Nice. You've been MIA like me. . .how's your son doing?
Lando - 94 Build
- Thread starter brettk
- Start date
This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate
links, including eBay, Amazon, Skimlinks, and others.
Yeah. I'll be back next weekend. I have a lot of catching up to do.
Welcome back brother.
What a handsome little dude. Miss them being young, not sure if it changes as they get older. More able to express themselves but still a handful. My daughter is 23 going on 1... LOL
brettk
SILVER Star
- Thread starter
- #25
First start was on Friday. We had a bit of a hiccup with the starter, it didn’t want to disengage for whatever reason. I was pretty discouraged, especially at first because that was not the sound you're anticipating as you fire a practically brand new engine. The old starter was recently rebuilt, so I wasn’t sure what it was. So I ordered a cheapo from Napa just to narrow down the issue.
Got the starter in today from Napa and it had the same issues for half a second, and it went away fairly quickly. Twas a huge relief. I might try throwing the other one back on just to see if it was a fluke chance after a while. It’s unreal how quiet and smooth this thing is now. I’ve got a few idle adjustments to make, but I took a quick break just to update you guys that the first engine rebuild is in the books!
I can’t emphasize how incredible and helpful this community is. 4 years ago, I knew nothing more than how to change the oil. I was just a poor guy trying to keep a 30 year old vehicle on the road. That’s turned into a mild obsession now thanks to you goobers.
I’ll keep updating y'all as we make big changes, but for now, we’re just going to focus on putting miles back on it.
Got the starter in today from Napa and it had the same issues for half a second, and it went away fairly quickly. Twas a huge relief. I might try throwing the other one back on just to see if it was a fluke chance after a while. It’s unreal how quiet and smooth this thing is now. I’ve got a few idle adjustments to make, but I took a quick break just to update you guys that the first engine rebuild is in the books!
I can’t emphasize how incredible and helpful this community is. 4 years ago, I knew nothing more than how to change the oil. I was just a poor guy trying to keep a 30 year old vehicle on the road. That’s turned into a mild obsession now thanks to you goobers.
I’ll keep updating y'all as we make big changes, but for now, we’re just going to focus on putting miles back on it.
Box Rocket
SILVER Star
Rock on! Nice work on the rebuild by the looks of it. Truck is looking fantastic.
mudgudgeon
Resident galah
brettk
SILVER Star
- Thread starter
- #28
Alright, I'm stumped, and need y'alls help. I've got about 800 miles on the engine so far, and for the past few weeks I've been burning oil, lots of oil. About a quart every 250 miles. Fearing the worst, I did a compression test and leak down test. Compression was 170 across all 6 cylinders, and leak down was 16% leakage across all 6 cylinders. I had some noise coming through the valve cover, but I was told this was normal because rings won't seal 100%.
After doing some investigating, I found out all the oil is being sucked up through the PCV and into the intake, because there was a pool of oil in it. I found a thread about the baffles in the valve cover being clogged. So I took it out and airflow wasn't all that great. I took an air hose and blew on one end and got a bunch of gunk out. Excuse the leaves, that was from the shop floor.
It still seemed a little plugged, so I figured this crap was in-between those screens in the baffle. I didn't want to drill those rivets on the baffle out, so I plugged the pcv and breather holes on the outside of the VC and poured Super Clean (standard degreaser) down the both openings of the baffles and let it sit over night. Then, I flushed it out with a parts washer, and about twice what I had in my hand came out. It was beyond gross. I did a couple of more rounds of degreaser until flow was good, and the degreaser was more purple instead of black.
I drove it 60 miles to go bowling (I was reminded that I hated bowling, especially having to drive almost an hour to the nearest lanes), and to my surprise that fixed it! No oil was consumed whatsoever, easy fix...but then oil consumption came back later that week. Still about a quart every 250 miles. I've put vacuum to the valve cover and it still flows great, and the pcv valve still has a jingle, so I don't think that's my problem. I did put a set of Saikou Michi catch cans on (they were wonderful to work with), I made some brackets that I'll paint later, its just lower on the priority list at the moment. The cans have a ball valve in the bottom to drain the oil. So at least now its not being burnt, and I can just catch the oil out of the cans and dump in back in the valve cover, but I don't want to have to do this every time I drive somewhere. I did put some clamps on the pcv hoses since this picture was taken.
I've been told a couple of things it could be. Valve guides/valve seals, rings didn't fully seat, break in process isn't over yet, etc....but I figured all of those things would've been telling in the leak down/compression test...right? I'm stumped, and honestly just tired of popping the hood. I'm kicking myself that I didn't do a compression/leakdown on the old engine, and its something simple that I could've fixed without having to pull this one. I keep telling myself it'll be worth it once I figure it out, and I'm kind of proud of myself for doing all of on my own with help from Mud/Youtube/Manuals....but also that I was and still in way over my head and should've probably left it to someone with more experience. Y'all have any thoughts?
After doing some investigating, I found out all the oil is being sucked up through the PCV and into the intake, because there was a pool of oil in it. I found a thread about the baffles in the valve cover being clogged. So I took it out and airflow wasn't all that great. I took an air hose and blew on one end and got a bunch of gunk out. Excuse the leaves, that was from the shop floor.
It still seemed a little plugged, so I figured this crap was in-between those screens in the baffle. I didn't want to drill those rivets on the baffle out, so I plugged the pcv and breather holes on the outside of the VC and poured Super Clean (standard degreaser) down the both openings of the baffles and let it sit over night. Then, I flushed it out with a parts washer, and about twice what I had in my hand came out. It was beyond gross. I did a couple of more rounds of degreaser until flow was good, and the degreaser was more purple instead of black.
I drove it 60 miles to go bowling (I was reminded that I hated bowling, especially having to drive almost an hour to the nearest lanes), and to my surprise that fixed it! No oil was consumed whatsoever, easy fix...but then oil consumption came back later that week. Still about a quart every 250 miles. I've put vacuum to the valve cover and it still flows great, and the pcv valve still has a jingle, so I don't think that's my problem. I did put a set of Saikou Michi catch cans on (they were wonderful to work with), I made some brackets that I'll paint later, its just lower on the priority list at the moment. The cans have a ball valve in the bottom to drain the oil. So at least now its not being burnt, and I can just catch the oil out of the cans and dump in back in the valve cover, but I don't want to have to do this every time I drive somewhere. I did put some clamps on the pcv hoses since this picture was taken.
I've been told a couple of things it could be. Valve guides/valve seals, rings didn't fully seat, break in process isn't over yet, etc....but I figured all of those things would've been telling in the leak down/compression test...right? I'm stumped, and honestly just tired of popping the hood. I'm kicking myself that I didn't do a compression/leakdown on the old engine, and its something simple that I could've fixed without having to pull this one. I keep telling myself it'll be worth it once I figure it out, and I'm kind of proud of myself for doing all of on my own with help from Mud/Youtube/Manuals....but also that I was and still in way over my head and should've probably left it to someone with more experience. Y'all have any thoughts?
Wish I knew how to helps troubleshoot. Hopefully someone smarter will chime in.
thatcabledude
GOLD Star
Hmmm, with that level of consumption it should be blowing blue smoke pretty bad. Is it?
mudgudgeon
Resident galah
How have you broken it in?
800 miles is barely, and not really, run in.
Do you drive it like you're driving miss daisy?
Or do you give it a hot supper?
It's had its initial run in. Everything is ticking over and running smooth, no catastrophic failures.
I'd say change the oil, change the filter
Then go find a hill (does Nebraska have hills? Or do you have to cross state lines
) do some hot laps. Drive it like you stole it for a couple of hours, get it good and hot.Or load up a trailer, and tow the trailer around for a couple of hours.
Don't abuse it, but also, don't wrap it cotton wool.
brettk
SILVER Star
- Thread starter
- #33
So on initial start up, I pulled the EFI fuse and cranked it over for 20ish seconds to prime it with oil. made sure there wasn’t any leaks, set the timing, drove it around the shop, made sure there any leaks again, then ran it at 2k RPMs for about 20 minutes to break in the camshafts. Checked fluid levels, and drove it home.How have you broken it in?
800 miles is barely, and not really, run in.
Do you drive it like you're driving miss daisy?
Or do you give it a hot supper?
It's had its initial run in. Everything is ticking over and running smooth, no catastrophic failures.
I'd say change the oil, change the filter
Then go find a hill (does Nebraska have hills? Or do you have to cross state lines
Or load up a trailer, and tow the trailer around for a couple of hours.
Don't abuse it, but also, don't wrap it cotton wool.
I’ve drove it like I normally would, I’ve got gotten it above 2k RPMs once or twice. I was told to take it easy at first? I changed the oil at 500 miles, and planned do change it again at 1000 and again at 2000. Nebraska is flat as a piece of paper, but I’ll run it harder later this week and see what that does. Thanks Dave!
RiverCityDave
SILVER Star
This will sound silly, but I like to start simple and go hard, and I've seen this before. It sounds like you have a vacuum source pulling oil through your valve cover. When I saw it before, it was a PCV valve without a check system, so the valve cover was exposed to constant vacuum, thus sucking oil up through the PCV and dumping it into the intake, where it was pushed into the cylinders along with the fuel-air mixture. If you think about it, this sounds exactly like what's happening to your truck.
Oil accumulating in the baffles (implies something is either drawing or forcing oil into them), noise in the valve cover (constant vacuum), burning oil (dumping oil into the intake), all with good compression and leakdown numbers (no blowby or valve stem seal issues).
You've (basically) ruled out leak down, ring blowby, valve stem leakage, etc, and given the accumulation of oil in the baffles, the evidence says that wasn't the issue anyway. Plug the PCV system on both ends (at the vacuum source and at the valve cover), and drive it for a bit. It's basically impossible to install the 1FZ PCV system backward, so I'd ask, did you use OEM? You mention the "ball rattling," so you've obviously looked at it as the culprit once, but I'd take a deep dive. To me it's almost a smoking gun.
Oil accumulating in the baffles (implies something is either drawing or forcing oil into them), noise in the valve cover (constant vacuum), burning oil (dumping oil into the intake), all with good compression and leakdown numbers (no blowby or valve stem seal issues).
You've (basically) ruled out leak down, ring blowby, valve stem leakage, etc, and given the accumulation of oil in the baffles, the evidence says that wasn't the issue anyway. Plug the PCV system on both ends (at the vacuum source and at the valve cover), and drive it for a bit. It's basically impossible to install the 1FZ PCV system backward, so I'd ask, did you use OEM? You mention the "ball rattling," so you've obviously looked at it as the culprit once, but I'd take a deep dive. To me it's almost a smoking gun.
brettk
SILVER Star
- Thread starter
- #35
Yep! Everything is OEM, I bought grey market Aisin/Denso parts where I could on RockAuto, but everything is straight from Toyota. I even returned the Napa starter back from post #25. I did reuse the PCV valve, but I just had replaced it a year ago, and it still worked as designed.
I have zero idea what the problem is, but my head has circled back around to this idea several times, call it hopeful optimism haha. This isn’t my valve cover, but a picture I robbed from someone else on here that drilled out their rivets.
The PCV side is on the left with 4 baffles, and the breather side is on the right with only 3 baffles. I’m almost convinced that I may have a partial blockage that’s causing this problem. I have what I think is good airflow on the pcv side, but it’s still not as good as the breather side. I figured it was because there was more baffles, but maybe there is more blockage?
I’ve thought about pulling the trigger on a new valve cover just to rule that out.
RiverCityDave
SILVER Star
A new valve cover is going to cost you a mint. Obviously a properly functioning PCV system is a necessity, (crankcase pressure has to have somewhere to go) but it shouldn't be filling the valve cover with oil, and pushing it into your intake. I have two valve covers, one came off an engine that overheated and coked the oil. I was still able to clean it thoroughly with a combination of gunk gel degreaser and regular purple stuff without removing the rivets.
Do you have a compressor? You can confirm function of the PCV valve that way.
How would you describe the noise you said you were hearing from the valve cover?
brettk
SILVER Star
- Thread starter
- #37
Yeah, i was going to shoot for Amayama, with shipping it’s still half the price of the dealer locally.
I do have a compressor. The noise I was referring to was just the function of the pcv valve by shaking it, not in the valve cover itself.
On your extra valve cover, If you blow in each hole on top of the valve cover, does the breather side seem to flow better than the pcv side? Maybe there was a chunk of gunk that got worked loose from the degreaser, and partially replugged one of those baffles in my VC?
RiverCityDave
SILVER Star
I'll run that experiment in a few minutes.
COYS
SILVER Star
FWIW, I had zero issues during break in of my 1FZ-FE that you're already familiar with, Brett.
I drove it gently first 5K miles even with a bunch of oil changes from 0 miles. No odd noises. Nothing drama go. Hasn't consumed a drop of oil 24K miles old now. You should expect the same.
Good luck, brotha! Glad I ran across your thread to keep an eye on progress. This too shall pass.
I drove it gently first 5K miles even with a bunch of oil changes from 0 miles. No odd noises. Nothing drama go. Hasn't consumed a drop of oil 24K miles old now. You should expect the same.
Good luck, brotha! Glad I ran across your thread to keep an eye on progress. This too shall pass.
Last edited:
