[s-cars] My pistons met my valves at the dealers

[Charlie Smith]

Earlier, Richard Molk wrote:
>
> With the head off, there are two obviously demolished valves, bent open
> and curved to touch the dome inside the head. There are scratches on
> the piston at the point of impact. While no other head damage is
> obvious, it has not been disassembled and may certainly be toast.

You need to remove the pistons, and check for top ring tightness
in the ring groove.  Hits on the top of the piston will bend the piston
to tighten up on the rings.  Then, have the pistons checked for cracks
with some sort of dye check process.  This type impact can also cause
cracks in the piston.  Really hard impacts can also cause bent connecting
rods.

When the valves bent like that, it probably screwed up the valve guides.
Imagine what a bent valve stem does to the guide when it slides around.
Also check the tappet buckets in the head.  This can cause them to be
cocked sideways chewing up the head where the bucket slides.

FWIW, there is no way I would let that shop do the repairs.  If you are
figuring on keeping the car for another 100K miles, you need to check
this stuff.

    - Charlie