Recently as in, in the last year, the top end on my 3vze was taken to a machine shop and surfaced by the PO's. Not to say they did a s***ty job but I have had to redo every single other fix theyve done since buying this 4runner in april/may. It was pretty clear when buying it but mostly a miracle that it made it the hour+ back home on the freeway. They also LOVED rtv, this grey s*** is everywhere. Especially places it has no business being, wiring harnesses, inside vacuum lines, inside the coolant, inside the oil passages. This all kinda leads me to believe they could not have done the cylinder heads correctly right? Its also dumping oil from passenger rear cylinder head gasket just like it never had a surfacing in the first place.
New loud knocking coming from the drivers side rear end of the engine made me finally run a compression test and decide to see what is really going on in there. Ill post the specific values below but for starters, I got low compression from two cylinders, 1 and 6. They both came out to 165 and 160. This isnt too concerning given they still have pretty decent compression for an engine with unknown history and 230k on the odo all other cylinders were 170 and up. Cylinder one had nasty oil fouling on the spark plug; 6 was fine. No coolant seepage in either.
On to the valve clearances; only one cylinder was alarmingly out of spec which leads me to think it is causing my clattering noise. No scoring or anything else otherwise upsetting in the upper valvetrain, just the one interesting cylinder and all numbers generally all over the place.
All in inches,
5- Intake: .011 Exhaust: .012 6- Intake: .009 Exhaust: .011
3- Intake: .011 Exhaust: .011 4- Intake: .006 Exhaust: .014
1- Intake: .008 Exhaust: .009 2- Intake: .008 Exhaust: .011
Is it safe to assume a valve adjustment would fix either issue Im having? Is the lower compression in any way aided by a valve adjustment or am I going to pull my hair out doing this for nothing? Would tearing down the cylinder heads to the block be worthwhile to make sure that my issue isn't with cylinder head gaskets? It seems like something I may have to end up redoing anyways so I am leaning towards a might as well on the cylinder head gasket. If I go that route I'll also do the front and back camshaft seals/plugs because unknown quality and oil sealing capbilities.
Is all of this futile because to hell with the 3vze or should I just let it die for now and start saving up for the 5vze swap? Maybe in the future it is, but for now what do I gotta do to make this engine live.
New loud knocking coming from the drivers side rear end of the engine made me finally run a compression test and decide to see what is really going on in there. Ill post the specific values below but for starters, I got low compression from two cylinders, 1 and 6. They both came out to 165 and 160. This isnt too concerning given they still have pretty decent compression for an engine with unknown history and 230k on the odo all other cylinders were 170 and up. Cylinder one had nasty oil fouling on the spark plug; 6 was fine. No coolant seepage in either.
On to the valve clearances; only one cylinder was alarmingly out of spec which leads me to think it is causing my clattering noise. No scoring or anything else otherwise upsetting in the upper valvetrain, just the one interesting cylinder and all numbers generally all over the place.
All in inches,
5- Intake: .011 Exhaust: .012 6- Intake: .009 Exhaust: .011
3- Intake: .011 Exhaust: .011 4- Intake: .006 Exhaust: .014
1- Intake: .008 Exhaust: .009 2- Intake: .008 Exhaust: .011
Is it safe to assume a valve adjustment would fix either issue Im having? Is the lower compression in any way aided by a valve adjustment or am I going to pull my hair out doing this for nothing? Would tearing down the cylinder heads to the block be worthwhile to make sure that my issue isn't with cylinder head gaskets? It seems like something I may have to end up redoing anyways so I am leaning towards a might as well on the cylinder head gasket. If I go that route I'll also do the front and back camshaft seals/plugs because unknown quality and oil sealing capbilities.
Is all of this futile because to hell with the 3vze or should I just let it die for now and start saving up for the 5vze swap? Maybe in the future it is, but for now what do I gotta do to make this engine live.