Thread: Certainly not what I expected.

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My curiosity got the best of me this weekend and I decided to pull the drivers side head on my T to see why it has zero compression on number 7. With all the compression immediately going into the pan I felt there had to be a sizable hole in the piston.

When I got the head off I set it down and looked at that cylinder's combustion chamber to see if there was anything there. Everything looked fine, a bit of carbon throughout every chamber, but I knew the car was running way rich due to a lack of pressure regulator. Then I looked into number 7 everything looked pretty normal, a lot of carbon but no hole! I took some WD40 and a rag and cleaned up the top of the piston and the cylinder walls, still no evidence of a crack or anything.

So, I have two theories:

1) There is still a crack in the piston land or somewhere that I can't see until I get that piston out, or.....

2) All that gas going into the engine washed that cylinder in particular because it sits lower than the rest, and the rings have lost their seal.

All the other cylinder walls on that bank look ok except number 3 has some scuffing on the one side, vertically going up and down the wall. I put this engine together on a budget because that was when I was trying for the $3K limit on this build. I cleaned up the old pistons, reringed them and had my machine shop hone the walls. It ran good for 2 years, so I guess I got my moneys worth.

Obviously, I have to pull the pan and get that cylinder out to see what I can see. I plan on running a cylinder hone down the bore to break any glaze that might be there, replace the piston and rings, and put it back together.

Do any of you who know engines see anything I am missing or have any opinions?

Don