Don't trust an old engine.
 

I almost had this 396 running a few years ago, but ran into a problem and decided to leave it alone until I could disassemble it. It's a good thing I didn't get it started. It had a '67 391 head on it and when I was removing the valve springs the head broke off of one of the exhaust valves. Don't trust old valves and be careful when trying to start an engine that's been sitting for a long time. I also found an acorn in the water jacket. I wonder how that got in there.

Wow! Good reminder for us all. My 67 GTO was mothballed for 10 years when I got it, and ended up having had shop towels crammed in the front cover radiator/heater fittings that I didn't notice before hooking up the hoses (and hence had to chance an overheating issue for an afternoon).

I have a 1962 327 sitting on an engine stand at home for the last 10 years. Before it goes into anything it will come apart just to check the condition of the rod bolts and valve springs. It went a 12.67@107 on its very last pass and it was pulled out soon after for bigger things.

----My father's (long gone) last car was a 1994 Buick Roadmaster wagon. After a couple of years he noticed a drop in performance that seemed to be getting worse. My brother took it into the selling dealer and had them poke around, but they found nothing,,,twice! I happened to be visiting and he said the car would take a 1/4 of a mile to get to 60. I started to poke around and found that the air cleaner was full to the brim with dog food. Squirrels or chipmunks had really done a good job with my fathers dogs dog food which he always put out by the front fender every night. We always wondered why the dog wasn't gaining any weight,,,LOL! Maybe not pertinent, but funny just the same......Bill S

That is funny:haha::haha::haha::haha::haha:

From the original post: "Don't trust old valves"

Just learned this lesson.............the hard way.

Thinking more about this situation - factory BB valves are one-piece, right? Must have been some extreme heat combined with some sort of stress riser on the radius.

Likely a rust situation. I have had many BBC valves break like that fit to water in the exhaust port. Good catch on what looks to be a special engine.

Jason