Valve Seals & Exhaust Valve Guides 87 Ram 50 Question

1987 Dodge Ram 50 Blowing smoke mostly on startup and after idling.
other than that its running fine.


It seems to be dripping oil into the exhaust part of the head. Which I figured out after replacing exhaust header gasket and after breaking it in and going back to tighten it up found streaks of oil coming out of loosened gasket.


So I plan to replace
The Valve Seals
and replace the 4 Jet valve O-rings while I am at it.


but my question is


1. do the Exhaust Valve guides generally need replaced or wear out or only replace if damaged?
Should I? Waste of Time & Money Normally or probably big improvement?


2. Anything else I should consider replacing at the same time?




Thanks For any help
steve

Hey, Steve - welcome to the forum.

If you go to the bother of replacing valve seals, by all means, replace them all...intake and exhaust. While you're at it, consider replacing the jet valves with an eliminator kit...it might save yourself some trouble down the road. The jet valves proved to be more trouble than they were worth.

Hi and welcome to mightyram. You will find that the vast majority of oil consumption issues all lead back to dead valve stem seals. Unless the shop notices there is wear and float on the valves I wouldn't replace the guides. A 3 way vales seat cut and getting the valves lapped should get them sealing nicely again. Where exactly is the head leaking oil from? If the head is going through a machine shop get them to check the face. I've posted on this several times - if the head is warped it should go though an oven and be pressed straight again. Cams don't bend and milling a head face to true it up will lead to mismatching combustion chamber sizes, and the cam bed will not be true. It can lead to heavy wear on the cam bearing surfaces. If you don't have access to a shop that can press your head straight, you gotta do what you gotta do...

eliminator kit as in "eliminates them?" or is that a brand name?

I ordered 8 each exhaust and intake, I like to prepare for al the mistakes and problems and have extra stuff on hand... so I should be good, I'll round up some more stuff and just go all out... does not look too hard on YouTube vids, so other than covering up everything for when I drop stuff I think I'll do ok...

Sorry for being clueless, I'm comfortable working on machines but have never been a car guy till I got this beast... I have been learning and replacing things since I got it...

no leaks on head itself that I have found, it seems to be dripping from valve cover area directly at where the exhaust header connects... i think the seals are good cheap 1st effort I can do, then if still have problems I can get proffesionals involved... thanks for the tips and knowlede... thanks Steve

Most rocker cover gasket leaks can be cured buy running a small bead of RTV silicon in the gasket groove, pressing the gasket into it to seal the cover gasket side, then running a second bead around the outside edge when the rocker cover is installed. Even a good quality rocker cover gasket seal will leak eventually without RTV silicon. And it's good that you're prepared to wrench on your own truck. You can do most of the mechanical repairs yourself and there is more than enough resource material on the WWW to help guide you if you don't have a hardcopy manual in front of you.

The 'eliminator' kit that Royster mentioned are a bunch of threaded plugs that replace the jet valves (jet valve eliminator kit). They are a weak link in the head that cause a number of running issues when they fail.

I'm reminded that on my 4G64, one of the exhaust guides DID slip down, causing oil burning. When the guide slips down, it pops off the valve seal. I had the guide pushed back into place (rather than replace it, by the mechanic's recommendation) and a groove was cut into the top, so an "o" clip could be installed...to hold it into place.

http://www.mightyram50.net/vbulletin...ll=1#post26192

Better order them jet valve plugs right away I ordered 2 sets on Amazon (Silver seal) and it was a few days short of a month to get them. I am still waiting on a head stud kit I ordered from another place the day before that just keeps giving me the run around.

You can order the jet valve eliminators direct from Silver seal - I got 2 sets in a week when I ordered them.