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I have a car in the shop now with a messed up 3100 V6 that appears to have had something put into the fuel system. The engine broke all the intake pushrods due to intake valves being seized. I was able to disassemble the heads by pounding the valves out and they were literally glued into the guides with some sort of sticky/carmalized substance. I cleaned the substance off and they now move in the guides fine.
Heres the full story...
The car has run perfect only 79k miles. Young kid owner leaves house one day and gets 1/4 mile down the road where the car stalls.
Happens to die in front of one of my friends houses who is pretty mechanically inclined. He decides to help a neighborhood kid out.
They notice that fuel pressure is low and figure it might be a fuel pump. They swap the pump, still no start. Spark fine, compression fine.
They pull upper intake to noid the injectors, all fine. They pull up fuel rail and crank engine to find the injectors are all clogged up.
Replace all 6 injectors, button everything up and starts up but has a hesitation and doesn't perform well. He thinks back on everything they have done and recalled that the gasoline when on his hands felt different and didn't seem as potent.
Takes a sample of the gas and lights it on his driveway. It seems to burn, but not intense. He takes a sample of fresh gas and lights that on the driveway and it burns very strong, way stronger than the other stuff in the cars tank.
He runs the pump by jumpering the relay and seems to get a good 6 gallons of this stuff out and puts 6 gallons of fresh gas in it.
Fires up and runs great. He drives it around trying to run more of this fresh gas through it. Puts a good 50 miles on it and figures its all good.
Guy comes to pick it up the next day and it struggles to crank and wont fire. They put a fresh starter in it and it cranks better but no start.
He checks the compression on the front cylinders and no compression
Pulls the front valve cover to find the intake pushrods are broke. Puts new pushrods in and instantly they break.
At this point, they call me and tow it up to my shop.
I pulled the front valve cover off and try to push on any intake valve and they are frozen. I take a brass punch and wack the valve and got them to move down , but they wont come back up.
I pull the head, was able to disassemble and its like whatever was in the gas sprayed through the injectors onto all the intake valves and when the engine cooled down, glued the valve stem to the guides. Its like a sticky/carmelized substance.
Ive never seen anything like this before...basically ruined the engine.
I heard that sugar is a myth, but what could be in the fuel that glued everything from the pump to the injectors, to the intake valves??
Poor little engine!! Was in beautiful shape internally...clean as they come.
Let me know what anyone has heard ruins engines by pouring into the gas.
Sorry for the long post
Tim
What could it be??
Heres the full story...
The car has run perfect only 79k miles. Young kid owner leaves house one day and gets 1/4 mile down the road where the car stalls.
Happens to die in front of one of my friends houses who is pretty mechanically inclined. He decides to help a neighborhood kid out.
They notice that fuel pressure is low and figure it might be a fuel pump. They swap the pump, still no start. Spark fine, compression fine.
They pull upper intake to noid the injectors, all fine. They pull up fuel rail and crank engine to find the injectors are all clogged up.
Replace all 6 injectors, button everything up and starts up but has a hesitation and doesn't perform well. He thinks back on everything they have done and recalled that the gasoline when on his hands felt different and didn't seem as potent.
Takes a sample of the gas and lights it on his driveway. It seems to burn, but not intense. He takes a sample of fresh gas and lights that on the driveway and it burns very strong, way stronger than the other stuff in the cars tank.
He runs the pump by jumpering the relay and seems to get a good 6 gallons of this stuff out and puts 6 gallons of fresh gas in it.
Fires up and runs great. He drives it around trying to run more of this fresh gas through it. Puts a good 50 miles on it and figures its all good.
Guy comes to pick it up the next day and it struggles to crank and wont fire. They put a fresh starter in it and it cranks better but no start.
He checks the compression on the front cylinders and no compression
Pulls the front valve cover to find the intake pushrods are broke. Puts new pushrods in and instantly they break.
At this point, they call me and tow it up to my shop.
I pulled the front valve cover off and try to push on any intake valve and they are frozen. I take a brass punch and wack the valve and got them to move down , but they wont come back up.
I pull the head, was able to disassemble and its like whatever was in the gas sprayed through the injectors onto all the intake valves and when the engine cooled down, glued the valve stem to the guides. Its like a sticky/carmelized substance.
Ive never seen anything like this before...basically ruined the engine.
I heard that sugar is a myth, but what could be in the fuel that glued everything from the pump to the injectors, to the intake valves??
Poor little engine!! Was in beautiful shape internally...clean as they come.
Let me know what anyone has heard ruins engines by pouring into the gas.
Sorry for the long post
Tim
What could it be??
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