Ajusting Valve Clearance this afernoon

[Dr. Jerryrigger]

So my Subaru could just a valve clearance adjustment and I was thinking... Wouldn't it be good for FE (and bad for HP) if I set them to the largest gap recommended, or maybe a little more.
Any thoughts? How far would be too far?

[hondaguy72]

Valve adjustment (outside spec) can only adversely affect economy. Too tight or loose will either cause the valve to hang open or give you valvetrain noise and increased wear. Keep them in spec.

[DRW]

How hard is it to adjust the valves in your car?
If it's easy you have the freedom to experiment with it. I'd check all valves and see how far off they are and see how bad they need to be before you get valve tick. The engine should be able to handle slightly looser clearance as long as you keep the engine rpm lower. If the clearance is too loose it could pound the valvestem and mushroom the tip at high rpm.

[Dr. Jerryrigger]

Originally Posted by DRW

How hard is it to adjust the valves in your car?
If it's easy you have the freedom to experiment with it. I'd check all valves and see how far off they are and see how bad they need to be before you get valve tick. The engine should be able to handle slightly looser clearance as long as you keep the engine rpm lower. If the clearance is too loose it could pound the valvestem and mushroom the tip at high rpm.

Well the adjusting part isn't all that hard (though I wish the threads were finer), I don't think I want to deal with doing this a second time. I had to take out the washer fluid, rad fan, bat, other stuff I'll forget to put back...
I'm only 3/4 done now, and I've been working on it all morning (I took thing apart yesterday after noon).

I've been shooting for the high end of factory spec. To make life complicated, those specs are in mm, and my tools are not, so I may be going over by up to .0003", but when I started some were over by more ten times that. I wish I had done a better job of measuring them first, as I was getting some valve tick (why I'm doing this in the first place). I'm also now wishing I had giving it a sea foam treatment (which I have never done) as now I'm worried the valves may have 0.003" of carbon on them, and that's why the valve lash was off in the first place...

Oh well, I guess that would be a good test of sea foam; to check the valve lash before and after. Maybe I'll do that in the next few week, a before and after compression test would also be nice to see. Now I'm just rambling as my back hurts, and I've avoiding finishing the job. Maybe I should have a beer....

[imzjustplayin]

apparently adjusting valve lash is something that takes practice and you shouldn't expect that you'll get good at it the first time you try it.

[Dr. Jerryrigger]

Originally Posted by *************

apparently adjusting valve lash is something that takes practice and you shouldn't expect that you'll get good at it the first time you try it.

Absolutely, I wouldn't recommend the job to a novice. My first valve took about 10 times as long as the last.
I worked as a machinist some time ago, which helped me with this job. Going into it I was quite comfortable measuring things to .001", with out that it would have been days of fiddling and or bad results.