Lifter replacement Q's for those who have done it

[kenamond]

I'm getting ready to replace my stock 2g lifters with revised lifters (TopLine). I've got the lifters and new VC gasket set, I've read the vfaq article a few times, and read all of the threads I found on this forum. But I still have a few questions. I'm one of those guys who has to know how to do something before I do it or I don't do it.

The vfaq article implies that when the cam lobes are up that there'll actually be no compression on the valves/rockers/lifters. Is that true? I know you still have to compress the valves to get the rocker off the lifter, but is there actually no compression on the rocker when the lobe is up?

When prying (either for removal, installation, or seating the rockers on the lifters), should I use blocks of wood to protect the aluminum head from the prybar and screwdriver?

When a rocker comes off, I don't want it flying off somewhere I can't find it (my garage is still recovering from my wife's recent garage sale, so there're plenty of hiding places for a tiny rocker to find). Any recommendations on how to keep the rockers from disappearing (rag over them?)? And should I use a face shield ?

Everyone says that the motor will tick for a while after putting in the drained lifters. If that's the case, I can't see how priming them with the MPI fuse pulled would do much of anything (turning the motor over for 30 seconds is nothing compared to idling for 5 minutes). Should I bother with priming? If the lifters are coated in oil, I wouldn't be worrying about dry metals touching.

Finally, for those of you who used TopLine revised lifters, are they full of oil in the plastic wrap? I'm not opening them until I'm actually putting them in (decrease chance of dirt). I know to drain them, but I'm wondering if they're just coated and drained already or full of oil.

The 2nd part of the vfaq article talks about rotating the oil passages to be 180* out of alignment, but the 1st part says the lifters rotate normally. So do I rotate or not?

As you can see from my questions, I like to know the details before I start. Maybe a personality flaw, but my projects almost always work out great as a result.

I intend to take plenty of pictures and put a tech article together with a lot more than the vfaq, but that assumes this all goes smoothly.

Sorry for the length. Answering any of those specific questions would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

 

[steve]

I used the 6G72 procedure and primed the lash adjusters with clean diesel fuel and installed them filled. The bleed down quickly and no chance of bending a valve. I didn't do anything special with the oil passages besides making sure all the air was out with I filled them.

Rockets flying around is a real possibility, When possible I held them with one hand taking them out and putting them in. The darn thing have homing radar for the oil drain holes in the head and come close to falling down inside so hang onto.

The cam isn't really compressing the rocker or valve but the adjuster is taking up the slack so you do have to compress the valve spring to be able to lift the rocker up off the lash adjuster.

The biggest problem was finding good angles for using the prybar on the various cylinders. If you have a plastic mat of sorts it might be better than wood that can splinter.

Steve

 

[kenamond]

I used the 6G72 procedure and primed the lash adjusters with clean diesel fuel and installed them filled. The bleed down quickly and no chance of bending a valve. I didn't do anything special with the oil passages besides making sure all the air was out with I filled them.

Rockets flying around is a real possibility, When possible I held them with one hand taking them out and putting them in. The darn thing have homing radar for the oil drain holes in the head and come close to falling down inside so hang onto.

The cam isn't really compressing the rocker or valve but the adjuster is taking up the slack so you do have to compress the valve spring to be able to lift the rocker up off the lash adjuster.

The biggest problem was finding good angles for using the prybar on the various cylinders. If you have a plastic mat of sorts it might be better than wood that can splinter.

Steve

Thanks!

Do you have a link for the 6G72 procedure? I looked, but didn't find anything with diesel. I did find this one (MS Word doc), and I'm wondering if any of the techniques are worth it for the 4G63.

I'll be pretty damned careful of the oil passages. A zip tie somehow dropped down there once, and I found out just how inconvenient pulling the oil pan on an AWD can be.

 

[steve]

Do you have a link for the 6G72 procedure?

3000GT FSM or this overhaul manual from our fiends at Manual CD page 11E-88 bottom of the page http://www.ecanfix.com/users/manualcd/gift/3s/6g72_overhaul_full.pdf

Steve

 

[kenamond]

3000GT FSM or this overhaul manual from our fiends at Manual CD page 11E-88 bottom of the page http://www.ecanfix.com/users/manualcd/gift/3s/6g72_overhaul_full.pdf

Steve

Much thanks! So I'm guessing the lower viscosity of the diesel fuel vs. oil is why you can fill them up w/o bending valves?

I'll probably turn the motor over a couple of times manually just to make sure, but I'm still weary of damaging the head/valves with filled lifters. But if steve and this manual say it works, I guess I should just have faith and quit "OCD-ing".

 

[steve]

Much thanks! So I'm guessing the lower viscosity of the diesel fuel vs. oil is why you can fill them up w/o bending valves?

I'll probably turn the motor over a couple of times manually just to make sure, but I'm still weary of damaging the head/valves with filled lifters.

Yes, the much lower viscosity causes the lash adjuster (we don't have lifters) to leak down faster.
You have to turn the engine over by hand as your replacing them so you'll see than they bleed down as the cam and roller load them.

The advantage to this way is the asdjusters are lubed from the beginning and don't have any air to purge. They will make a little noise on startup until oil displaces the diesel.

Go find some diesel fuel and get this done.

Steve

 

[selmerguy]

I have replaced my lash adusters with 3g and they are very much quiter than stock. I read the vfaq on how to do it many times but I was to scared to use a prybar on my cams. If it was me I would just pull the cams and retime the motor. It is a hour or so more work but much easier that pring.

 

[kenamond]

I figured I'd follow up on this.

I installed the lifters successfully using the prying technique. I started out with the diesel priming idea, but it flat out didn't work. Even with diesel in the lifter, you can't compress it, so it's impossible to get the rocker back in. Maybe I was missing something, but I couldn't figure it out. Lifter was just as hard to compress as when full of oil (i.e. impossible). So I just primed with oil, drained, then installed.

I submitted a tech article, but I've not heard back or seen it show up. I wanted to edit it in a few places after I sent it in (finished it at like 2am on a "school night" and rushed it a bit).

Anyway, the tick is gone. I honestly smile just listening to my motor idle.

 

[steve]

Glad to hear you got them changed over but I don't get what problem you had.
It sounds like you were expecting to compress the adjuster by hand to install the rocker. They go in just like taking them out, you have to compress the valve spring to fit the rocker over the lash adjuster. They leaked down for me under the force applied by the spring and cam as you turned the engine over to replace the next. You can tell that none of the valves are held open when you done.

Steve

 

[kenamond]

Glad to hear you got them changed over but I don't get what problem you had.
It sounds like you were expecting to compress the adjuster by hand to install the rocker. They go in just like taking them out, you have to compress the valve spring to fit the rocker over the lash adjuster. They leaked down for me under the force applied by the spring and cam as you turned the engine over to replace the next. You can tell that none of the valves are held open when you done.

Steve

The lash adjuster is spring-loaded so that it extends if left to its own devices, and when it's full of diesel or motor oil, you can't re-compress it without disabling the check valve (paperclip). So if it's full (or partially full) of oil/diesel and you put it in the head, the spring extends and the check valve makes it practically impossible to recompress. And when it's fully extended, it's much too tall to get the rocker on top.

I had to fully drain them, put them in the head, get the rocker positioned on the end of the valve stem, pry the rocker with one hand+prybar and compress the lash adjuster with the other hand+2nd-prybar (screwdriver would've worked). I couldn't see any way to compress the adjuster with the other hand. Maybe a 2nd person could use the paperclip to compress it, but I'd imagine that paperclip would get wedged into the adjuster when the rocker snapped over top.

So I must still be missing the trick.

EDIT: below is a picture showing the adjuster uncompressed and compressed. It's a lot longer when fully extended, and I wasn't able to compress the valvespring enough to get the rocker over top of the adjuster.

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

 

[toojung2die]

I installed 3g lash adjusters almost two years ago and the only thing I remember that was difficult was finding a fulcrum for the pry bar that wouldn't slip and would keep the pry bar from nicking the rockers or cams. After fighting the first two lash adjusters in using wood and other semi-soft fulcrums I almost gave up. I finally settled on using a rolled up terry cloth hand towel. After that the rest of the lash adjusters went in pop, pop, pop. I bought the lash adjusters from Parts Dinosaur. The lifters have been silent ever since.

 

[steve]

So if it's full (or partially full) of oil/diesel and you put it in the head, the spring extends and the check valve makes it practically impossible to recompress. And when it's fully extended, it's much too tall to get the rocker on top.

I didn't find it impossible to get the rocker on top of the lash adjuster, I just had to lift the rocker up compressing the valve until it could be popped onto the adjuster. The hard part was lifting it up and then sliding it over without it coming off the valve stem. Once the roller was on the adjuster the force of the valve spring quickly caused it to leak down.

Did you fill yours up with oil before and then switch to diesel? Perhaps there was still a lot of oil inside.

They are difficult to compress, they do leak down both with oil and diesel inside but a greatly different rates. That's one of the tests in the FSM for checking the lash adjuster to measure the leak down rate.

Thanks for explaining what you ran into. I'll watch for that in the future.

Steve

 

[kenamond]

I didn't find it impossible to get the rocker on top of the lash adjuster, I just had to lift the rocker up compressing the valve until it could be popped onto the adjuster. The hard part was lifting it up and then sliding it over without it coming off the valve stem. Once the roller was on the adjuster the force of the valve spring quickly caused it to leak down.

Did you fill yours up with oil before and then switch to diesel? Perhaps there was still a lot of oil inside.

They are difficult to compress, they do leak down both with oil and diesel inside but a greatly different rates. That's one of the tests in the FSM for checking the lash adjuster to measure the leak down rate.

Thanks for explaining what you ran into. I'll watch for that in the future.

Steve

I tried to install the first lash adjuster with diesel, and I couldn't pry the rocker high enough. I certainly may have been able to do it, but it was the first one I'd ever done, so I didn't yet know what I was doing.

The revised adjusters had some lubricant in them, but they certainly weren't full. I pumped plenty of diesel through it, so it probably flushed a lot of the lubricant out. But that didn't matter, because I never got a rocker on top of a diesel-filled adjuster. It may have worked just fine.

toojunk2die: That's exactly what I ended up doing: clean shop rag rolled up as a fulcrum. I think that's the biggest tip anyone should know when doing this. I have it in the tech article.

Anyway, car sounds tip-top now, VC gasket isn't leaking, didn't break anything, and only bled a little bit (sharp edge of cam lobe sliced my finger a bit).

Thanks for all the help guys!