Piece of aluminum chipped off my Tbi injector casting and got sucked down my throttle body

[95gmcguy]

So the aluminum casting that the injectors go into for the TBI on my 454 chipped off near the jet of one of the injectors and got pulled through the throttle body. Sadly my plan is to remove the intake manifold and see if I can find it (it's about a 1/4" x 1/2" piece of aluminum) this means I'll have to remove the distributor which I'm a little nervous about messing up the timing. Any tips or info would be greatly appreciated, how far you you guys think it went? I'll try to post pictures soon.

 

[Hipster]

Pull the tbi if you haven't it might still be sitting under it, Bad news is I chased stuff that fell down the intake into a cylinder if a valve was open and ended up having to pull a head.

 

[Hipster]

see if I can find it

No, you need to definitely find it.

 

[95gmcguy]

No, you need to definitely find it.

That was just my optimism saying see if I can find it in the intake manifold lol. Sadly with the throttle body off it's nowhere to be seen. After it chipped off, the truck was running until the leak flooded the engine and it died before I realized it had chipped off and there was a piece of metal in my engine I had it at full throttle trying to diagnose so who knows how far it got sucked down.

 

[movietvet]

So the aluminum casting that the injectors go into for the TBI on my 454 chipped off near the jet of one of the injectors and got pulled through the throttle body. Sadly my plan is to remove the intake manifold and see if I can find it (it's about a 1/4" x 1/2" piece of aluminum) this means I'll have to remove the distributor which I'm a little nervous about messing up the timing. Any tips or info would be greatly appreciated, how far you you guys think it went? I'll try to post pictures soon.

You can pull the dist cap off and mark the rotor tip and the body of dist, if need to. IMO, if you are worried about pulling the dist, that tells me the mechanical ability is suspect and best to let a tech do it or a trained friend. Look at some you tube videos before you do anything. Pulling the TBI is simple and it may be under that but if you pull the intake and reinstall without gasket/seal prep knowledge, you could make a large oil leak.

In the future, is best to post your vehicle info when asking for help or post it in your signature.

 

[1998_K1500_Sub]

I had it at full throttle trying to diagnose so who knows how far it got sucked down.

Bad news is I ... ended up having to pull a head.

And now the question is, which head should @95gmcguy pull first?

And what will he find once he's pulled the correct one? What comes next after this dumpster fire?

@95gmcguy, I feel your pain. I once was changing my intake gaskets and, with the intake off, dropped a tap down into the lifter valley and through the distributor hole into the oil pan. I could have made a sailor blush with the string of words that followed. I learned a lot from that mistake.

 

[Hipster]

And now the question is, which head should @95gmcguy pull first?

the one he uses a borescope to find the piece in, he says it got sucked in, so head might need to come off to fix up some valves etc. Could be quite a little mess before it's over.

 

[95gmcguy]

Im pretty confident in my ability to do it, I'm aware I'll need to replace the intake gaskets and the distributor gasket and clean everything very well prior to removal I've just never worked on a vehicle with a distributor before so I was seeing if there was any tips. The vehicle is a 95 GMC K2500 with the 7.4L 454

 

[1998_K1500_Sub]

the one he uses a borescope to find the piece in

Smart

(edit) This option hadn't occurred to me; I don't own a borescope and have never used a borescope. Maybe I should get one.

 

[movietvet]

Did he say anything about noises? If that chunk is on top of a piston, that is hard to believe if is 1/4" x 1/2" and if it is lodged in a valve seat, that should have a dead cylinder.