Found this in the oil pan when replacing pan gasket!

My son is swapping engine/trans from one 1987 Dodge Power Ram50 to another same year/make/model. Oil pan gasket was leaking, so he dropped the pan to replace it, and found this mystery part in the bottom of the pan. We have no idea where it came from and have looked at several diagrams trying to figure it out. :shrug:

Looks like a bushing of some sort. Somewhat valve-guide like. Doesn't really look like it was sheared off from anywhere. We are scratching our heads.

Here are some close up photos:

Compared to Penny "Top side"
http://www.mightyram50.net/vbulletin...id=27421&stc=1

"Bottom side"
http://www.mightyram50.net/vbulletin...id=27422&stc=1

Thanks in advance!

Kind regards,
Chris

To me, this looks like it might be a valve spring retainer for one of the jet valves. Thoughts?

I cannot imagine that it came off, and may have been an "extra" from when the head was rebuilt.

A Muffler Bearing ?;)

...or it came off a jet valve before or when the head failed. It's about the right size and there aren't any other components that are that small.

Is it magnetic? Could be someone placed it there to grab any metal dust moving around in the oil.

This is the son! Looking back, I found that my dad never replied! Sorry, he's super busy! Thank you all for your help! geezer101 was spot on! It came off a jet valve that - near as we could tell - melted in the jet valve guide, (it looked burnt pretty good, was missing the whole valve head and bottom part of stem, and had metal that had flowed into the intake holes in the guide assembly) and broke the jet valve "ear" of the rocker arm off. I bought and installed the eliminator kit!

Sorry if I used a bunch of terminology wrong, I couldn't find much on "jet valve terminology"!