possible stupid question

[thebluemax]

Just picked up a 350 take out from a late 80's k30. Got the engine transfered from one truck bed to another safely. Arrived home and while hoisting it into the garage one of the legs on hoist slipped out ....see where this going? Engine hit the concrete floor of the garage. My question is ....did I ruin the motor? It doesn't appear to be too bad.broken spark plug and dented valve cover and a dent on the crankshaft pulley . Okay stop laughing . Think its okay?

Will try to post pictures ASAP

 

[Fordum]

Somebody else might have a better answer for you, but in my opinion, there is absolutely no way to tell if its OK.

Pretty easy to tell if its destroyed if its bad enough. Big crack the the side of the block, things like that.
But, you could have caused a crack almost anywhere. Cast Iron is tough, but its also brittle.

Can you post a picture of the damage? If it hit on the valve cover, and if it was one of the thin steel ones, that might have cushioned the impact enough to not do any damage.
Of course, it could have snapped something off under the cover.

I would put it on an engine stand, check for obvious damage, pull the valve cover and look where the impact was to see if you bent or broke anything involving the valve train.

Make darn sure that you have not bent anything in the valve train before you try to rotate the engine at all.
A bent valve stem, or rocker could destroy the cam or timing gear/chain when it tries to move it.

Also inspect the sparkplug hole with a good light after you get the plug out to make sure you did not crack the plug seat.

 

[63chevyll]

A friend was helping me and dropped a.small block. It broke the water pump and fuel pump. Dented oil pan and valve cover.... how it all happend I don't know, but it was bad.Like stated above, hard to tell, but fix the obvious and run it I guess unless you want to tear it down farther and check everything out

 

[diesel4me]

Chances are if it only fell 3 feet to the concrete it survived OK...when I worked at the junkyard we dropped quite a few engines,when the chain we used to pull them slid off the forks,---the loader operator was a madman as far as speeding around with it most of the time..but they fell in hard packed dirt,not asphalt or cement,most of the time..some got dropped onto steel truck beds too...
I dont recall any of the engines getting more than "cosmetic" damage like a mooshed valve cover or busted water pump--oil pan was what got the worst of it usually..

One day my co-worker was delivering a 350 chevy motor to a customer,and he didn't tie it down good to the ramp truck's bed,he had placed it in an old truck tire and figured a skimpy ratchet strap was "good enough" to hold it on there...well,it was,until he took a turn going a bit faster than he should,and the strap got cut on a sharp edge and broke,and the engine slid to the side of the bed and rolled right off into the street!...had to winch it back on,and the poor thing was pretty bashed up--the 2 valve covers,water pump,carb and oil pan were JUNK!..but he took it to the customer anyway since he was almost to his shop,and the guy said "well,if it ran good before you pulled it I guess I'll gamble its still OK,I have all the parts off the other engine to swap onto it--and I dont have time to wait for another engine from the only other place in NH that has one for twice your price either!"....he put it in after swapping everything and told us it ran great!...we were hoping it would,because most likely our boss would have canned my co-worker if he ever heard about the engine taking a "dump"!...