Guesses on What happned to the 460?

[Mighty Thor]

I would welcome ideas on what caused my engine to break. I pulled the plugs first and #2 was smashed. Pulled the valve cover and everything looked ok at first but one rocker on #2 was a little loose. pulled the intake and that pushrod was severely bent. Pulled the head and found the exhaust valve head sitting on the top of the piston which was very broke and pretty well jammed in the bore at TDC. The valve stem and spring and keeper are all still in the proper place on the head.
When I drained the oil I got about two gallons of water first. When the pan was off the #2 rod is bent and jammed into the bottom of the bore but still in one piece with the wrist pin still in place, The piston is obviously not connected.
I am thinking that the valve let go but what would cause this? Or is it possible I some how pulled the piston apart and it took out the valve? I had just gotten on the throttle when this thing let go. I didn't even get to 4000 rpm so I know I didn't over rev it.

[Squirtin Thunder]

I had a similar problem many years ago, a valve stem broke !!! No strange wear on the valve guide, the valve head just came off. Now this was on a 4V Cleveland 4bolt block, destroyed the bore of #3. I spent hours looking it over and it just boiled down to metal fatigue. BTW the head was also destroyed.

[Mighty Thor]

Yeah, My head doesn't look real good either. It might be useable with inserts but not by me. With all the water in the Oil I am sure that either the head or the block is broke but I won't know for sure till I pull it apart further. I wanted to take pictures for you all so I just left it like I found it with the sheet metal off. Tomarrow I will have the camera.

[Big Kahunaa]

hey squirtin thunder do you live in bullhead if so i didn't think there were two ford guy in this city wish i had a 4 bolt cleveland

[Squirtin Thunder]

hey squirtin thunder do you live in bullhead if so i didn't think there were two ford guy in this city wish i had a 4 bolt cleveland
Well, there is a bunch of other guys in this city, I don't know what they are !!! But two smart guys is cool with me.
Jim

[Big Kahunaa]

squirtin thunder where do you hang on the rio {river}

[Squirtin Thunder]

squirtin thunder where do you hang on the rio {river}
Rio Lomis Beach mostly !!!

[Big Kahunaa]

cool maybe i'll see you out next season boat is down bought house no money so now i drive my beater toyota 4x4 to grass and circle

[Squirtin Thunder]

cool maybe i'll see you out next season boat is down bought house no money so now i drive my beater toyota 4x4 to grass and circle
Get a Rope !!!

[Big Kahunaa]

no jet in the boat piece off junk wont even float

[Squirtin Thunder]

no jet in the boat piece off junk wont even float
I have a Sanger Super Jet Here that can be for sale !!!

[Captain no fun]

A couple of things are likely;
If you are running OT exhaust with a high overlap cam, shortly after decelleration, you get reversion, you pull a small amount of water into your cumbustion chamber, hence the roughened idle. This cools your exhaust valves to rapidly, into a martinistic state, and over a period of time the valve crystalizes, and can no longer take the constant slamming into the seat. It fatigues, and breaks off.
You could be running older heads, that are not designed to run on unleaded fuel. The exhaust stem has no lubrication, it expands, friction increases in the guide, the friction overcomes the springs ability to pull the valve back into position, and the piston hits the valve, bending it over, and the second hit breaks it off.
You could have weak valve springs. The bent push rod tells of a severe mechanical interference, so when the piston was coming up, the valve was attempting to open. I'd say the problem is in the guide interference from your description.
The water in the oil can be explained from the compromise in the integrety of either a cylinder wall, or head. Look around the forensics of failure analysis is exciting, and will make you a more informed hot rodder!

[Rampager]

What kind of pistons and comp ratio are you running?
Had a nearly identical failure in my 460 2 summers ago. The top of the piston broke thru the ringlands and broke off the tip of a valve which banged around and eventually stuck into the piston top and stopped the motor. I was running too high a comp ratio for hypereutectic pistons. We fixed that all up and replaced just one piston. The next summer the motor started knocking. ran it onto the trailer but on teardown found nearly every piston either cracked or already broken. Was extremely lucky both times no other hard parts broke. (I did bend the rod the first time) At this stage we figured the hypers may last a season at the comp I was running but no more. I went forged at that stage...it was about 10.7:1, manufacturer was shocked it lasted even that long and said no more than maybe 9.5:1 #shrugs#
Good luck, it sucks blowing a motor

[wrenchdogg]

sounds like you guts need to get a chevy .. :rollside: just kidding

[lucky]

i WAS GOING TO SUGGEST - CRYSTALIZED VALVE STEAMS AS I HAVE BEEN READING ALOT OF THAT ON THESE BOARDS LATLEY :D

[SmokinLowriderSS]

There's my bet for the failure, the valve broke at the stem, and became FOD (Foreign Object Debris ( I been working on aircraft way yyy to many years :D )) this earned you a busted piston, bent rod, broken rod (all likely pretty much in that order) and a rapidly stopped 460.
I wonder about the bent pushrod, there may have been a guide problem. I don't have any really good guesses to dispute it with.
I'm gonna go about 50/50 on the head because, while the valve can tear up a bunch of stuff, so can that rod jamming in the sleeve. either could have opened a crack to the water jacket. From the amount of water (2 gal) I'm gonna lean on the block. There wouldn't be that much available from a head just on gravity available I don't think. A pressurized auto system would be different.

[Mighty Thor]

here is what It looked like when I took the engine apart.
http://www2.***boat.com/image_center/data/500/2121Broken460b.jpg
http://www2.***boat.com/image_center/data/500/2121Broken460a.jpg http://www2.***boat.com/image_center/data/500/2121Broken460.jpg
Looks like I will be searching for a new block. This motor was an automobile engine that someone had hung the boat stuff on. only performance stuff here was the performer intake and Marine carb. Probably a combo of old heads, automotive cam and who knows how many miles.

[Jeanyus]

That looks like the inside of the only Big Block Ford that I owned.
Go BBC and use your boat.