Found this metal on my oil plug. What is this?

[sk47]

Hello; I can see how the cam bearing cap & bolts coming off and then bouncing around among the camshafts and springs could damage the clips. I would look at the bolts to see if one or the other broke. If the bolts are broken a guess might be they are a faulty part. I expect them to be banged up some after bouncing around but if they are whole probably means they backed out.

Seen scoring on some cam lobes. To me it means a tear down to the short block at least. A careful inspection of all components. A thorough clean out of all oil passages (that likely will be a cross your fingers and hope sort of cleaning) Likely would replace the crank and other rotating parts or at least get the crank machined.
Might be time for a different long block???

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[Andy13186]

The cam cap is in pieces which is pretty crazy imo.

Getting new gt500 head gaskets, ARP head studs, ARP cam cap bolts, MMR billet cam caps, OEM cams, new Ford performance high performance lifters, OEM gen 3 followers(*EDIT may get predator followers) along with cylinder head work for the billet cam caps, billet OPGS, billet Crank sprocket, new timing chains. New timing chain tensioners. And probably a lot more... hopefully this is fine.

 

[Bullittproof]

Is this all out-of-pocket ?!??

 

[Andy13186]

Is this all out-of-pocket ?!??

yes going to be like 8k+ in total I think

 

[Bullittproof]

I assume you exhausted any possible consideration by ford…but, wow, sorry to hear that.

 

[Paul McWhiskey]

Serious question here @Andy13186, do you still feel that 8K runs are not the cause of this failure? I understand that the engine is FI, but I want to understand what else has been done that makes it good to 8,000 RPM? I am serious and not trying to be an ass.

 

[Andy13186]

Serious question here @Andy13186, do you still feel that 8K runs are not the cause of this failure? I understand that the engine is FI, but I want to understand what else has been done that makes it good to 8,000 RPM? I am serious and not trying to be an ass.

I think 8k is fine, but ive hit like 8495 atleast like 40 times unintentionally in rolling burnouts etc. Going to get my tuner to put a softer and lower rev limiter at like 8200. Ive also done a few thousand 60-130 pulls and have hit 194 mph in this car.

 

[Paul McWhiskey]

I think 8k is fine, but ive hit like 8495 atleast like 40 times unintentionally in rolling burnouts etc. Going to get my tuner to put a softer and lower rev limiter at like 8200.

Man, that just seems to be too high to me. But, hey, it's your build. I am a bit more conservative with these kind of things. Best of luck to you!

 

[PoCoBob]

Are all the missing clips from this head? If so you might be able to conclude the cap broke first and vibrated the clips until they broke. If they're missing from both heads it really doesn't explain what happened.

 

[Andy13186]

Are all the missing clips from this head? If so you might be able to conclude the cap broke first and vibrated the clips until they broke. If they're missing from both heads it really doesn't explain what happened.

Thats a good idea, I will ask. At least 8 were missing according to this shop not yet sure if it was only on this one side (edit* shop said 5 missing driver side, 3 passenger). The cam was bent though somehow and not held down at that end.


Compression test came back good so the lower end is fine thankfully, as far as we can tell. I think a clip got caught up on some of the cam lobes that look terrible.

 

[sk47]

Thats a good idea, I will ask. At least 10 clips were missing according to this shop not yet sure if it was only on this one side. The cam was bent though somehow and not held down at that end.


Compression test came back good so the lower end is fine thankfully, as far as we can tell. I think a clip got caught up on some of the cam lobes that look terrible.

Hello; Cam being bent at the end with the missing clip makes sense. The other four caps held it down and kept it in place, but that end would flex when working against the spring pressure.

Here is a thought. A lot of metal was bouncing around on top of the one head on top of the valve train. A lot of it in chunks. However the scoring on the cam lobes would seem to indicate small particle metal bits shaved off into the oil. In addition all the breaks may not have been clean nor in big chunks. Seems possible the entire engine had bits of metal circulating in the oil. For peace of mind and before spending 7 to 8 $K on a partial rebuild, i would likely take it down to the bare block. Might get lucky and be able to salvage the crank, rods and pistons.
At any rate the heads will come off. If you do not go bare block have a good close look at the cylinder walls.
Good luck

 

[Andy13186]

Shop said that both sides were missing clips. Maybe a clip getting caught in a cam lobe caused the cam lobe scoring and broke the cam cap on that side? idk

 

[deanm11]

Well I'm really sorry for your experience but this may help others, especially on those 'assembly'clips. I removed them on my just completed Comp Cams install.

 

[Coosawjack]

Can you set a REV LIMITER in your blower tune to 7500 so the high RPM harmonics don't do it again??

Seems like a pretty simple solution if indeed the 8K+ Revs are causing it??

Good Luck whatever you do!!

 

[Andy13186]

My cam cap bolts are what failed then let the cam cap bounce around according to the shop after they thought about it more.


"Both of the bolts for that cam cap are broken off in your head. (so that'll be extra labor to safely remove those...)

So the cam cap didn't fail, the bolts snapped which let the cap loose and it bounced around in the cylinder head until it finally landed in the corner where I found it. You can see some serious gouging on the cap itself from where it was being ground down with the camshaft.

OEM cam cap bolts ARE NOT reusable. They are torque to yield bolts which means that once they're torqued, they cannot be retorqued and must be tossed in the trash and new bolts installed. I'd be willing to bet they were reused multiple times on one of the multiple jobs that required the removal of your stock cams. They finally failed and let that cap bounce around."

I had a ton of warranty work done when the car was stock, almost lemon lawed it. Apparently ford tech may have reused the cam cap bolts which are what failed. Sucks if true.

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