Gernby

How difficult is it to see this with the cams installed? Is there a way to measure the gap between the retainer and rocker?

David1

You can somewhat see them with the cams installed, but you need a mirror to see the ones next to the rear cam tower. All of my stems were where they should have been after my over rev. The one valve that was ready to drop progresssed that far in 130 miles after I inspected them. One valve had no lash since it had hit the piston and the car ran fine. When I get the parts back I will show how many retainers cracked since you cant see the under side of the retainer without a very good small dental mirror. BTW, the parts around the valve stem that looks split are called keepers and these are what really holds the valve with spring tension on the retainer.

apex2k

[QUOTE=gernby,Nov 15 2004, 04:35 PM]

slipstream444

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Billman250

YES...the keepers have stayed in the same place on the valve. Only the retainer itself split and made it's way upwards.

David...Holy F!@#....Now in David's pic of the single valve, the valve is NOT in it's correct relative position to the keepers, unlike mine. Question David...Is that cyl #1, and is the tip of that one valve broken off, or just knocked way the hell down?


This car is all back together and out the door. No cracked guides, no burnt seats. 16 valves, 16 retainers, 32 keepers was all that was used in rebuilding the head.

Gernby

I went ahead and did a valve adjustment yesterday. I looked as closely as I could at the valves and retainers. None of them looked like the pictures above, but they didn't all look exactly the same. Some retainers looked further down on the valve stems than others, but I don't know for sure.

On a side note, I went about 30K miles since my last valve adjustment, and only 3 valves were ever so slightly out of "gernby's spec". I have been running .007" intake clearance and .009" exhaust clearance for about 35K miles, so I was surprised they were all so close. I only had 1 intake valve and 1 exhaust valve that had a little bit more drag than I wanted (still probably within .0005"), and 1 intake valve that had too little drag (still probably within .0005").

With all this broken retainer talk, I wonder if tighter than spec clearances would be better in the long run (with more frequent inspections). I also wonder how much more the risk of broken retainers will be with more agressive cams and valve springs.

David1

Nothing on the valve was broken off. The valve was just hanging there. Another start or two and it would have dropped into the cylinder and cost me a lot more than just rebuilding the head. The car had a cel but ran ok. Poor idle though from low compression. The pics are from Hardtopguy and I cant tell from the photo what cylinder it was. I know I bent a valve on cyl #1 because when I checked the valve clearances, one of the intakes had 0 clearance. On the power stroke, the valve was still pushing up on the rocker! I was as lucky as you can get. As soon as I get the parts back I will post pics. I

slipstream444

Gernby,

I've spoken with Jeff G. @ Ganley Honda in Cleveland, and he noted that the best indication of an impending problem is the lack of uniformity in valve stem to retainer height from valve to valve. Pulling the cams and rolling back the rockers (as you know) is the best way to determine if there's a problem. However, if you've already noticed a possible problem ... it may be a good idea to replace your retainers and keepers before the problem gets worse.

David1 noted that his bad valves progressed from "OK" to dropped in under 200 miles ...

Your valves may not slip as fast ... but there's no way of determining how long they'll hang in there.

Gernby

If there is a "spec" retainer to valve stem end distance (which there should be), then it shouldn't be very hard to make a guage. Even if the cam needs to be removed, it would be worth checking!

David1

This was cylinder #1