Have a potential issue that I wanted to ask about. I have had a leak on the passenger side valve cover for a while and finally had time to tackle replacing the gasket today. While tapping on the cover to loosen it with a rubber mallet, it slipped past where I was hitting and I hit the oil cap. I hit it pretty good and it broke the inner plastic piece of the cap. When I got the valve cover off I could see several pieces of the plastic around the springs and got them out, but I'm afraid some of the pieces might have fallen down into the cylinder wall. Im not positive anything did fall in there but at the same time if anything did what would be the best course of action? Short of removing the head.

 

I don't think any debris would fall down into the cylinder walls. There is no opening from camshaft area (where valve springs are) to the cylinders below. You are probably OK. The worst possible case scenario is that one of the pieces may have fallen down the oil passages that drain oil from the camshaft area down to the oil pan. You can try to drain engine oil and see if anything is down there. I do not exactly know where the oil passages are, so i do not know how likely it is for a piece to fall there. Let us know what you find. It is always good to know what comes out of such unfortunate accidents.

 

Haha, I don't know why I was thinking the oil passages went to the cylinder wall..I'll blame it on being Monday. I'll drain the oil and update to as what I find(if anything). Thanks again.

 

Might take a shop vac and vacuum all around the area where the pieces are.