Got my cylinder head back today. Skimmed for a tenner.

20 thou off gives me just over 10:1 CR apparently which is nice. As an asides, since I had lost a valve collet I asked if he might have a spare - he gave me two

While he was at it, he said "here, have this, it's no use to me - had it sitting here for years"

Another complete cylinder head including cams. So - no worries about spares, although I might be forced to give it some serious attention once the car is up and running again.
So - lots of cleaning to do on all the parts, porting of the head and then it's reassembly time

Oh - a pic would be good here I suppose
Rescued attachment Heads.JPG

Nice amp

When you put the top half of the cam box back on make sure you use a thin film of non setting sealer (but NOT hermatite red) between the head and the top piece that hold the cams down. Otherwise its a piece of cake to re-assemble.



Enjoy.

quote:

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Originally posted by subk2002
Nice amp

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quote:

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Originally posted by jollygreengiant
When you put the top half of the cam box back on make sure you use a thin film of non setting sealer (but NOT hermatite red) between the head and the top piece that hold the cams down. Otherwise its a piece of cake to re-assemble.



Enjoy.

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John, did you have it hardness tested?

Oh good - a curved ball....

No - I didn't. If it is any indicator at all, there was no lip or step where the liners had sat. There was some micro pitting, but that's been taken out with the skim. The old bloke who did it recognised it straight away as a K from the other side of the road - said he does them all the time - reckoned it was really quite good actually. He also reckoned that the K gets a bad press - just don't expect over 100,000 miles without changing the gasket. Guess what mine has just done, mileage wise...

quote:

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Originally posted by zilspeed
Oh good - a curved ball....

No - I didn't. If it is any indicator at all, there was no lip or step where the liners had sat. There was some micro pitting, but that's been taken out with the skim. The old bloke who did it recognised it straight away as a K from the other side of the road - said he does them all the time - reckoned it was really quite good actually. He also reckoned that the K gets a bad press - just don't expect over 100,000 miles without changing the gasket. Guess what mine has just done, mileage wise...

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oh and fit a new thermostat and waterpump to it.

A lot of new generation Alloy heads anneal if they overheat, apparently. If there isn't any indent from the fire ring you may well be OK. I would DEFINATELY fit a remote stat to the K3, John. I paid £100 from QED, but I know Rich and others fitted a BMW one from the breakers for much, much less.

Ferg

Having now become intimate with K series cooling theory, I agree entirely with the remote stat. Plumbed in at the front where the flow and return to the radiator pass by one another.
BTW, my head and my new spare head are both early versions (low port), so I don't know if that influences the mettalurgy in any way.

On the K16 the camshafts run directly in the head material this gives away which aluminium alloy is used LM29 a hyper-eutectic alloy with 25% Silicone and 1 % each of Cu, Mg and Ni --- exactly the same stuff the Hillman Imp engine was made from. It was also the alloy the famous Reynolds linerless Chevy engines were made from in the back of the Group 7 CamAm Maclarens back at the end of the 1960s.

Taking over head gasket problems with fellow Imp nuts a few years back we arrived at the conclusion the real problem is that with light alloys stressed for long periods at warm or hot tempertures is low temperature creep in the head the block and the gasket leading to stress redistribution. Although the head bolts could still be tight the clamping pressure in the ring around the bores would reduce over a long period time.



[Edited on 18/6/05 by britishtrident]