Valve Job or engine swap?

I have a 2006 Tundra 4.7 double cab in good overall shape 280K that appears to have leaking valve seals, cold start I get a solid blast of white blue smoke that goes away shortly after... I have had this truck from day one and honestly can’t afford to replace the truck, I love this truck and body style

Valve work I am looking at roughly $2.5k. I do have a possible main seal leak as well or leaks in both pans can’t confirm. I can get a low mileage A grade 4.7 for $2.6K with about $1.5k labor. Dos it make sense to replace the motor? My worry is what gremlins would I encounter with a swap? It’s a CA truck and found a matching motor but out of state (CA emissions)

A Toyota specialist mechanic says valve work, but another well respected mechanic says do the swap?

 

I had a similar predicament with my wifes Honda. I wanted to pull the head myself and have the valve work done, then put it back together myself. The trouble became I never found the time.

Everybody I asked said just swap the motor. Eventually that's what I did, or rather had a mechanic do. The motor swap was really just the long block. Everything that bolts to the motor was swapped over and the seals were replaced during the swap. So far no problems.

As far as the CA emissions I don't think there is a difference in the motors. I have read that CA trucks had 3 catalytic converters where other states had 2, however my truck is originally a CA truck and only had 2.

 

Swap,,, that way you are starting out semi fresh all around. Best of luck and hope it goes smoothly

 

Ok thanks for the insight, so positive for the swap.

I am leaning towards the swap as I do get an occasional cold start knock as well goes away in a minute under load.

 

A valve job requires removing the head and grinding valve seats. Valve guide seals are a relatively minor deal. I haven't done them on this engine, but when I've done them on other engines, it only required removing the valve cover, not the head.

 

The two mechanics I spoke with said they need to pull both heads to replace valve seals and do a once over the heads

 

Have you checked the PCV valve for sticking or plugging?

How much oil are you having to add, and how often? Or is the smoke the main symptom?

 

Yes replaced PVC and did a full sea foam clean. Burning a decent amount of oil

 

Some smoke at start up on a 280k motor. Unless you're starting the truck in your bedroom I don't see this a major problem. I certainly don't see it as a problem needing to spend $4,100 on a used motor that may smoke just as bad once installed or have a host of even worse problems. This sounds like a big gamble especially since money is tight as you say.

I'd do a little more diagnosis, pull the spark plugs, run compression on the cylinders, could be just some bad rings on a cylinder or two and not valve seals. How's your coolant level? With the newer oils it's pretty hard to distinguish oil smoke from coolant being vaporized, at least to my old eyes.

 

It can be a lot of smoke at start, pretty good cloud.
It’s not coolant.

 

Also, other possible cheap fix: Power Steering Control Valve. Read on: https://www.tundras.com/threads/finally-some-good-news.95760/

 

I would totally look into that. It doesn’t explain the oil consumption, but the external leak(s) sure could.

 

https://www.google.com/shopping/pro...366803_0,prmr:1,pid:15731826140300366803,cs:1

 

Thank you I’ll check my PS level!

 

Here's my 2 cents. Dump some of this stuff in there and wait a couple hundred miles.

$15 ATP Automotive AT-205 Re-Seal Stops Leaks, 8 Ounce Bottle

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000NVW1LM

If it gets better great, if not you're only out $20. I've used it a few times on different things and it works pretty well.

 

Yea did that with Lucas stop leak, sadly no improvement

 

I've tried the Lucas too, the ATP seems to have more reliable results.

 

Ok might give it a try thanks

 

Try the

$15 AT-205 Re-Seal Stops Leaks, 8 Ounce Bottle

AT-205, supply chain issues might make it a little hard to find right now. The ATP has plasticizers that restore plastic/rubber, complete different animal than the Lucas junk. I would empty the crap you have in it and put an OEM weight synthetic oil. Drive it a tank of gas with the new oil, then add the ATP and drive it another tank of gas or so with it and see if your consumption lessens. After 1k miles or so goto a higher weight oil and see its working for you. If you still look like you're rolling coal on startup, figure out if its valve seals, valve gaskets, or rings. If it's seals, I remember reading about changing them with the heads on with string or something on ih8mud.

 

Thank you!

 

Yes, it’s a simple process. That’s what I was getting at a ways back. If it’s just valve guide seals, you remove the valve covers, get the engine so cylinder-1 is at the bottom of the compression stroke, remove the spark plug, stick a couple feet of cotton clothes line at in the cylinder through the plug hole (leave a length sticking out of the hole so you can pull it out when done) then slowly turn the crank until the rope bunches up and is lightly compressed against the head/valves. This keeps the valves from dropping down into the cylinders when you release the keepers. Remove the keepers, replace the seals and reinstall the keepers. Do one cylinder at a time until you’ve done them all. As I said, I haven’t done this on a Toyota but have done it on two European engines and stopped the oil consumption and smoke at start-up.

 

If it’s just a minor puff of smoke during startup and goes away I wouldn’t bother fixing it. 2.5k to 4K buys a lot of 1qt bottles of oil for topping it up.

 

The 2uzfe is not a OHV Ford or Chevy. The crux of this repair is the labor involved in removing the cams in order to remove the buckets to then get to the valve stem seals. I'm not aware of many, or any, posts on the forum of guys DIY'ing cam removals on a VVT engine. It seems to be a very intricate affair.

This guy at the Lexus forum did a detailed write up.

Good luck.

https://www.lextreme.com/how-to-replace-toyota-and-lexus-valve-seals/

 

Man, it really looks like just pulling the heads would be worth it at that point.

 

That's a great write-up.

Here's another one on a Toyota 4 cylinder... it's the same process (just half the cylinders), but he uses the rope method to hold the valves and has a different tool. Just another resource.

https://www.toyotanation.com/thread...ement-without-removing-cylinder-head.1429378/

Whether the heads come off or not, you still have to remove the cams and shims. I don't think removing the heads really gains you anything.

 

I removed the cams a few months ago. It's not that bad of a job to get there, but basically adds onto doing a regular timing belt replacement. Just followed the FSM. After removing the T-belt, you take off the valve covers, remove the cam caps, then the cams. I had a leaking cam seal on the passenger side, so replaced both. All in all, it added about 3 hours on top of just doing the T-belt. The cleaning of the sealant took the longest, but that's the same as having to do just the valve covers.