Posted by MadMav71 (63.124.245.234) on May 13, 2001 at 22:04:14:
I've been chasing down a miss in my car since the day I bought it. I had tried everything external (fuel system, electronics, etc.) with no luck. I replaced the valve-stem seals. Stopped smoking, but still missing. It's been a couple of months since I've even touched it.
So I finally broke down and took the head off today, hoping maybe I had a bad head gasket. It didn't look like anything was awry with the head gasket, but I also checked my valves to make sure they were seating. Sure enough, all that oil going through the bad valve-stem seals had caused really bad deposits, especially behind the exhaust valves. I cleaned out as much as I could and did a "back yard" valve job (a drill and a tube of grinding compound go a long way). So I thought I had found my miss, since there was no way the exhaust valve on the #1 cylinder was seating. Got it all put back together, fired it up... still missing. Let it run for a while... overheated.
On the plus side, the cylinder walls still have cross-hatch and NO RIDGE, even after 113k on the clock.
What should I try next? Timing chain set??? Stick of dynamite?