Head repairable?

[cruisermon]

So I needed to do a timing belt replacement and since the motor had been eating some coolant I decided to pull the head for a HG replacement, rebuild the head and clean things up a bit.

First thing I notice is that one piston is slightly different. Valve relief cuts are "sharper" and the stampings are different from the other 5. Next item I notice is the newer rocker, just one.

So obviously a tbelt broke during it's life. Upon disassembly of the head and pulling of the cam, I notice quite a bit of scoring of both the cam and the cam bore/bearings.

My question is, can this be repaired? Obviously a new cam can be fitted but what about the head? Are there cams available with oversized journals?

If the head is not fixable, should I replace the cam and hope for the best? Money is tight right now with my wife back in school. It ran very well and was not noisy at all before I tore it down.

[E30_fiend]

pics arent working for me

[kenika65]

Might be cheaper to source a new head instead of having that head fix by re cutting the cam bearing, it might never be right again.

Keep us updated!

[E30_fiend]

Might be cheaper to source a new head instead of having that head fix by re cutting the cam bearing, it might never be right again.

Keep us updated!

word. 'i' heads are fairly easy to come by in good shape for cheap as well

[BMWLA]

word. 'i' heads are fairly easy to come by in good shape for cheap as well

a good 885 head cheap and easy?

good luck

[Aptyp]

take it to machine shop and source another cam. You'll be good.

[SpecM]

a good 885 head cheap and easy?

good luck

yea... why not?

[BMWLA]

yea... why not?

18yo machines is why and even the quote reman heads for like 900 are way out of spec due to wear and fatigue

[cruisermon]

take it to machine shop and source another cam. You'll be good.

So I'm guessing take it to a machine shop have them check it out, micro-polish the bearing surfaces and once they give it the OK get a new cam? This is my first M20 "involved" experience. From what I have seen and with the searching I have done in the forums (which hasn't turned up much), the cam bore "bearings" are simply the bore surfaces only and there are no traditional cam bearings that can be put in place if the bore has to be enlarged. I guess my main question still stands, if the bore does have to be enlarged, is there a way to take up the space? A cam with larger journals? If there is I haven't found one so it leads me to believe that enlarging the cam bore is not an option. It seems to me that unless welding in the bores and reboring to original spec is an option, the only other option is a new/used head that is in spec.

I'm asking questions here just trying to understand this particular engine/head. I don't completely trust the machine shops here to know exactly what they are talking about when it comes to a vintage BMW since e30s are not as plentiful as other locales and my M20 head could be the first one they have had in their shop.

I appeciate all the responses thusfar. Ordinarily I would just bite the bullet and buy another head and cam rather than messing with this, but like I said, wife back in school = -fundage and tuition is due tomorrow.:eeek:

[Aptyp]

most shops, good shops, with bore that surface out and put in a race. Which is like a spacer to return it to specs. It's not expensive either. You will not be polishing that cam however. Locally, here, a lot of machines shops simply refuse to do that.

[cruisermon]

Awesome! Exactly what I was talking about and looking for. Race is the word I was looking for, the traditional bearing surface I was speaking of. I was hoping that was an option. I haven't been into a ton of engines but I seem to recall all the ones I have worked on/rebuilt had bearing races for the cams. I hadn't encountered one with the bore itself being the bearing surface.

I'll start making some calls tomorrow and see if I can come up with a shop that knows what they are doing with a euro part. Lots of shops around that can handle a sbc of course, as they need rebuilds at 75-100k, but that's who I want to avoid.

Thanks!

[SpecM]

I've had an insert put in a cam journal before (thanks matt!). But I got it for free and re-used the same cam.

worked for me

[cruisermon]

Update

Took the head into a machine shop today. They didn't think the cam journals looked too bad. They'll be going though the head, hopefully no cracks or anything.

On another note...Ireland Engineering rocks! I ordered a new cam on their website on Friday afternoon. With the late order and holiday, I figured end of this week I'd see it. Nope. Tuesday it's on my doorstep by noon! Awesome customer service!