I got a core motor (H23a1) from my parts guy that he claimed was throwing a rod a rapping. When I got wat I needed from the motor I noticed when I took the valve cover off two rocker arms were laying in the valve bay. When I called him and asked him if he every removed the valve cover he said no. So i told him about the two rockers that were not connect and he said "then you got a good motor cuz I assumed it was throwin a rod." I thought this is great but I want to know wat I can do to make sure that the motor is still good cuz I dont want to fix the rockers and put in and do all the work for it to t have a bad rod bearing. I was thinking about removing the oil pan and checking each rod for play, Im about to install this **** and I need to know how to check it. I any of you guys got any ideas please let me know I dont want to go thru all that work 4 nothin. please help!!!!

 

The obvious awnser is visual inspection of the whole motor. Mean tear it down and inspect the componets.

Or you can fix the head and hook it up to a starter and check things like compression and anything else that is pretty obvious.

Id personall go for the break down. If you have a rocker arm that fell off, there is a reason, mabey it broke somewhere and there is loose pieces of metal floating around.

 

Yeah that **** makes me wonder, I think the visual break down is my best bet. like you said there is some reason why those rockers are off, either a major malfunction, or the person who own the car didn't adjust the valves right. I know in the past when we had motors that were rapping after swaping in a new one we would take the oil pan off and right away there is chunks of metal and you wiggle those rod and find one with play then thats it but i'm goin deeper than that. thanks for the reply bud