Restoring Rusty

[Gregski]

well after a quick trip out of town for some replacement Vortec heads turned out fruitless, I started on the OG Heads Autopsy, I should have know just from this text from the seller, after I asked him for some pictures and a part number since the ad had neither of those things, he wrote and I quote:

"If I'm going to worry about sending pictures and finding cast number I'm going to want more than $50 for the set"

he followed that up with a pic from 50 feet away of the heads with valve covers on them, LOL

Gotta Love Craigslist [/sarcasm]

alright so the Oirignal heads go on the work bench and the disassembly comences, getting these valves out was a bear as the retainers were gunked up in there for good, but The Greg persevered

[Gregski]

cleaned up the #1 chamber for a closer looksie - for 42 years of age, these looked spectacular

[Gregski]

I was blown away when I cleaned up the OG exhaust valve, it was in more better shape than his Vortec grandson, it could use a 30* Back Cut to remove the inner lip on the back of the valve wouldn't you say?

[Gregski]

I is learnin that the intake valves always look a better than the exhaust, and this OG intake is no exception, nice metal

[enaberif]

Sir ... It looks like that one valve maybe bent.. Might want to either replace or check those lol.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by enaberif

Sir ... It looks like that one valve maybe bent.. Might want to either replace or check those lol.

these are from the old cylinder heads that will live on a garage shelf - we be cleaning them just for fun

[Gregski]

and here's how the magic happens, a quick tour of a state of the art valve cleaning facility

make sure you are using a high pressure fuel line and not some cheap vacuum hose, no just kidding it don't matter

[Gregski]

alright you suffered enuff, so let me leave you with this Old Timmers Engine Tunning Trick from back in the day

lets say you got an engine that is running just right temp wise, or maybe a bit too cool, and you want her to run hotter, maybe even overheat, here's what works like a charm

pop one of them cylinder heads off real quick like and gently and carefully insert a small rock or pepple inside any of the water jackets / openings, I prefer somewhere closer to the back of the engine say between the #5 and #7 cylinders

took a pic of that peice next to a spark plug so you can see how big it needs to be

after a quick hug with a magnet turns out it was actually metal

[68post]

Unidentified Floating Object ???????

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by 68post

Unidentified Floating Object ???????

lol wonder what option code that was

[enaberif]

lol that would be a breakdown of metal from various engine parts getting stuck and clogging passages.

that much foreign material is pretty scary.

[68post]

0u812

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by 68post

0u812

lol, 5150

[Gregski]

went out in search of another Vortec cylinder head today

second pic (what can I say it's not my first Rodeo)

[Gregski]

spotted a beautiful 1999 Chevrolet Suburban down in the meadow by the creek. Judging from her antlers she couldn't have more than 247,472 miles on it, ha ha , so what's another 50,000 right? (Sometimes I thank the GM gods for Chevys being behind the times still using analog odometers, just imagine if it was digital we could not tell the mileage.)

someone already did some of the heavy lifting for me, since they took the passenger side head

pulling this head off made me remember my '97 Tahoe and how I dreaded working under the hood, just look at that mess

[Gregski]

so after confirming the right GM part number 122558062 I locked her in my sights, took a deep breath and pulled the trigger, she was coming home with me today

don't mind the water in the valve train or the cylinder bores we had a storm for a few days and there were things under the hood with rain water in them that I knocked over climbing in and out of the engine bay

[Gregski]

for reference I took pictures of both the intake and exhaust gaskers

FEL-PRO 98000 Intake Manifold Gasket

GM 12550033 Exhaust Manifold Gasket

(they would not allow me to keep the gaskets for free so that I would buy the same ones, no biggie, a picture's worth a thousand words)

[Gregski]

and into the shopping cart she went

Time Spent - 2 hours that included walking the yard, about 8 rows of trucks etc

[Gregski]

the cashier made me pull the rockers off or he would charge me an additional $30 bucks

so here is the bill breakdown

$38.99 - Cast Iron Cylinder Head

$ .16 - Admission Tax

$ 4.99 - Core Charge

$ 3.41 - Environmental Fee

$ 3.79 - Tax

=====================

$51.34 TOTAL

first he quoted me like $65 bucks just for the head before all the BS fees with a ONE YEAR WARRANTY (I tried really hard not to laugh, and simply said No Thank You)

[enaberif]

Those 5 valves are pretttttty white.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by enaberif

Those 5 valves are pretttttty white.

Yeah, seems like she was a mean LEAN machine, no?

[Gregski]

In case any of you may be considering such masochism I took a few notes on what I saw today in the yard that you may find useful:

1994 Chevrolet Suburban - 14102193 non Vortec Cylinder Heads

1995 Chevrolet Tahoe - 14102193 non Vortec Cylinder Heads

1997 Chevrolet Suburban - 10239906 Vortec Cylinder Heads

1999 Chevrolet Tahoe - 12558062 Vortec Cylinder Heads

1999 Chevrolet Suburban - 12558062 Vortec Cylinder Heads

[Gregski]

I don't know about you but there's just something about a nice clean work bench, even if only for a second

[Gregski]

alright the patient is ready, it's time for disassembly

[Gregski]

so we start by removing the #1 Exhaust valve, yes she was running lean, but after the wire wheel treatment we see the same pitted condition as our original Vortec exhaust valves, so at least they are consistent