I finally got my Engine Builder heads w/ o/s valves this weekend, and started to tear into my rig to get the old heads off. I've got 140k on the stock mill and lost compression on cylinder 3 a few months back. Spent Friday evening and most of Saturday, and have one head off, and am ready to pull the second. At times I think the Toyota engineers did a pretty good job at laying out assemblies, at other times I curse them heavily. It looks like a small amount of coolant had been leaking out of the headgaskets in the valley under the intake manifold. Oil hasn't shown any indication of mixing with the coolant. I haven't had a chance to check the exhaust valve on cylinder 3, but I believe it's the culprit for the low compression. The cylinders all look good with the cross hatch visible.

Unless I'm missing something, you have to pull the cams to get the head bolts out of the inner portion of the head. So I'll have to pull the cams on the new heads to get the inner bolts in place. The heads look killer, EB does nice work!

So I'm wondering, since I have the engine torn down this far, is there anything I might want to replace while I'm in there? I'm thinking of swapping out the instrument that lies under the intake manifold, just because replacing it later would suck. I replaced the timing belt and water pump about 10k miles ago, so they are good to go. I've debated headers, but the downside doesn't seem worth it. I don't need the extra work of fabbing up the crossover either.

Can't wait to get my rig buttoned up and driving again.

You haven't missed any trick, that is how it is normally done, when the valves haven't already been shimmed in the head prior to install. You can get a short star(IIRC) socket in around the cam, to remove the head bolts, though if you are reusing the head it will be more difficult to remove the cam with the head off the block.


Replace the Knock Sensor and Knock sensor wire, if you haven't come across the info, the knock sensor goes bad nopt lkong after having the heads off. Everyone recommends replacing both, since it is unknown which one actually causes the sensor to fail. You should also get the injectors cleaned, if done locally it is a one day process, shipping them out will take longer. Move the PVC valve out from under the intake manifold, this will make it easier to replace or clean it. When reinstalling the valve covers use an FIPG gasket material, for some reason the left side likes to leak.



I would reconsider headers, the new heads will be flowing more air, and the oem exhaust manifiolds are constricting with that x-over design. Also, that oem x-over pipe dumps all of the 1-3-5 exhaust in onto #6 before exiting the engine. IMO headers have been the best upgrade on my '90, and work well with the my other mods.

Headers will be far easier to install now with the heads off than later if you decided to add them. You could easilly fab up your own new x-over pipe using pre-bent exhaust tubing from a parts store, or have a shop build you one rather cheaply. However if you haven't budgeted for headers, you should figure about $6-700 more for headers and exhaust.