Trying to diagnose an alarming knock

[grizzlyjosh]

First off, thank you to everyone who has been helping diagnose and walk me through fixing my truck, its been VERY helpful.
So, I got the heads off and took them to a machine shop to have valves and guides looked over. I haven't heard back yet about what shape they are in, I'm hoping he says the guides are bad so I have a smoking gun.
The only thing that I uncovered while taking everything apart that seems related was 3 or 4 injectors were very gunked into the their holes in the heads, as if they weren't seated properly or something. In fact, I broke one getting it out. I attached a photo of one of the holes. What was causing this and could it have been part of my problem?

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[tbrumm]

Well, it seems like I'll be pulling heads off pretty soon. Some questions:
-I keep seeing references to Mel's write up about removing heads but all the links are 10 years old; can anybody put up a working link to that? Or repost it?
Josh

I see that you already have the heads off, but this may help.
https://www.oilburners.net/threads/7-3-head-gasket-replacement-arp-head-stud-install.76304/

 

[grizzlyjosh]

Another quick question: should I pull out the lifters and look at them or is the fact that they all move when the crank turns good enough?
And thanks tbrumm, that was pretty helpful to look though.

 

[IDIBRONCO]

I'd say that the cause of the crud around the injectors was from them not sealing. They use a copper washer underneath them to seal off the combustion in the cylinder. If you have the heads off, it wouldn't be a bad idea to pull them out to look at them. It's hard to tell if they're good, bad, or just weak from looking. My recent experience with this was after I had a set of Comp 910 valve springs installed. After the engine was back in, it had a miss when I got it running. I could see the rockers all moving without the valve cover off, but one wasn't moving enough. Maybe it was ok while I cranked the engine over with the starter and not while *** was running. The lifters all looked fine. After buying a new set, it now runs smoothly. Since it ran fine before, all I can guess is that one of them had a weak spring in it.

 

[grizzlyjosh]

Idibronco, what am I looking for if I take them out? What goes bad with a lifter?

 

[IDIBRONCO]

Other than the spring inside, I'm not sure. The rollers can go bad, but it happens more with the earlier style that used bushings instead of roller bearings. Since they're roller lifters, they really don't wear much.