Brass/bronze in 351W oil

I did an oil change this past weekend. I have a little bit of brass or bronze in my oil and I had quite a bit of oil consumption lately. I also cut open the filter and there is just a little in the pleats. Nothing big and not a lot. Maybe a qt per 1000 oil consumption. I sometimes have smoke out the exhaust on cold start. I do not have any bearing noise but occasionally I will get some noise up high in the area of cylinder #8. I can’t tell if it’s a lifter or valve or what and it’s not consistent or constant. It does seem to make more noise when the oil gets a qt low.

I think the easiest thing to check first is pull the distributor and check the gear. If that’s ok the next thing I’m thinking is valve guide possibly from #8 cylinder. See if I can wiggle the valve while in the head. I am getting occasional noise in that area and oil consumption out my exhaust. My opinion is this is my problem it’s just hard to diagnose without pulling head. Most of what you see online says bearing but I don’t notice any bearing noise and I have acceptable oil pressure.

Is there anything else brass or bronze that it could be?

Thoughts/opinions?

Would sure help to know what this is you are having the trouble with. Now I am guessing it is an engine problem and that could also be rocker arm bushings Cam bearings, main bearings, and bushings in any other gears in the timing drive train.
You might also just pull the tappet cover and have a look. Might also be just valves to tight.

(quoted from post at 08:33:16 12/19/18) Would sure help to know what this is you are having the trouble with. Now I am guessing it is an engine problem and that could also be rocker arm bushings Cam bearings, main bearings, and bushings in any other gears in the timing drive train.
You might also just pull the tappet cover and have a look. Might also be just valves to tight.

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351W - put it in title

1969 351W rebuilt 13 years 6000 miles ago before I had it

Probably a long shot......I bought a new '69 Torino with the 351W.
The valve guides wore out at 17,000 miles and Ford repaired them under warranty by knurling them.
I wasn't too keen on that, but I drove the car to 140,000 miles and never had another problem.
If your engine was rebuilt 6,000 miles ago, could there be a chance bronze valve guides were installed.
Like I say, probably a long shot.
Smoke at start up is sometimes an indication of oil getting past the guides.

(quoted from post at 08:47:33 12/19/18) Probably a long shot......I bought a new '69 Torino with the 351W.
The valve guides wore out at 17,000 miles and Ford repaired them under warranty by knurling them.
I wasn't too keen on that, but I drove the car to 140,000 miles and never had another problem.
If your engine was rebuilt 6,000 miles ago, could there be a chance bronze valve guides were installed.
Like I say, probably a long shot.
Smoke at start up is sometimes an indication of oil getting past the guides.

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Guides are my assumption right now due to the oil consumption out exhaust. From my knowledge It’s hard to diagnose these problems accurately without tearing down.

Well places where it may have come from are wrist pin bushing or off the bearings , chances of valve guide if they would have been done at some point in time are pretty slim . also it could be from cam bearings Now since today we really don't have GOOD OIL PRESSURE gauges you really don't know what you have , you just go by what it shows on the factory gauge or light . If Ford has not changed the pressure on the 351 from when they came out you should have around 45 hot . Been many years since i have done anything on a 351 W . Back in the FUN days it was let's see how much we can get out of one of these and just how hard can we twist it before it makes spare pieces and parts . And i am almost sure that to drop the pan and do a bearing check will be a nightmare and probably require pulling the engine to do so .

Does it have an oil pressure gauge? Any changes?

If not, that would be the first thing to check is hot idle oil pressure. That will be the first thing to go if it's a bearing.

If that looks good, pull the rockers, check the pivot surfaces, push rod ends, contact tip with the valve.

I don't see it being a valve guide unless one has come loose and rode up hitting the spring retainer.

Distributor gear seems more likely than valve guide.

I put a mechanical oil pressure gauge in it last year. I want to say at hot idle it has at least 30. It never really low such as 20 or less. Cold idle around 50.

It will be difficult to track down the source of your brass or bronze. It's almost certainly not the cam, rod, or main bearings. It's also probably not rod bushings as those aren't usually used on those type of engines. (usually press fit wrist pins) It's probably not the distributor gear unless the engine has been fitted with an aftermarket roller cam. It could be that the engine was fitted with bronze guides (not that common) and they were not reamed to the proper size after installation. Sorry I can't be of more help.

With the increase in oil consumption, some blue smoke on start up, and a bit of bronze in the oil filter, I'd have to go with valve guide/seal wear. Rocker arm bushings are brass, but that and the pin bushing are brass but would not result in greater oil consumption(change). To be more specific, most likely exh valve guides as intake guide wear would draw the brass into the combustion chamber, and most of it would exit the engine after firing. Also, exh valve guides run quite a bit hotter, and are the most wear-prone item on an internal combustion engine.

Validating exh guide wear is not difficult. Remove the rocker arm from the engine. Remove one spark plug from that side. Insert about 12" of poly rope into the cyl, leaving about 4" with a knot sticking out. Gently move the crankshaft around BY HAND to compress the rope in the cylinder, and keep the valve from dropping into cyl. Remove the keepers and retainer from the top of the exh valve. Remove the spring(s) from the exh valve. Wobble the top of the exh valve from side to side. There should be very little play. Watch the top of the guide seal as it is moved(this replicates the action of the rocker on the valve.

If you have wobble on the valve when moved around by hand, that is a guide failing and the seal unable to maintain integrity with the valve stem. Remediate by removing the head, and having the exh guides, seals, and valves replaced with new, then grind the seats to the correct chamfer angle(s) of the new valves.

Other possibilities that would could cause the bronze filings but not oil consumption. Main crank
thrust bearing can wear through the babit outer layer and into the bronze base. A manual clutch
with a high release pressure or in an automatic the torque converter can fail and balloon. The
ballooning can be caused by heavy towing. A failing thrust bearing generally will not drop oil
pressure. These scenarios are possible but do not occur real frequently.

Hello nrowles,

Copper is found on triple layered engine bearings. If you
engine had that type in it, I don't know that, then you need
to find out, as it sure is one of the sources for copper in
the oil,

Guido.

This is what I was thinking - the main bearings are worn out and your down into the copper alloy.


That alone wouldn't cause oil consumption but if the main bearings are shot I would assume the rest of the engine is probably worn pretty bad too.

First thing is that if there were enough wear on main, rod, or camshaft bearings, the engine would be knocking. Loudly. Oil pressure would be dangerously low.

So, having said that, I would say that the source of your brass or bronze is NOT from main, rod, or camshaft bearings.

To caterpillar guy: This engine does not use wristpin bushings. They are not used in any modern Ford engines.

Second thing is that using a quart of oil every 1000 miles is excessive. You should not be using more than a quart in 3000 miles on a normal engine. Your oil consumption is indicative of rings not seated or loose valve guides or bad guide seals.

There IS a bronze bushing under the distributor in the block that could be a possibility for the origin of the brass or bronze.

My (retired) professional opinion is that when the engine was rebuilt, bronze guides were installed or heads with bronze guides were installed. Brass in the oil is most likely from the machining from installation of bronze guides that was not cleaned out properly from the beginning. Early 351W engines were famous for bad guides. In the beginning, the dealers were knurling the guides as a repair. Later, they were boring out the cast in guides and installing bronze guides. After installation, guides had to be reamed to size for the valve stems, then the seats were centered up. Some guys (flat rate artists) were simply not cleaning up the heads after doing the machine work on the assumption that the bronze shavings were to soft to do any harm.

Also, be advised that just because you are told that an engine was "rebuilt" does not make it like factory new. There are varying degrees of what work might have been done in an "overhaul." A complete and proper rebuild returns an engine to the equivalent of factory new condition and is very involved and expensive.

Is it a straight drive ?? could be thrust bearing . Or could be cam bearings.

I would drop the oil pan, and look at the rod bearings, they are usually the first to go. Then the other bearings will follow as the oil pressure drops. I recently took a engine apart from a 2004 GMC Envoy with the 4.2L straight 6 which had good oil pressure, but had a very slight knock (usually a loose timing chain on those engines). Turns out it had a rod bearing that had completely spun in the one rod. You normally won't get a noticeable amount of brass/bronze in the engine oil from bad valve guides.

I always try to create these threads in generalities. I just need to provide more details from the start. This is a fun toy. 1965 Mustang with a 1969 351W that was rebuilt in 2005 with mild cam, ported and polished heads, Eddy intake, etc. Supposed to be around 400hp at the crank.

I think I'm going to stick with the original plan. Pull the distributor and look at the gear. Inspect the valve train and related. Drop the oil pan which is very easy on these cars and look at the rod bearings. I can check engine compression again but this summer (before I started noticing major oil consumption) all cylinders were 120+ psi cold. If nothing obvious comes back from this I'm just going to drive it until it starts making some more noticeable noises or low oil pressure. It's hard for me to say it's bearing when I have no knock or oil pressure issues. I'm really leaning towards the oil consumption being valve guide/seal related since the only smoke I ever notice is on cold start.

Just send a sample to an oil analysis place and they will tell you exactly where it is coming from. Would be money well spent.

(quoted from post at 09:49:05 12/20/18) Just send a sample to an oil analysis place and they will tell you exactly where it is coming from. Would be money well spent.

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Thought about that but here's the problem. I just did the oil change and put the old oil in a laundry detergent container. That oil is surely contaminated and the engine has fresh oil in it. I sent them a question this morning on how many miles the oil needs on it for it to be a good sample.

Something else that is possible for oil consumption besides piston rings is the intake leak into the lifter valley. Also usually on new heads is like the Edelbrock's are they only put positive style oil seals on the intake guides only because only the intake guides see a vacuum. The exhaust guides normally see pressure.
The seals would look like these.

Most likely the heads where rebuilt with bronze guides, I've seen cases where the guides didn't have enough clearance causing the valve and guide to gauld. Once this happens the guide will wear away fairly quick and allow oil to leak past the guide.

Not true .It has been found that during overlap oil is strongly pulled down the exhaust guides. Modern usage is seals on every guide.