Valve springs good after extended storage?

[racerxrick]

I now have my GN back on the road after buying it last year from my friend who basically stored it the last 11-12 years. I'm looking forward to taking it to the track soon, she ran 10.70's back in the day on an old school 70 series turbo. Updated now with a Precision 6768, modern boost control and a few other tricks.

QUESTION: Is there a concern with valve spring tension considering the car has probably had only 50 miles over those years. (218 cam...no roller)?

Thanks!

 

[Pronto]

You could check them with one of those small spring pressure testers that are put in a vise.

 

[Flyin Brian]

I would check them. Have you driven it? If it pulls hard up to a reasonable rpm they might be ok. I am not sure if they make one of those cool on-the-car valve spring testers for our engines but that would be an easy to check a few of them.

 

[fastblackracing]

I would not even worry about them, it is the lift cycles and heat that fatigue them
more than sitting, I would be more concerned if they had put 20k miles on them.

And you car looks real good buy the way, cant wait to get mine back.

 

[racerxrick]

You could check them with one of those small spring pressure testers that are put in a vise.

it occurred to me...but I've been accused of fixing things that ain't broke ;-)

 

[racerxrick]

I would check them. Have you driven it? If it pulls hard up to a reasonable rpm they might be ok. I am not sure if they make one of those cool on-the-car valve spring testers for our engines but that would be an easy to check a few of them.

dunno, was hoping my buddy "Turbo Don" had something along those lines

 

[racerxrick]

I would not even worry about them, it is the lift cycles and heat that fatigue them
more than sitting, I would be more concerned if they had put 20k miles on them.

And you car looks real good buy the way, cant wait to get mine back.

that's kind of what I was thinking but don't really know the theory.

and thanks for the compliment, been going over the car front to back even though I bought a running, driving car for the last eight months. Just spent around 40 hours on paint correction and she turned out 150% better than I had hoped for!

Good luck with getting yours back on the road and/or track!!

 

[racerxrick]

I would check them. Have you driven it? If it pulls hard up to a reasonable rpm they might be ok. I am not sure if they make one of those cool on-the-car valve spring testers for our engines but that would be an easy to check a few of them.

Brian I forgot about the first part of your post. The car does pull hard though I haven't ran it past 5k yet as I need some help with FAST Classic to make sure the tune is safe. It seemed like it didn't rev that fast but then again I've gotten used to two LS based cars that RPM so quick!

 

[Flyin Brian]

When you get it tuned up and if it pulls hard to the shift points without nosing over they are probably ok.