I just took my throttle body apart to clean it and maybe polish it while the engine is down. There is a body on top that the vacuum lines feed into. When I pulled it I found a couple of galleries, one with a little ball in it. What is that ball and it looks like it might drop into the throttle body if it gets loose and end up in the engine.

 

Looking at the diagrams of the TB GM printed in their service manuals, there is no metal ball in any of the TB passages, and there wasn't in either my 3.1 or 2.8 throttle bodies. Get it out of there before something bad happens. Maybe someone used it to plug one of the passages in the vacuum block (the rubber part the vac lines connect to) and it got down into the TB somehow. Either way, get it out of there.

 

Thanks Dan, I will do that and see how it runs. It is in that little body that bolts to the top of the Throttle Body and the only way it stays in there is if it is jammed in- loose, it just falls through into the throttle body and it then would have a clear run down the IM to a valve seat!!

 

I hear you there. I keep wondering where the bolt came from that ended up in the #6 cylinder of my 2.8 and helped kill it...

 

not good, get it out !