Snapped Camshaft
Posted: 25 Nov 2016 09:59
Hey guys, first off for everyone that celebrated I hope you had a Happy Thanksgiving.
So as you may have seen in a previous post, the L20 that I got with my project 510 ended up being junk so I had to get a new engine. After a little searching I bought an L20 with an A87 head for a great price from a guy that works on Datsuns and he said that the guy he got it from said it ran but if there was an issue to let him know and he will give me money back. So I pulled the valve cover yesterday and at first glance everything looked clean until I noticed the cam shaft had snapped in two and one of the cam towers had rotated. I'm not sure what caused this, maybe the engine overheated and warped the head which bound the camshaft? Lack of oil which caused a cam bearing to seize?
So my question is what kind of damage could this cause? Obviously I could try and return the engine to the seller, and I will do that if it's the best course of action, but it's a bit of a hassle to load it up and drive an hour and half away and then I am back to looking for an engine. The W58 head I had off my old engine looks good so I'm wondering if it's a bad idea to pull the head from the new engine and if the lower end checks out to just do a head swap?
From my understanding the A87 head is better than the W58 so Do you think that head is potentially salvageable and it's worth getting a new cam and have the head refreshed?
Any input would be greatly appreciated. I just want to get this car running and I keep running in to an issue around every corner.
Thanks.
Chris
In the first two photos below you can see the break in the cam and in the other three photos you can see how the cam tower is rotated in relationship to the head.
So as you may have seen in a previous post, the L20 that I got with my project 510 ended up being junk so I had to get a new engine. After a little searching I bought an L20 with an A87 head for a great price from a guy that works on Datsuns and he said that the guy he got it from said it ran but if there was an issue to let him know and he will give me money back. So I pulled the valve cover yesterday and at first glance everything looked clean until I noticed the cam shaft had snapped in two and one of the cam towers had rotated. I'm not sure what caused this, maybe the engine overheated and warped the head which bound the camshaft? Lack of oil which caused a cam bearing to seize?
So my question is what kind of damage could this cause? Obviously I could try and return the engine to the seller, and I will do that if it's the best course of action, but it's a bit of a hassle to load it up and drive an hour and half away and then I am back to looking for an engine. The W58 head I had off my old engine looks good so I'm wondering if it's a bad idea to pull the head from the new engine and if the lower end checks out to just do a head swap?
From my understanding the A87 head is better than the W58 so Do you think that head is potentially salvageable and it's worth getting a new cam and have the head refreshed?
Any input would be greatly appreciated. I just want to get this car running and I keep running in to an issue around every corner.
Thanks.
Chris
In the first two photos below you can see the break in the cam and in the other three photos you can see how the cam tower is rotated in relationship to the head.