Help mate has old 72 viva hc leaded or un

[Tonye]

Cant find any info at all, without taking the head off can't tell if its been converted, thats if it needs to be. So lead or not is the ?. Thanks in advance.

 

[SpikyMikey]

Cant find any info at all, without taking the head off can't tell if its been converted, thats if it needs to be. So lead or not is the ?. Thanks in advance.

Dunno for certain. I'd have thought it's leaded, unless it's had hardened valve seats retrofitted.

 

[AMGeed]

To be on the safe side he should use super unleaded unless he knows he has hardened valve seats.

 

[GeeJayW]

To be on the safe side he should use super unleaded unless he knows he has hardened valve seats.

To be on the safe side, he should also use a lead replacement additive in that super unleaded.

Eg. Redex Lead Replacement 250ml | Euro Car Parts

 

[Tonye]

Thanks to you all. My thoughts were the same, will go down the additive route to be on the safe side. Wonder if a borascope down the in and outlet manifolds will show the inserts if converted, thanks again

 

[190]

My experience running an old engine on unleaded fuel is that the issue can be over blown. Consider what the problem is, without lead in the fuel to act as a lubricant, micro-welding can take place between the valve face and seat which gradually causes the seat to wear and the valve to recess into the head closing up the valve clearances. This is a temperature dependent effect, so if you potter around it's very much less of an issue if even a problem at all, compared to an engine that is driven hard or raced.

The thing to do is monitor the valve clearances carefully between services to detect if valve recession is taking place. That in itself will be fun on a Viva engine because the recommended method was to insert the feeler gauge with the engine running. Not as bad as it sounds as the feeler slips in easily enough when offered up with the engine at idle but a messy job and hard on the feeler gauges. I never understood the logic of this method but that's the way it was supposed to be done.

 

[Tonye]

Not as bad as it sounds

It flippin is last time i did that i forgotten to put my glasses on, Ooooh it smarts. I've done rockers without guages in the past on 60s 70s fords in the past as long as you don't go to far