Found wierd little spring trapped in oil filter - help identify??

[LA_Dog]

When I changed my oil I had some metal pieces in the filter from a grenaded cam thrust washer. I also found this weird little spring and one end of it is squashed.

It is actually very small (I blew it up larger in photoshop), about 1/16th in diameter and maybe 1/4" to 3/8" long at most.

Where would this super tiny spring have come from???

 

[francoblay1]

interesting..... let´s find out!

Just "shooting blind".... Carb? it seems it has been crushed by a valve????

.......

 

[LA_Dog]

Yeh- I can pretty much identify anything caught by the KP oil filter- a few bits of charred nose cone seal rubber, some slivers of steel from the broken thrust washer, and a few small pieces of aluminum from the case area next to the thrust washer.

but this tiny spring??? WTF?? I can;t think of anything inside an Evo motor that uses a tiny soft little spring. The SS HVHP oil pump doesn't have it. I'm mystified.

Only thing I can thing is it was something dropped into the motor when it was apart? Or maybe it is a piece of the grenaded TP oil pump from last rebuild that got left in there? I think the TP pump has tiny ball bearing check valves for the upper and lower oil passages in the pump body- and springs that are machined in- one them was messed up in mine.

 

[Sven]

I can;t think of anything inside an Evo motor that uses a tiny soft little spring. Only thing I can thing is it was something dropped into the motor when it was apart? ... one them was messed up in mine.

'So tiny I had to blow it up?' Might that be part of an oil pressure or sending unit type of relief valve with a spring behind it? Are you the soul engine builder? No one around helping with the first rebuild? If yours was messed up, did it look like that spring?

I assume you found this in the oil filter?

 

[LA_Dog]

'So tiny I had to blow it up?' Might that be part of an oil pressure or sending unit type of relief valve with a spring behind it? Are you the soul engine builder? No one around helping with the first rebuild? If yours was messed up, did it look like that spring?

I assume you found this in the oil filter?

Sven- I had a shop do the rebuild (twice, very long and sad story). I have an SS HVHP oil pump and a single AutoMeter oil pressure gauge on the tappet screen hole. No other senders or gauges. I've looked through all sorts of Evo engine diagrams and I cannot find any reference to a tiny spring (motor, pressure gauge, SS oil pump etc). total head scratcher.

Yes it was caught by the oil filter- I have a KP Engineering reusable oil filter.

 

[05chop]

a long heli coil maybe

 

[pknowles]

Part of the spring out of a mechanical seal.

 

[05chop]

Yep that would be a better guess

 

[LA_Dog]

Part of the spring out of a mechanical seal.

Now that is interesting- I can see that. I will check the nosecone camshaft gasket that was fried from heat. if the seal uses a support spring inside it, mystery solved!

 

[pknowles]

Did you ever find the origin of the small spring? If it was from a seal, there's probably 2 to 3" more laying in there some where.

 

[Sven]

Seal springs are not that stout or they'd wear a groove even deeper then they do now.
Mechanical seal is used for water/oil separation but use the same shaft. So this spring is about a nickel round in size and only a few coil winds as in about 5 or less.

Joe Blow and Jerk Off were throwing parts at each other and oops, the spring landed inside your open engine.

Say it is a seal spring. How supple is it and if it was one piece at one time, are the ends able to have matching sheered ends? Can you move them into each other as if they fit together, right?

And, how large is this spring? As long going around the crank seal? There are no shifter seals, but say the cam cone seal/crank seal and that's about it for engine seals, right?

 

[francoblay1]

.....
Joe Blow and Jerk Off were throwing parts at each other and oops, the spring landed inside your open engine.
.....

My thoughts too! I don´t see this kind of spring in any Manual....

 

[Sven]

Agree, Franco. But that spring has to show it is a spring behind a seal. That would be size:
1. Crank seal = How could that slip past the roller bearings on the crank side?
2. Cam seal = How could that be snapped off if it rides in between the seal and cam nose?
3. Extra part = I too have not seen this kind of part, sans a seal spring being caught once on the chop? You'd think it would be chopped a lot more in the same place, times thousands of rpm in a second?

 

[pknowles]

if it came from a sensor, it wouldn't be wound tight. It would be for compression I would think.

 

[liferider]

If you still have the spring, put it next to a penny and take a pic so we have something for size value

 

[Jersey Big Mike]

check valve spring in an oil pump like in the revtech design
http://www.customchrome.com/dcm/cc/images/eng_upgrds/rt_oilpmp.pdf

 

[BWG56]

if it came from a sensor, it WOULDN'T be wound tight. It would be for compression I would think.

X2

 

[BBChopper]

X2

X3 that's a pull spring not compression!

 

[Sven]

if it came from a sensor, it wouldn't be wound tight. It would be for compression I would think.

X4

If this was a short fuse build, oh boy do you have a case if the place is still in business.

This is about hours, not some space in time comes to an end as in, whichever comes first. This is about hours running. And if you clock on 3k and she breaks, not what I call a proper rebuild in terms of hours: on any rebuild area.

We are talking thousands before something comes flying apart.

 

[knucklehead]

That doesn't look like a spring to me. It reminds me of a metal chip from a lathe. Is it possible when the washer grenaded that a sharp edge made a spiral metal chip? If you pull it apart does it spring back or stay stretched?