Lost a valve on the #8 cylinder....bad day Buick fans!

I had driven 50 miles on Sunday in my 1970 GS Stage 1. No issues and the car ran great with a nice easy drive at 55 mph on country roads. After parking the car for four hours, I started it up and headed to the store. Two miles into the trip, intermittent noises like a grinding starter when I was going about 25 miles per hour. Turned around to pull off the road and shut it off. It wouldn't restart. I could get the motor to spin up to a point by manually turning the crank bolt, but there was a point where it would stop.

I took it apart today and found one of the valves on the #8 cylinder had fallen into the cylinder. The month old spark plug was crunched up on the tip.

I guess it's time to pull the motor! So much for my favorite kind of social distancing for a while.... Thanks for listening to me whine!

 

Jeez, that's some damage. Tough luck, hope your engine will end up stronger in the end!

 

By looking at your heads,it looks like your pushrods were a bit too long.Bruno.

 

Hi,

Sorry for your luck hopefully damage isn't too bad.

I had a similar experience with a 330 Olds, broken valve spring, end result put the piston into the oil pan, cracked block.
Now putting in a 455.

Good luck with the repairs

Regards,

 

It's a miracle you didn't window the block.

Is it the numbers matching block?

 

I broke a spring once in the 71 and the clip stayed on the valve, dodged a bullet there, not so lucky with our 2014 GMC Sierra with 6.2 ltr, dropped a valve at hiway speed,, warranty to the rescue.

 

No. I have a 70 factory replacement block that was in the car when my father bought it in 1986.

 

Last fall the rocker arm shaft broke between the #2 and #4 cylinders. Just replaced the two rods, shaft and rockers and drove another 750 miles since. Could have been an early sign....

 

Could have bent the stem when that happened. I don't get why the spring broke in so may places, never saw that. It was running when you shut it off, so, maybe the valve didn't drop until after it shut off, you may be OK. I had a valve drop in a 460 Ford racing engine in a late model at 7,000 rpm. It punched 7 perfect holes in the head like it was play dough.

 

The "installed valve spring height" wasnt checked at assembly. After being squished too much a billion times, the spring broke. Pull the head (or both) for a looksee. ws

 

yikes, that's ugly, sucks man. sorry.

 

Well the block needed a 0.040" bore, but was otherwise good. New internals arrived Friday from TA Petformance. Hoping to get everything back together for some spring driving.

 

How did the heads look, did they take a beating?

 

The #8 intake valve seat and guide will need some work. The machine shop has them cleaned up, but hasn't started the cylinder head work yet.

 

I was thinking the same thing, it broke cleanly into 4 pieces... springs are made from a solid pieces of wire that is heated and rolled, right? At least that's how it was shown on the "How it's made" show lol

 

A tip having nothing to do with the OP. In post #12 I see bags of "top soil" in your truck. I have used that stuff and found that it is terrible for anything that involves growing grass or plants.

 

I bought a bunch of it to use as sand bags during one of the last hurricane threats. Works well for that!

Sorry... back to the original post topic

 

50# bags of play sand were $8 and up at Lowes. Had to save money for Buick parts and went with $3 bags of top soil. I'm in Michigan and my 2WD truck needs all the help it can get when the snow flies!

 

Fortunately, we don't have that problem in Florida. I applied the same principle though. I think they were even on sale for $2 each. Plus I didn't have to wait in a 3-hour line to fill bags.

 

I also had a broken spring on the #7 cylinder. This one broke near the head. Apparently 50 years is too long for a set of springs.