RolanTHUNDER

AP1 with about 130k miles. After spending several hours researching how to DIY valve clearance I finally took the plunge today. I had to improvise with the bent feeler gauges since it topped out at 0.20mm (largest in the bunch) by combining sizes to make the correct gauge size for clearance between 0.21 - 0.29. I really took my time with this as it was my first time so I checked every valve multiple times and from multiple angles. To my dismay I found that not even the 0.20mm gauge would fit in ANY of the adjuster gaps! That obviously meant they were way too tight right?
I decided to use the info underneath the hood as a guide choosing to go 0.22mm on the intake side and 0.25mm on the exhaust side. After double checking everything I bolted everything back up, held my breath for a long time then hit the start button...... she fired up nicely! First thing I noticed is that the valve train sound is much more pronounced now. Pretty loud compared to before. Is this normal? On the road she feels more aggressive especially when VTEC kicks in. It's a pretty hard kick now compared to before. The kick feels like it did when I used to run without the airbox lid but now I put the lid on and it feels as aggressive as without it. This I like. I'm still paranoid that the job may have to be redone. Should I be worried about anything? Did anyone else who adjusted their valves from too tight to within spec find their engine sound got louder?

Thanks peeps.

Charper732

Your engine was COLD when you performed this, right? As in, it wasn't running at all the day you did the valve adjustment.

RolanTHUNDER

Yes completely cold. Sat overnight then I did the adjustment

Car Analogy

Tight valves are quiet. Properly adjusted valves make some noise. If they were too tight, you would expect more noise afterwards. Seems like you're good.

Tight valves make more power, at the risk of damage, burnt valves. Only if they were so tight they never closed would you lose power from too tight. But then engine would barely run, and valve damage would happen quickly.

Also running lidless on airbox is proven to LOSE power, due to hot air. It does make it sound louder, and make vtec really loud and obvious.

That it might feel faster is an illusion. Butt dyno is not accurate. Likely the feel of more power from valve adjustment (from too tight to just right) is also illusionary.

Perhaps what you are feeling is engine running smoother overall, not necessarily more power.

Note, adjusting from too loose to just right WILL make more power after VA. Maybe some of your valves were too loose, and its because those are now corrected you really are making more power.

RolanTHUNDER

Thanks for the input! I feel more at ease now. I am 100 percent sure that no matter what angles I tried with the gauges I could not fit the 0.20 or even 0.18mm if I remember correctly into any of the gaps of either the intake or exhaust sides. I was properly worried at that point. It never had issues while driving or felt like it was barely running as you mentioned extremely tight valves would cause.

You're right about the lid on/off. I'm leaving it on from now on. I blocked off the resonator in the airbox as well. Makes it very slightly deeper sounding. Maybe on the next drive I'll take her up to 9000rpm because I was paranoid revving that high just after the job lol. Went up to 8000rpm and everything was A ok.

jwzimm

Are you sure you weren't looking at the inch sizes and thinking they were metric? Unless you had a strange feeler gauge set most of them top out at .020" which is equivalent to .508mm.

RolanTHUNDER

The gauges I have showed metric only I believe. Clearly said 0.20mm, 0.05mm, etc then went on to that extra o.xxx but ended off with mm. U make me want to double check now lol.

cosmomiller

I have never heard of someone "combining" gauges to make them add up to a desired limit. It seems to me there would be too much room for error.

jwzimm

A standard set of feeler gauges goes from .006" to .020" (inches)
.05mm equates to roughly .002". Two-Thousandths of an inch is VERY thin (about half the thickness of a sheet of copy paper). Unless you have a really weird set of feeler gauges you may want to check them and make sure you read the sizes correctly.

RolanTHUNDER

I'll get another set of gauges just to be 100 percent sure and then if its more accurate I'll redo the adjustment.