Dropped my 3.0 heads off to the machine shop today... UPDATED :)

[ritmusic2k]

My 3.2 swap has been dragging on and on... in two weeks the car will have been off the road for 4 months...

...but progress continues nevertheless.

Just tore the cams and such off the top end this morning; both heads are getting resurfaced for $50, which I'm told is a pretty good price.

But while I was there my buddy that works at the shop convinced me to go for the full valve job. I'm kinda regretting it for financial reasons, but I'm glad that I opted to do it while the car is all apart; way better than deciding to do it later.

Being that this is my first project of such magnitude, I've never really dealt with valve jobs before. They're charging me $270 - which they said themselves was a pretty expensive valve job. I'm wondering though if it, while being an expensive job, isn't actually too expensive for these engines.

Any of you guys who've already been where I am, how much did your headwork cost you?

 

[LOUDSHO92]

You should have called me!!!

Anywyas you only need a clean up on the heads to remove the casting marks. The heads already flow really well and you cant get much more out of them. In fact if you do too much you will loose on the low end.

If you need valve seals or anything let me know.

 

[ritmusic2k]

Heh,

Didn't know you had a machine shop hookup, Matt!

They're not really milling them down any; I was adamant about shaving as little as possible; they're just resurfacing to make sure it's nice and flat and ready for the gaskets.

Regardless, don't you worry... if I get the heads back by tomorrow I'm dragging you out to do my valve lash adjustment.

EDIT: Already got my stem seals from RCM; the machine shop has them for the valve job.

 

[yamahaSHO]

A valve job just consists of grinding new or reseating old valves, with a possible swirl polish. $270 for both heads is on the cheaper side. I paid $791 for a 3-angle valve job, a very slight shave, and studs... If all you end up paying is $270 in the end, feel lucky.

 

[ritmusic2k]

And so it begins...



I ran into a little problem with the machine shop today. The problem has been resolved, but now I have a new question, and need gurus to chime in.


Long story short, the shop is now only doing the resurface... not the valve job. Before this had happened, they had asked for the valve stem seals that I ordered from RCM.

When I talked to them today, they gave me one of the two bags back and told me "these are the wrong seals". Now, when I first looked at them, I'd noticed that there were two part numbers, and that the two bags of seals looked different from each other. There were 12 of one # and 12 of the other. At the time I'd just hoped that there was a difference between the intake and exhaust seals, and that RCM knew when they were doing.

Anyway, bag #1 had seals made of a tarnished-yellow metal and brick-red gasket material. These were apparently the correct ones (they are still in the possession of the machine shop, so I can't include a part #).

Bag #2 has seals that look almost identical... but they're made of an unfinished silver metal and black gasket material. There looks to be an extremely slight difference between the shapes of the two gaskets. The SKU for these was 7 57522 77633 2. These are the ones that the machine shop said were wrong. Also on the sticker was a part number I196AA.


So, I guess I have two questions: (1) is the machine shop correct, and (2) since the machine shop isn't doing the valve job, am I even going to be using these seals?

In other words, since the remainder of the top-end stuff is going to be work I complete on my own, are the stem seals even something I can do myself? If the answer to that is "yes", then I guess I need to find out whether or not I need to contact RCM about getting the correct parts, or if I did in fact receive the right stuff...

Sorry that was kinda wordy - I had to sound it all out myself before I figured out what I really needed to ask. Any help will be greatly appreciated. Thanks guys!

 

[yamahaSHO]

Time for a new machine shop....

http://www.shophoenixproject.com/stemseals/stemseals.htm

The exhaust seals have the black seal and the intake is brown. The are the correct seals. It sounds like the machine shop isn't very compitent.

 

[LJRuddy]

I know that there are two types of seals; one for the intake and one for the exhaust. It is possible that the ones you have now are a bit longer and fit one one half of the valves while the shorter ones go on the other. What possibly happened is that the machine shop took the shorter and put them on the valves that need a longer seal. They fit and so they thought it was the right kind. They went to put the longer seals where the shorter ones go and they did not fit. That is why they sent them back to you. This is not fact but it is, in essence, what probably happened at the shop.

Footnotes- there are 2 different sizes of seals for the heads. Shop flipflopped the two sizes, put one size in the wrong set of valves while the other seals were not able to fit into the other set of valves.

 

[ritmusic2k]

Thanks, guys. They'd better not have done anything to screw me up...

The problem is that the machine shop is not the 1st point of contact for me. They're contracted by the place I have direct contact with. This place gave me a full refund on the valve job, but it looks like I'm going to need to make sure that the other guys didn't get started on it and screw it up. Man, I don't need any more delays.

I'll keep everyone posted with my progress. Hopefully these things will be back in my possession by the weekend.

 

[Eric VerValin]

Well, I had a 3 angle job, and a resurfacing of the head for $320. I got my valve seals from SHO Bros and mine were all the same? Apparently they fit, and fit well, because I don't seems to be losing any compression And yea, I'd say that was a good price.

 

[ritmusic2k]

Update -

The machine shop didn't actually do anything with the valve stem seals I gave them. They must've referenced a catalog that only showed one part #.

Regardless, I caught them in time and canceled the valve job. They had the heads back to me, resurfaced, by the end of the same day. So, that's cool.

So... we'll see about maybe getting another shop to do the valve stem seals, or I might just throw the heads on there as is... I'll decide by tonight.

 

[yamahaSHO]

Well, I had a 3 angle job, and a resurfacing of the head for $320. I got my valve seals from SHO Bros and mine were all the same? Apparently they fit, and fit well, because I don't seems to be losing any compression And yea, I'd say that was a good price.

Bad valve seals do not give you a compression loss. If anything, it would help as the bad seal allows oil to leak into the cylinder sealing the rings better.


You can do the valves stem seals yourself... I can do them in about 5 minutes (yes, all 24 of them).