Had an 02 out tonight for routine valve adjustment, found most of the intake retainers split open. The guy is confident he never over-reved, but the car has 9k on it from the previous owner. It's currently at 37k. I think

Stay tuned for some on the car money shots with the cams removed.

 

bump.

more proof that you need to have your retainers checked no matter how "ok" your car seems after a mis-shifted overrev.

 

totally.

I had an over-rev due to a missed shift (4th at ~8500 rpm to 5th - ended up in third). It kind of ties into a long and boring story involving my first transmission that had been rebuilt under warranty - that ended up much worse than before the rebuild. The rebuilt transmission was replaced by Honda a day or two after the over-rev. I told the Service Manager what happened and requested they do an inspection and valve adjustment.
I had the cams removed and a thorough inspection done by a very competent S2000 mechanic. It cost me about $30 more than a standard valve adjustment - and worth every penny for the piece of mind.

I was lucky - no apparent damage. However, I've inspected the retainers myself every 3,000 to 5,000 miles since (also an excuse to check the valve adjustment). That was around 20,000 miles ago. I will continue to do this until I pull the heads and send them to Alaniz.

I recommend others to do periodic inspections - even if you don't think you've over-revved. If I ever decide to buy a used S2000 - this would be part of the pre-purchase scrutiny.

One of my aircraft mechanics (formerly stationed out here with me) had an '03 Toyota Celica GT-S that dropped a valve due to damaged retainers. This illustrates the S2000 is obviously not the only car that can suffer this kind of damage.

 

How do you check the retainers? Do you look at the top of them or do you need to get a dental mirror under them with a light to see the cracks?

 

You need a dental mirror to get a good look at the top side. The bottom side (where the cracks form) is terra incognito. Unfortunately.

 

Yeah this guy had no symptoms at all.

All you need to pull is the valve cover. A dental mirror and a penlight will reveal recessed retainers clear as day.

Pics tonight

 

I would like to get a good look at what to look for on the car (without removing the retainers.) I have a pretty good idea what "good" looks like. But to be sure I need to know what "bad" looks like.

 

I did a complete rebuild on a head for someone on this forum, while only one valve had broken off and split down through the retainer, while taking off the rest of the retainers for replacement purposes( extra insurance) almost all of them were cracked on the under side, not visible from a first glance with just the cover off.

My motor has 12,000 miles on it, F20C1, I think it may have been over-revved once that I can recall myself, but not extremely bad. I want to go through and do a check on my entire head, I hate the valvetrain on these cars. If there was a cheap enough valvetrain upgrade I would have bought it a long time ago, if you are careful enough you don't have to remove the head to change your springs/retainers/keepers as long as you dont let a valve drop in the cylinder.

I think it should be a routine check up on all our heads every other oil change if you do alot of hard driving, to just pop the cover off, do some rotating of the valvetrain, get a mirror and magnifying glass. It is and will be something that is extremely preventative in saving your motor in the future.

 

I agree that it takes more than a glance, but if the retainerts were cracked they were also stretched, and if they were stretched the valve stems and keepers had to be recessed. That is visable looking at the *top* of the retainers and checking the stem/keeper height.

Originally I thought that the retainers stretched first and then cracked, but according to some of what Billman has said it seems that they actually crack and stretch at the same time. Either way though, the stretching is shown by stem/keeper depression rather than the cracks on the bottom of the retainers.

I'm sure Billman will correct me if I'm wrong, but based on my understanding of this issue, there is no need to look at the bottom of the retainers for cracks. The depressed stem and keepers are a dead give-a-way.

 

being completely honest with you, I took a straight edge at all angles to the top of the retainers and they showed no warpage at all. I almost didn't even pull them all out.

I replaced the valves, the springs, retainers, and keepers on that head, I didn't want an issue to come back and haunt me.