plain and simple. My Pistons and valves don't hit the heads. The guy who built my engine has been building these engines longer than most of us have been alone. Or at least half of us.



As far as those who made the points about the coil and the effect of a cam on the stock distributor, the richness of my plugs, and even somewhat the person who recommended mystery oil (what a solution!), thank you for offering constructive advice, not simply trying to tell me I'm an idiot cause I didn't fly to Salt Lake City while my motor was being built, just so I could clay the heads myself. I think those people forgot that when you pay a professional to build something and check up with them regularly, you don't have to redo all their work. I don't think too many people are pulling the heads off of their brand new H&H motors just to clay the Pistons. Lol

 

I'm very aware of that and a long time friend of mine is the store manager of the autozone in south Nashua. BUT, they didn't stock the delco coil and it was more or less a test. So now I have an 18$ spare coil that I can throw in the toolbox in my trunk, once I find an appropriate replacement.

Is anyone familiar with Brillman coils?

https://www.brillman.com/store/product_detail/e1-6-volt-ignition-coil-premium-quality-usa-323

 

You can't control who posts or what they post. Just yourself.
you start off thinking and typing all sorts of shit and that just feeds into the obscurity.

Do you have any idea how much nonsense of your info I had to read thru to be able to tell you what your problem was. It was a bunch I'll tell you. Yet there was no berating for it.
You tore up the 3x2 thread, the kicked the dog, beat the old lady & thru the computer out the window but here totally missed your own problem. No biggie it's the Internet and that's what is expected.

Now it's up to you to figure out why your 1st coil failed. Keep that 18.00 test spare (substitute for a known good one) in the trunk because you'll need it to get home unless you figure it out and fix the problem. Your symptom is the coil failed.

 

It was an extremely old, somewhat rusty, Prestolite coil. It was a proper 6v, non resisted coil of stock replacement design, so the evidence points to a old coil that just wore out. They don't last forever. As far as the Chinese coil, it was just a stop gap to eliminate other problems. I'm trying to track down a good American made set of points, condenser, and coil so I can have a little more confidence in my ignition system. I'm also trying to get in touch with BUBBA to order one of his updated dizzys.

I really do appreciate the advice but I just don't need people worrying about problems that aren't there and sending the whole conversation in a million different directions.


And BTW, it's really funny that you claim the information I posted was laborious to go through to find the "important" stuff, but yet I constantly see people complain about OP's not giving all the correct information. Forgive me for being thorough. And also forgive me for trying to address each concern that people bring up, trying to eliminate more confusion. I'm not a professional forum poster. Just someone trying to find some constructive advice.

 

You can get good ignition parts from NAPA for your old heap. You may have to tell the fella at the computer to step away from the computer. If he is too young to read anything but pictures you may have to ask if they have a boomer or Gen Xer working there.

If you want American made parts you have to bear in mind that Mexico is also America, so if you are afraid of Mexican parts ( I am not but some are) you have to specify Made in the USA. Echlin and BorgWarner parts are still made here for the most part. I know that NAPA still stocks and or sells Echlin parts.

 

Thanks Beaner, I'll call Napa.

 

Yup, your coil got cooked. How does that happen? Age, and the occasional time that somebody leaves the ignition key on when the motor isn't running. There really isn't any other way to accidentally cook a coil, unless it's the wrong coil for the job.

Putting the wall-of-words aside, your thread title asks about burned valves and bad lifters, so I'll respond to that:
A compression test is the best way to check for leaky/burned valves. Find a cylinder with abnormally low compression and you've likely found a leaky valve. The second best way is with a vacuum gauge. Leaky valves will cause the needle to be jumpy. The third way is backfires through the carburetor indicate leaky intake valves and "chuffing" through the exhaust indicates leaky exhaust valves.
As far as the lifters, a bad lifter will give you fairly strong ticking sound.

 

best coils I have run into to date are the Bosch Blue coils that VW and porsche used , and they still make them, one in a epoxy filled form and the other is oil filled .. a bit more than $20 ( they run around $50 and I buy them on amazon or my Vw guy ) but never had one go bad ( I actually pulled them off the cars that had them ( der Bugs ) and reused them ) and to make them look nice a rattle can treatment of black makes it nice and ordinary looking .

 

Just ordered one of Bubba's mech advance dizzys. He said it will be a week or two.

 

I'm really starting to think I jinxed myself with this username...........

 

just shooting from the hip, coulda also been the condenser you changed. If they are funky, they tend to act up when hot, and the ugly points would point in this direction as well.

 

Falcon, I agree, but the points and condenser had been replaced by the previous owner as part of a partial tune up to hide be broken piston ring in 4&8, so the 30+ year old rusty coil on it seems more likely.

However no worries, the new dizzy has new points and condenser.

 

You ever get this thing sorted out?


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No sir. It's just sitting in my garage. No money, no more information. It's for sale on Craigslist at the moment.

 

Burned Valve: PHTTT, PHTTT, PHTTT

Bad Lifter: CLACK, CLACK, CLACK

Glad I could be of help.

 

And this is exactly why I don't come on this message board any more. Just full of a bunch of jackasses that sit around waiting to talk shit.

 

You asked, via the title of your thread, what a burned valve or bad lifter sounds like. That is exactly what they sound like. Two distinctly different sounds. What do you expect, a recorded video? Let me get that for you.

From me and the other jackasses on this board, good bye again.

 

Oh yeah, considering you didn't read the post, didn't use any deductive reasoning that a post of this age had already had some prick-ish know it all add a useless comment like yours. Maybe you could just keep your mouth shut when no one asked you. Read the last 2 posts before your buffoonery. Obviously an interchange between 2 people that know each other. But again, judging by your comments, it's obvious you didn't read the thread and wouldn't have anything to contribute if you did. GO AWAY SMARTYPANTS.

 

What it appears we have here is a gross failure to realistically communicate, sprinkled with a earnest drive and desire to engage in a urination festival.......get a grip and leave the caustic attitude somewhere else. Most of the folks here go out of their was to be helpful but, as everywhere else, there are always a few folks that either are ignorant and don't realize it or those that live for the nit to pick. Life is to short. I'll get off the soapbox now as those I am referring to will probably not let it lie.