Do I need a "valve job"

[AuroraGirl]

My cousin, who knows a fair bit mechanically but hes quite... good.. at thinking he knows EVERYTHING so its hard to determine, unless i already know, if he is talking out his ass, and his friend took a ride with me in my truck to the back of the property and when we got back were looking under the hood(they wanted to see) and made the comments that I need to do something about getting a valve job. I said why. They said burning oil smell.

This truck for about 10 years kinda puked a good amount of oil off the, well, any surface that oil can come out. Valve covers down. And I just fixed the valve cover gaskets this summer and retightened the one side which got loose(has since held tight?) and the engine of course is just covered in a thick veil of sludge of years of dirt, grease, oil, leaking fluid, power steering, water, you name it. As example, this is post-carburetor/valve cover, but pre retighten of valve covers (cleaned A LOT of the engine especially on top, around valve covers)

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I did mention this to them, and they stuck to their guns insisting this engine is gonna grenade itself soon if I dont address it. I also pointed out to them that for 10 years gasoline was about 20% of the oil because of the shear amount of richness the carb it had before ran it. So the valve train is very clean... I never took a photo but that was spotless. Since october its had the same oil, which is dirty, yes, but not diluted with fuel anymore. I was gonna put in a nice quality oil here soon since it was probably the first oil change without excessive fuel dilution in a long time. Im also gonna do a tune up. I use a wix filter, if that means anything.

despite knowing i cleaned the top of the engine and fixed the leak, they say it has to be valve related because the amount of smoking on engine didnt correlate to the amount of smell. which i also told them that every bit of oil under the valve covers, so heads, exhaust, pan, etc. is all untouched and just as full of grime as before, and a lot of it happens to be near hot-things. They still insisted.

Do I have anything to worry about? Should I do or check anything?
Oil is still got some amber to it, not much.
Oil pressure is middle of gauge at warm running 20-30 psi at idle, iirc. I forget where the middle of gauge is. 0 to 50 psi gauge I believe?

 

[Arkansas_V8]

I say they are both IDIOTS.

Are they used car salesmen?

 

[AuroraGirl]

I say they are both IDIOTS.

Are they used car salesmen?

No but this is rural northern wisconsin and they both lack most of their teeth. I was just curious and making sure. THey said the only indicator was burning oil smell, which is not an indicator of anything other than burning oil, which if its not coming out the exhaust its likely the sludge on the motor that only recently stopped being replenished.

 

[Arkansas_V8]

No but this is rural northern wisconsin and they both lack most of their teeth. I was just curious and making sure. THey said the only indicator was burning oil smell, which is not an indicator of anything other than burning oil, which if its not coming out the exhaust its likely the sludge on the motor that only recently stopped being replenished.

That a crack at toothless Arkansans? Lol

 

[Vbb199]

That a crack at toothless Arkansans? Lol

Speak ol toothless one LOL

 

[Arkansas_V8]

Speak ol toothless one LOL

Ass. Lol

@AuroraGirl tell them the Southerners revoke the honorary Redneck/Hillbilly titles.

 

[MrMarty51]

Does the engine idle smooth ?
Get a compression tester, warm the engine to operating temp, remove the spark plugs, disable ignition system so it dont make sparks, throttle wide open, screw comp test hose into the no. 1 spark plug hole and spin over the engine until needle quits climbing on the compression tester gauge. Write down that number, go to no.2 and repeat until all cylinders have been tested.
They say any cylinder that is off by 10% is a low cylinder on compression.
Low on comp. cylinder. Give those cylinders, one at a time, a few shots of oil through the sparking plug hole and repeat the compression test on those cylinders. If the numbers comes up then it is the rings, if numbers stays about the same, valves.
if the engine idles smooth and no wooshing noise out the exhaust, I would not be concerned about it.
if the engine smokes on the initial startup of the morning, then suspect valve guide seals, which can be replaced without removal of the heads, aaaand, if the compression test comes back ok, do not let them characters near Your vehicle again. I`d be leary of letting them near My vehicle if the comp numbers comes up bad too. Just because. LOL

 

[MrMarty51]

One more thing, bad valves will usually not cause a oily or bad smell to come off the engine.
Another thing to check is the PCV valve. Remove it from the valve cover, it should be heard to rattle, if no rattle, replace.

 

[SquareRoot]

Can you please elaborate?

 

[AuroraGirl]

It runs perfect and I can only imagine it will even better with new plugs and wires and cap and rotor. It doesnt have leak down that is noticeable, even a week after. Now my old 2001 olds aurora? That thing would be blue smoke after 2 hours. It burned a quart every 400 miles. I put aabout 10 gallons of kerosene in the crankcase and when it drained out it blew white smoke for 5 minutes solid when i put oil in and started. PCV is new

 

[legopnuematic]

If the engine runs smooth and such, I'd say its most likely that the old o-ring valve stem seals have hardened and cracked and are not doing much anymore for keeping oil from seeping down the stems. Which is something that small blocks are very well known to do.

 

[AuroraGirl]

But even then.. its not really burning any noticeable oil and the smell is so minimal and its usually only accompanied by a tiny bit of smoldering on the manifolds or near em.

 

[Rusty Nail]

One guy with an opinion could get punched in the mouth and the other has nothing to fear over the internet...

Just sayin.

Maybe safety in numbers?

Could go either way but we are Professionals, i like to remind people.