Lifter install....with specifics! For future use in Tech Articles!!!

[bosljeff]

Okay, vfaq and other posts have installs regarding the lifters, but they aren't all that specific.

I'm installing 16 3rd gen lifters and I need to know specifics/details:

1. Should I do an oil change just before, just after, or both?

2. Should I do an engine flush just before, just after, or both?

3. Can I simply make a mark on the timing belt so I can remove the cams, drop the lifters in, then reinstall cam and belt?
-Would I still have to check/adjust the timing?
-Or should I just take the time, tough it out and leave everything in place and pop the old ones out and wedge the new ones in?
-I remember one time simply taking off the valve cover, and taking just one lifter out and damn if it wasn't a bi*** to put it back in, let alone 16 of em with all that crap in the way.

4. Should I play it safe and install a new valve cover gasket?

Ideas, thoughts, suggestions, tips, step by step, links: all would be appreciated.

Thank you.

Jeff

 

[Defiant]

1.) I'd put new oil in with the new lifters.

2.) Unless you've taken a shit in your engine, there's never a need to flush it.

3.) You don't touch the cams. You lever out the followers and yank the lifters. Read over those VFAQs again.

4.) Any time you're inside any part of an engine that has a gasket on it, replace the gasket.

 

[psychlow]

Defiant, I know you're wiser than I at cars, DSMs, and life in general, but at $45 to replace the VC gasket and all the sparkplug grommets, I'm gonna disagree with you on that one. I've had good success reusing the cam cover gasket 10 seperate times on two seperate DSMs. As long as you do a good, even, thin layer of RTV and let it dry, it should seal up. Even on one that started leaking, I was able to re-RTV the gasket, torque the cover down properly and it stopped leaking.

When replacing the lifters, make sure you rotate the camshafts (17mm wrench on the cam gear bolt, rotate CLOCKWISE) so that the cam lobe isn't depressing the lifter you're removing. Otherwise, you'll never get it out. I usually take the spark plugs out, and drop something long (like a wooden dowell) into the plug hole to make sure the piston isn't at TDC, just for piece of mind - I don't have to worry about bending a valve trying to get the lifter out. It's unlikely you'll move the valve enough to worry about it anyway, but I like to be overcautious.

 

[bosljeff]

Great ideas keep 'em coming.

Is there any preventative care one could do to prevent/maintain the new lifters?

I am going to religiously use a dsm oil filter and mobil 1 10w30. Should I thicken it up to 15w40 (I think that is their "performance" car weight?)?

I need more stuff ya'll, I want a good tech.

Thanks for the specifics psychlow.

btw: I have a spare valve cover gasket, so I mine as well use it....

 

[dave99gst]

i agree with psychlow about the v/c gasket , its pretty re-useable in general.
if i had the loot to get a new gasket every time i removed the v/c i would.

 

[awd4g63]

Soak the lifters in oil before you put them in, also.

 

[cmarrero]

Be careful not to drop a lifter into the oil drain holes. Those slippery bastards are hard to get out of those holes sometimes. Also you should probably use a K&N oil filter or a Mitsubishi one. They seem to work the best for our cars.

 

[bosljeff]

Soak the lifters in oil before you put them in, also.

Good idea, I like it.

Boz

 

[psychlow]

Yeah, as stated, DO NOT drop a lifter in the oil drain holes. To prevent this, stuff shop towels in the holes. You can easily pull the shop towels out, but its much harder to pick a lifter back out. I'd have lost 2 or 3 down there when I took mine out if I hadn't, because they pop out (sometimes violently) due to the pressure the valve springs exert on them, and it's hard to control where they'll end up at.

Also, wrap whatever you're using to pry the lifters out with something (duct/electrical tape maybe?) to make sure you don't score up your head like I did with my crowbar.

 

[bosljeff]

Well all, hopefully I will be changin' the lifters out sometime this week. I will try to get good pix and stuff for a good tech article.

Again, any ideas/help/experience will be helpful. The clicking lifters are an infamous problem, let's save everyone the hassle and compile a worthy tech article.

Thanks for all your help.

Boz

 

[bosljeff]

Okay all, I'm changing them Sunday so any tips and so on would be massively appreciated. 'carly' and I are having a DSM day: cleaning IC (and pipes), TB, swapping ISCs, and changing out the lifters.

So, any and all ideas/info regarding lifter install would be awesome. I'll take pix and compile everything for a tech article.

Keep it up.

Boz

 

[bosljeff]

If anyone cares or still may have ideas/advice here are my plans for Sunday:

1. Lifters ( w/valve cover gasket, oil change, oil filter).
2. Cleaning: InterC and i.c. pipes and Throttle B.
3. a. Replace ISC. b. IC wheel well screen thing.


Also, is it seriously as archaic as vfaq's lifter cleaning/replacement?

http://www.vfaq.com/mods/lifters.html

I mean, I don't like the idea of prying off/snapping on 32 lifters that are supposed to be all pretty and smooth with a crowbar or screwdriver. Aren't the surfaces of the rocker and the lifter supposed to remain scratchless?


Thanks for the therapy.

Boz