Advice please chaps - Think it might not be bad!

[gpz900r]

Well as you know last week my car turned into a heap and I decieded that I had burned a valve out from what i had been told over the phone.

Let me explain

Was on a long journey, 2nd hour into it ( mostly fast but some stop start stop in hereford ) engine did get quite hot at one stage but not off the temp clock more about just over 3/4.

Car had been playing up a bit in the sence that the throttle was sticking, not the cable itself but the bit on the carb end would sometimes not quite go down all the way and so engine would sometimes enroute in my journey stick at around 3000 revs.

On the way back the car started to make a ticking noise but only when

A: I put my foot on the gas over about 30mph

B: Noise would go when I took foot off gas

Was on the M5 at this stage with no hardshoulder so couldnt stop.

Carried on for around 2 miles and to be honest I thought it was the rear wheel driver side bearings going so wasnt to fussed anyway.

Then the ticking got really bad all of a sudden and I lost power, not all power but as if one of the spark plug leads had come off the distributor cap,

Pulled over to the hardshoulder with engine still running, car is now shaking like a leaf and running as if its running on three.

THought I might have holed a piston, pulled off on spark plug lead and it didnt seem to make any difference to the running so thought yes its that.

But then a chap at the garage I spoke to on the phone while at the side of the road said he would be very supprise if Id holed a HC piston. Ive taken the spark plug out and there was a tiny bit of swarf but the spark plug was in tact and not smashed as I expected.

Strange thing is, as bad as the car shakes when its running and as rough as it sounds with very little power it does kind of tick over at a steady(ish) 1k revs which make me think that the piston might be ok? guess I dont really know hence this mail.

I will take the oil filter off in the morning to see if there is any swarf visible but wonder if I have

A: smashed a piston ring

B: Holed a piston

C: Some thing to do with the exhaust?

Any ideas would be great, cars just sat waiting for the next avalible space in the garage so me and Nick can get it out and have a real look, could be weeks away tho!

Appriceate your input guys and gals

[Paul C]

Could the cambelt have jumped a tooth?

[Evil_Dr_Fish]

Worst case scenario (I'm all sunshine me! ...but bear with me, there is method to my madness)

Spun a bearing. Check for tinsel in the oil - dipstick, filler cap & filter when you get the chance...

May well still run almost normally and won't necessarily cause huge Spy Hunter plumes of smoke or Baddie deterring Oil Slicks...

Have you since checked the oil level? Do you remember what the Oil Pressure was doing? (tho what it shows NOW doesn't necessarily mean much)

Sump off, examine the bottom end.

Worst case... New Crank, New conrods, new set of bearings and a bottom end rebuild

There you go...

After THAT, whatever you find out it is, you will now be happy it's not this - and not pissed off at whatever it actually is!

(err... unless of course it IS this )

[gpz900r]

Oil presure was fine but after I got the car home I checked the oil presure and it had gone down lots ( dip stick shows around 4mm )

I forgot to say in the top post that I had blue smoke coming from car when I put foot on gas,

[Guest teigan]

not sure why the throttle stuck. did stepping up and down on the pedal loosen it? as for the other symptoms, definitely sounds as if you are not making combustion on one or more cylinders. the smoke is interesting. when i blew a gasket in my merc the smoke was opaque from water vapor being present. what colour was your smoke before? maybe your car just badly wants to be white. like wacko jacko on wheels.

[Splashout]

hard to tell really from what you have said get a compression test done this will tell you if you have any issues with piston or valves.

[Evil_Dr_Fish]

He said there was Blue smoke Teigan = Oil n'est ce pas?

[Guest teigan]

yes could be oil although i've never called that blue myself. doesn't karl's car always make blue smoke? anyway, the prognosis is not good with all those fluids mixing.

[USAndretti42]

It could be piston rings. I had an Elan in my youth and, on full-throttle, it made a ticking sound and pumped smoke out of the breather. When I took off the head, I found that one of the rings had broken and worked its way up into the combustion chamber. The ticking sound was it being bashed against the head by the piston and its loss caused combustion gas to get in the sump and out the breather.

I don't know if 4 mm on the dipstick is good or bad on a turbo but, if the oil level got too low, the bearings could be damaged.

When you got the blue smoke, did it continue the whole time you had your foot on the gas (because you are drawing oil into the combustion chamber all the time) or did it go away (because the oil got in there at low throttle and burnt off when you floored it)?

Alternatively, the high tickover could have been something inside the carb venturi stopping the throttle closing and then finding its way into the engine damaging the spark plug and leaving behind bits of aluminium.

It doesn't sound like a burnt vavle as that should not affect the oil pressure.

I agree the best start is a compression check and drain off some oil to check for silverfish but not so much that you cannot move the car.