prosunseeker

Hello Members,

New owner here of an 2001 Ap1 with 125k miles. I'm somewhat mechanically inclined and understand how things work. I'm a bit hesitant to get into things too much in case I break something or reach a point of no return. The car I purchased has no history but seems to run just fine except for clutch buzz. A few questions:

How often do valves need adjustment?
What happens if you don't adjust them?
If 1 is a person with no mechanical experience and 10 is ASE certified, where should you be for a valve adjustment?
All this talk about valve adjustment and broken retainers has me nervous about revving my car. Should I be worried with so many miles and no history? She really runs fine but revving past 6k she gets mighty noisy which I expect somewhat.

Dealer for these?

Orjinal

I wouldn't even recommend dealerships for an oil change.

Post in your local forum and find a mechanic/forum member who has experience with adjusting valves on s2000.

Garhead

LOL tru dat!

Car Analogy

Have to concur. DO NOT bring your S to dealer. EVER.

I cant enumerate the reasons. Trust us.

Valve adjust is a 5 on your scale. Its not at all difficult, but it is possible to screw it up, and cause damage.

Follow this one rule though, and you cant screw it up. Dont adjust any valve whose cam lobe is not pointing up. Got it?

You go through the whole, turn to this mark, adjust that, turn more, adjust this, etc. You can screw that up. But if you just make sure the valve you are now about to adjust has its cam lobe pointed up, you did it right.

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Chuck S

Car with a (service) history! What' s that? I know of no one anal enough to record this stuff past the last service. Your Cessna may have a log book, but few used cars do.

Noise could be valve clatter or the timing chain tensioner.

Valve adjustment skill 5? Probably more like a 2 which involves the ability to read simple sentences and recognize simple tools. Right tools are less than $30. Photo essay in the library. Tedious but simple. Get a gasket set off Ebay and if the spark plugs are old change them too as the engine is easier to turn over with them out anyway. Torque wrenches are on sale at Harbor Freight in a couple of weeks. Don't be surprised if the valve clearance is fine -- or wildly out of spec. Timing chain tensioner rattle seems common enough. Mine was silent but I changed at 40,000 miles as preventive maintenance.

You can't hurt the car "revving" it, the rev-limiter prevents damage. Where you can hurt the car is down shifting to the wrong gear at high speeds. Down shifting from 5th to 4th but hitting 2d at 80mph will spin the motor well beyond where it should go. Skip the fast-n-furious shifting!


-- Chuck

prosunseeker

Thanks for the input. I think I may give it a try later this month. While I'm at it, I'll repaint the valve cover and change the spark plugs. By the way, I called the dealer wondering what they would say about valve adjustment. They said to not worry about it until you see a check engine light. I think the next best thing to do is to find another S2000 to get a frame of reference on whats normal.

redwing497

I don't think you'll get any check engine light for the valve unless something catastrophic happens. At 125k and no knowledge of valve adjustment ever being done, I highly, highly recommend you do it or have someone do it as soon as possible.

windhund116

Valve adjustment on this car has a couple of problems. Little space to do cylinder #4 correctly. And low engine = back pain.

Have you ever done a valve adjustment before? Have an idea on what the correct feel of the gauges? If not, prolly best to have a good mechanic do the first adjustment. Hopefully, can watch him and learn some tricks.

Check spark plugs. Could be original ones. Unless you know for sure when the last oil, filter change was --- maybe best to do them now. Check air filter.


Good luck with new, used car!

Car Analogy

The good mechanic you are looking for is either someone tjat knows S2000, and has done vavle adjustments before, or is someone that often does valve adjustments on all the other cars with adjustable valves, which is pretty much none.

You know what mechanics do have lots of valve adjustment experience? Motorcycle mechanics. That is who you want. No, not a Harley mechanic. Harleys arent Motorcycles, they are Harleys. Find an actual Motorcycle mechanic. They will immediately recognize the adjustment.

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steven975

This advice is downright scary.

Thing is, even when these cars were new, dealers did not see them very often, nor do much beyond warranty work and oil changes. Since these cars were so dependable, warranty work wasn't really substantial. Many owners do their own oil. Now, all knowledge of these cars is effectively gone from Honda's dealership network. These aren't really that exotic, but compared to their other models, they're different enough.

The fortunate thing is that the valve adjustment and inspection, and the timing chain tensioner are not hard. If your retainers are fine in an inspection, there's no need to replace them. It's when they get damaged due to over-rev that the concern should be there.