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Replaced valve stem seals without removing cylinder head
As the title states, today I replaced the intake and exhaust valve stem seals without removing the cylinder head. Was about to pull the trigger on a new O/S valve head and figured why not try this first.
Truck: 1987 Toyota 4Runner 22re 5 speed with 17X,XXXmi
Reason: burns oil like nobody’s business, fluctuating idle, bad warm starts, and spits the Black Death out of the tail pipe at cold starts.
Compression check before hand:
cylinder 1: 165psi
cylinder 2: 165psi
cylinder 3: 175psi
cylinder 4: 170psi
With the compression numbers reading what they were I figured; valve stem seals. This cylinder head has seen better days, most of the exhaust studs are heli coiled and #2 spark plug is as well. All of which were previously done leaving the head on. I wasn’t too afraid of losing the head gasket (might still happen) and I had some oem valve stem seals from some horse trading. So I grabbed an $11.99 valve stem compressor from harbor freight and two shoe strings...
I set the engine to TDC, drained the coolant, left the oil in it, removed the spark plugs, removed the coolant neck, unbolted the vacuum hardlines, removed the valve cover, took apart a spare rocker arm assembly, removed head bolts/current rocker arm assembly, torqued the head back down sans rocker arms and shafts, backed it off TDC, stuffed in shoe laces, rotated it back towards TDC until it stopped, utilized the HF valve spring compressor, pulled off old seals, installed new seals, removed head bolts/rocker towers, re-installed rocker assembly, re-torqued head bolts, and then buttoned her all back up. Took about two and half hours.
She runs better than ever, rock solid idle, solid warm starts, oil and coolant levels haven’t budged, exhaust is less stinky, and has improved acceleration.
Been driving her all day, put almost a 100 miles on her. Really, I tried this just to see if it could be done. I have read threads where people said it can be successfully done, but the majority of those threads are full of naysayers. If it failed/fails it would/will be momentum towards spending real money on a lce/22re performance O/S valve head. I plan on re-torquing the head bolts at 500 miles, and keeping this thread updated with any new occurrences. Below are the only pics I took:
Good writeup. Those seals were wasted! I look forward to your long term reports.
Call me a doubting thomas, i hope i am wrong. But I'm one of those people who swapped a cam and made it about 500 miles before the head gasket let go.
I was pretty sure there was enough play n the springs to slip them (rocker arms) off to the side to replace the seals on the 22r series..
???
Nope, and it’s conjecture just like this ^^^ that I’d like to put a stop to. Too much of it in these forums. But maybe I’m missing something here. You tell me how that would work.
So I’ve put roughly 220 miles on her. I’ve been running her to 4-4500 in every gear, highway and stop ‘n’ go traffic. Pointless drives everywhere just to see if she’d pop. Coolant hasn’t budged. Stock coolant temp dummy gauge reads middle of the road. There is still some oil consumption. Oil pressure dummy gauge reads just fine as well. Quieter than ever. I need to work on my wife’s truck and then if I still have time I’ll do a second compression check. If not today later this week.
Added about 10ml oil to cylinder #2 Jumped about 20 psi. Looks like I misrepresented the before compression numbers on cylinder #2. Cylinder #2 also has the spark plug thread repair.
I set this box in front of the tail pipe during start up in the garage to minimize the spread of Black Death and to kinda get an idea of what is coming out. You can see the box has been turned and there’s 4-5 starts on there. Some of these are from before Here’s the start up from today for the compression check.
So compression in #2 is down, but it was also the lowest reading from before.
Maybe it was fubar’d from on head spark plug thread repair.
Maybe there was oil in there before from the leaky seals creating a false reading, but you’d think the readings from the other cylinders would have fluctuated more as well.
I don’t believe it to be a head gasket issue, but I also can’t say it isn’t just yet. Here are the Denso W16EXR-U plugs. They were ran for a few months before this process. Probably should have swapped em out for fresh ones.
I have a bottle of liqui moly pro-line engine flush I’m gonna run through it with the thought that it might clean/free up the rings and any other sludge/gunk that may be of hinderance. She has been buring oil for quite a while. I’ll do a compression check after that too. Needs smog/registration renewal by 6/13 has always passed before...
She’s always had a slight to moderate ping at take offs in 1st and part throttle 2500-3000rpms in 2nd-5th. I’ve monkeyed with her for the last 4 years. I’ve cleaned EGR, adjusted TPS, installed ‘94 upper intake manifold and throttle body, adjusted valves, adjusted timing, ECU voltage and resistance tests, the entire volley of FSM tests multiple times, adjusted AFM, fixed injector harness, new injectors, new fuel pump, fixed stripped spark plug threads, installed tri-y headers, added 4-wire O2, and welded up a 2.25 exhaust. Slow fixing/modding/tuning process when she’s the 4th project vehicle.
With her now running considerably smoother and burning a substantial amount less oil, she still pinged but quieter and less than ever before, I decided to install an 82 Supra AFM. The ping became more audible than anytime in the past. She was also after-firing on deceleration and the engine would break up and physically rock back and forth on neutral revs.
She was running lean, but that seemed a little odd because I live at 5,000 feet. So I fooled with timing, spark plug gap/heat range, and AFM adjustments the last two nights. 5* 8* 10*, 1 to 3 teeth lean and rich, stock and one range hotter plugs, opened and closed gaps. She hated anything more than 5*, the hotter plugs in general, larger gap, the stock AFM setting, and any AFM setting in the lean direction. Tonight I finally ended up with 5* timing, 1 tooth rich AFM setting, and stock plugs gapped to .65mm. No pinging what so ever, climbs hills and holds 60-65mph in 5th up to ~6000 feet, no after-firing, idles and revs completely smooth, and stinks even less.
Add another 120 miles to her and now my fingers are white knuckle crossed her head gasket doesn’t give up the ghost. Here’s a blocked EGR port... had to dremmel this out of the head The valve got replaced with a freebie from the yards (shhhh) Random bits of slag, found pre cat, from previous owners exhaust fix. Thought for sure this was part of the pinging sound, it wasn’t.
Well, I spoke too soon she still pings... did a smoke test to check for vacuum leaks and found a pretty good one coming from the throttle body shaft seals. There is play in the shaft so the bushings are probably toast.
Other than that, coolant and oil are staying where they’re suppose to and she runs strong. The work around for part throttle pinging has been, give her more throttle... I think it’s obvious I’d rather there be no ping. I’ve set spark plugs and AFM settings back to stock and am waiting on a billet big bore throttle body from LCE to show up this week.
What octane fuel are you running?
Are you sure your knock sensor is working?
87 octane regularly, pings on 91 as well. The ping at 5* jumped is so light my passengers struggle to hear it, unless it’s really hot. It was non existent at sea level. After I checked for vacuum leaks previously (didn’t have a smoke machine) I figured it was carbon deposits from burnt oil causing hot spots and multiple flame fronts, because it doesn’t make since to me to be lean at high elevations.
The knock sensor itself has no continuity between its wire terminal and sensor body.
The sensor wire has continuity back to the ECU.
The sensor wire shield, knock sensor side, has continuity to battery negative.
Can’t find the shield ECU side.
Engine block has continuity to battery negative.
I’ve never had a knock sensor code. There’s been codes just not for the knock sensor.
Since there are no FSM procedures on the knock sensor, I figured continuity checks out, no codes, or flashing engine light while pinging, the knock sensor must be functioning properly.
Is the sensor wire suppose to be shielded all the way back to the ECU? Mine is not.
Where is the sensor wire shielding suppose to be terminated at?
Where on the ecu side? All I have is a black wire into ECU connector.
Where on the knock sensor side? Mine ends about a half an inch before the sensor connector.
Yet still has continuity to battery negative...
The fuel octane really has nothing to do with knocking. The ECU constantly advances and retards the timing until pinging just starts (as sensed by the knock sensor), then backs off. If you use lower octane gas it will just set the timing a little retarded. It won't leave it knocking enough to hear.
The knock sensor shield is not grounded at the sensor, only at the ECU. My EWD shows the shield connected to a BR ground wire at splice I1, which is shown to be "near" the ECU. I've never done this, but I expect that if you pull off 4" of tape-wrap at the ecu you'll find the splice.
The lack of code tells me your knock sensor is working correctly. I don't know why you're hearing pinging.
05-25-2019, 11:05 PM
