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My brother has a Snapper with a B & S Model 21A07 11 HP electric start Intek OHV engine. He changed his oil last week and heard something fall into the oil pan. It is a small "C" shaped piece of aluminum that looks like an ear off of something that a bolt went through. The diameter of the hole fits a 1/4" bolt. We have looked a parts breakdown but don't see anything where the piece came from. We pulled the valve cover and everything looked OK in that area. The motor runs good but we are worried that a bolt or something is not tight as it should be and may cause more damage if nothing is done. Has anyone had a similar problem or have a clue where the piece came from. The next thing is to pull the engine and drop the pan but thought we would ask others before we went that direction.
Thanks

Can you post up a photo of it.

Do not run that engine until you have opened the crankcase. The first thing that came to mind is a connecting rod cap, but the engine would not run if that came off, unless it is running on one cylinder. Running the engine could lead to you spending big bucks in repairs. This manual might help.


http://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/12502267/B&S Service Manuals/05_273521TwinCylinderOHV.pdf

Tigwelder said:

My brother has a Snapper with a B & S Model 21A07 11 HP electric start Intek OHV engine. He changed his oil last week and heard something fall into the oil pan. It is a small "C" shaped piece of aluminum that looks like an ear off of something that a bolt went through. The diameter of the hole fits a 1/4" bolt. We have looked a parts breakdown but don't see anything where the piece came from. We pulled the valve cover and everything looked OK in that area. The motor runs good but we are worried that a bolt or something is not tight as it should be and may cause more damage if nothing is done. Has anyone had a similar problem or have a clue where the piece came from. The next thing is to pull the engine and drop the pan but thought we would ask others before we went that direction.
Thanks

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I would seperate the pan from the block, and check it out real good. You will need atleast a new pan/ sump gasket. Im with Mr. Rivets it sounds like a piece of the cap broke off where the bolt goes through.

Yes I was also thinking connecting rod...!

I have found through the years of mechanic work. I something is floating around in the oil some place down the line it will do damage. STOP and repair it before something big happens and a small job turns in a whole engine. I know its a pain in the A## but worth it in the long run.

Thanks for the comments from everyone. I hope you can view the attachment of the piece. I made a scale of 1 inch x 1 inch to give an idea of the size. I've had some experience with the older style motors but have never been into an Intek OHV engine. From looking at the parts diagrams, I don't see anything in the crankcase that is bolted other than the rod. However, I don't think this is a rod cap. The bottom section under where the bolt would be is only about 1/8 inch thick and the rod caps I've seen are a lot thicker and have at least a 5/16 diameter bolt. There is a possibility that this did not come out of this engine but got on the motor from somewhere else and just fell off the engine when he was changing the oil. He said he doesn't remember working on anything but it could have been there for a long time and just decided to fall off at this time. This is the reason for my post. If there is nothing in the motor that this could have come from, I don't want to do the work required for nothing. Course it probably it probably could use a set of rings and if it gets torn down they will be replaced.

I would say that is a piece of the connecting rod cap. Time to open the engine up.

Open it up and inspect.

lzn197 said:

Open it up and inspect.

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Yep thats the only way to be sure.

I found the problem! Got a blown up engine from the local small engine shop and tore it down. The inside were completely destroyed, Rod broke, cam shaft bent, holes in two sides of the block. Interesting thing that I could not find anything that looked like a place for the part we found but then looking through the pieces of broken parts, I found a piece that matched the one we found from my brother's motor. I remembered reading somewhere that this type of engine had a compression release and after a little research found that was where the piece came from. It is not listed in the parts breakdown, nor is there a line item to purchase one, as it is a part of the Camshaft assembly. I am suspecting this is what caused the catastrophic destruction of the engine we got, because nothing was left on the camshaft. A picture of a camshaft shows a counter weight assembly that is around the camshaft and holds a valve open to release compression when the engine is cranking and disengages around 500 RPM when the engine starts running. I think the valve adjustment may have something to do with this problem. We have replaced two intake push rods on this engine and he said it had been hard to start. If your engine gets hard to start, you may want to take some steps to prevent a bigger problem. Not certain what we will find when we open up his engine, but hopefully a new camshaft, a set of rings and some gaskets will get him back in service with a easy starting engine that will last a few more summers.
Thanks for the input from everyone.

An update on my quest. Opened up the engine and as we suspected the compression release was broken in pieces and was laying in the bottom of the pan. There was no damage to anything and not certain what caused it to break unless some how something got out of line when the valves were adjusted. Anyway, after looking at the situation and not wanting to put a lot of money into an old motor (the compression release can only be purchased with a camshaft and set of lifters about $85.00) we opted to put it back together without the compression release. We were a little concerned about the lack of a compression release, causing a problem with it starting but it starts better than it did before we worked on it. Will have to say we did also find the starter was gummed up pretty bad and we cleaned and lubed the bushings in it so that didn't hurt any. We can't tell any difference in the motor without the compression release and hopefully it will run for a few more summers. We were lucky that the part fell in the pan and didn't get tangled up with the rod or camshaft and that he was watching when he drained his oil. It may have been broken for a while and may have never caused a problem but at least now we know that there is nothing loose in the motor and if it ever stops raining, he can start cutting grass again. Only cost was for pan gasket, valve cover gasket and bottom seal and a little time spent learning about Intek motors.