A few years ago the generator was running then all of a sudden stopped. Could not restart it as it felt seized. Pulled the valve cover to see one rocker arm off to the side. Put it back on and ran it a few more hours the next few years till one summer it stopped again. I was welding at buddies house this time. Pulled cover , same thing. Pulled the push rod and it was bananna shaped. We put it in a vice and straighten it and I have run it hours since. I then bought the push rod and rocker arm to replace it. Well like 2 yrs later here we go as I did not get it done before this storm and every the I run it I worry it will fail and I will be repairing g it when I need it. So this time before I put the genny up I finally got to replacing g the parts. Here is the old push rod. U can barely see the bend in it.
If that was the exhaust side, I would say look for a valve guide working it's way out of the head. But since it's on the intake side, I would have to think the only reason it would drop the push rod would be either excessive amounts of valve lash or the valve is sticking on occasion. A valve seat working it's way loose can do that too. How good does it run when it's together? Does it run flawlessly or does it have a little hiccup now and then?
Runs as smooth as you can expect from a motor with a carb that has been gummed with E10. Have to keep a touch of choke on. But when the right combo of choice is there its smooth. U have to run it about 20% on choke or it stumbles. But only that way since carb trouble and cleaning .
Waited for the silicone gasket to dry to start it up. no go. All I got was a few back fires. Thinking g it was almost like the intake was not closing all the way is how it sounded. Then I remembered that the rods seemed the same length both did notice the rockers were different. I just assumed the new one was a new design or something. As I ordered parts based on the engine tag. Pulled the cover today and noticed the hold down did not nest into the rocker all the was and that the amount t of push looked greater ..maybe? Pulled it down again. Compared push rods. They looked same, so I swapped the old rocker back in amd it fired up first pull and ran as smooth as ever. Glad I went to run the this g dry and did not have to mess with that in a power outage. I hate wrong parts. I would be so much more efficient with the right ones the first time. Started for ranger was misboxed. Putting a heater core in the saturn today. Part ordered off amazon. It says its the right part the parr is stamped with the same number. Ebay even lists the same part. Guess what. Its not the one In my saturn. The thing was spouse to be the same from 92-01, I have a 96???
