Valve Adjustment

[40 Deluxe]

Sponsored Links (Register now to hide all advertisements)

Originally Posted by Leatherback 57

All my old valves had the stems cut down. Before doing valve job, I adjusted Al lifters down to bottom. Ground 3 angle seats and installed new valves and lapped in. I use the plus 9 method for valve adjust. Clearance before adjusting valves as noted. After adjusting all valves to.015 a couple lifters only have .010 left before they bottom out. The stems I ground allowed for. 050 extra for further adjustment if needed. Usually clearance gets larger with wear. Just wandered if I should give the2 valves a stem grind or let go.

On a flathead engine I suspect that, if anything, clearances are going to tighten up with miles as the valves wear into the seats. Not much else there to wear. The heel of the cam lobes will never wear, nor will the stem and lifter faces. If the bottoms of the lifters wear, kiss the cam goodbye in short order.
On overhead valves, clearances can get larger with wear: pushrod tips, rocker arm faces and pivot points all wear.