Pulled the camshaft off and started sanding the head surface.
The small gouges look better, but some others are a small concern. I think copper sealant should resolve those issues.
This one is odd: it sems to have been partially milled off-axis...
I got a 7x24 tempered glass shelf at the store and taped the 600grit to it. I lubed generously with wd40 and slid the head back and forth longitudinally.
I'm not sure I want to sand any further... The straight-edge currently shows no gap end-to-end and corner-to-corner, but the openings of the precups seem about .001" proud. If I keep sanding, I'm concerned that the precups, which are harder, will let me rock the head back and forth on them and create a rise, since there is no way for me to force the head to maintain the same plane as the glass.
It did clean up. I would check for gap between the cylinders as well. I currently have one head disassembled with about 3.5 thousandths between #3 and #4. Not sure what I will do with THAT.
Personally, I get the feeling this engine has been manipulated to some fashion before. I don't think those soft plugs in the block are the originals...not even. All of these valves look like they match. I can't remember if the new TRW's have that same small dent or not.
Wonder how much wobble the valves/guides have? I would recommend stem seals if you have access to a valve compressor. The precups generally always protrude a bit. Not sure why one of them sits in there different.
Here is a question I have regarding peening a head around the precups: if a guy peens these....does THAT totally rule out sending the head back for a core to a rebuilder? In other words, do most exchange-rebuilders accept peened-precuped heads as cores.....or do you lose your head and have to fork over the core charge? Just curious.
Ja, I have seen quite a few pix online, and none had the machining marks I see on the head, precups and the block.
(This is just after a very light scrape yesterday with a new carbide blade. The peaks are faint, but enhanced by the gasket residue.)
The PO said he was a wrench at FedEx... parked the VW after it dropped the exhaust and drove his Jeep thereafter. Hmmmm.
I had corrosion pits in the head around the coolant flanges and near the oil drain hole where it would seep coolant (92 Eco). I cleaned the pits down to bare metal, filled with epoxy then wet sand, repeat till smooth. Fixed the leaks.
Another way would have been to get a shop to tig weld aluminum to fill the pits and sand it flat. I didn't want to look for a shop to do that and end up with longer down time and possible complication and wanted to try the epoxy so that's my story.