For all you who do your own valve adjustments (I guess that's just about everyone), how messy is it? I've been putting it off for too long and now that I have the day off, I think I'm going to go for it today. I've set aside five hours. I hope that's enough. Thanks for your wisdom.

Alex

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1983 300D (parked for four years)
2012 VW Sportwagen TDI Manual
2001 Miata SE
1962 Chevrolet Corvair Rampside

Not messy at all, I usually keep a shop rag handy. If the vc area is really dirty, you might degrease and clean the area before starting the job. Good luck, its really easy.

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2001 Dodge Ram 2500 Cummins Turbo Diesel - 4x4, auto, 3.54 gears, long bed
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'92 300D 2.5 Turbodiesel - sold
'83 300D Turbodiesel - 4 speed manual/2.88 diff - sold
'87 300D Turbodiesel - sold
'82 300D Turbodiesel - sold

Thanks. I still have to run to Sears to pick up a set of feeler gauges and then I have to let the engine cool off, so I probably won't attack this until 1 or 2.

Alex

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1983 300D (parked for four years)
2012 VW Sportwagen TDI Manual
2001 Miata SE
1962 Chevrolet Corvair Rampside

I thought there was a differential used when adjusting the valves warm. Take DH's advice and de-grease the engine (will make the job cleaner) and wait until tomorrow AM when the engine will be cold. I always do mine when the engine is stone cold. Otherwise the job is really easy.

Good Luck,
Mark

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1987 300DT 127K
1987 300TDT 283K (Sold)
1999 528iTa 75K
1991 300D 2.5T 214K - Dead Tranny
1984 300DT 375K (Sold)

Check the archives on what folks think of Sears quality. I read a couple of posts where folks claimed that there is considerable variation in blade thickness from one set to another.

Sixto
91 300SE
81 300SD

Just the valve adjustment (first time is 1-2 hours). However, if you decide to clean your valve cover after taking it completely out (area under accelerator linkage brackets atteched to valve cover gets pretty gritty and gummy) this will take additional time as will cleaning the bolts and additional parts of the throttle linkage that you disassemble if you become overly meticulous and decide to clean them as well. All depends. On the otherhand, I am not even sure that you need to disassemble much of the linkage if you simply flop the valve cover over.

If you do go the overly meticulous route your engine will certainly look better and make you feel better but may eat a substantial portion of your 5 hours.

Good luck. Post your results.

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2008 GL320CDI 6K
1970 280SL 112K
1982 240D 210K (Sold)
1973 220D 220K (Sold)
1967 200D 160K (Sold)
1992 400E 139K (Sold)
1988 300E 148K (Sold)
1987 300D 257K (Sold)
1991 300E 108K (Sold)
1987 300E 131K (Sold)
1978 300D TMU (Sold)
1980 300D TMU (Sold)
MBCA Member

I did the adjustment and it took almost four hours because I disassembled a lot of the linkage and took my time checking and re-checking the valves. Sears ran out of feeler gauges so I borrowed my mechanic's Blue Point feelers. I hope they're ok. Anyway, something happened with the shifting in my trans. so if you could read my other post and help out, that would be marvelous. Thank you!

Alex

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1983 300D (parked for four years)
2012 VW Sportwagen TDI Manual
2001 Miata SE
1962 Chevrolet Corvair Rampside

I just noticed that CarolinaMBZ asked me to post my results so don't worry, I'll take a little more time later to get into more detail as to what I had to do (I think I did some things the hard way).

Alex

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1983 300D (parked for four years)
2012 VW Sportwagen TDI Manual
2001 Miata SE
1962 Chevrolet Corvair Rampside

So I finally got around to doing my first valve adjustment. It wasn't all THAT hard, but it was definitely a little more difficult than I thought it would be. The difficulty wasn't in adjusting the valves themselves, it was dealing with all the linkage and whatnot. I didn't know that most people just left most of the linkage intact and "flopped" the valve cover over to one side. I disassembled all the linkage, including the piece with the rubber on the firewall and completely removed the valve cover.

Only two of the valves were within spec, the other eight were tight and there was no clearance between the camshaft and the rockers. I adjusted them and double checked them. Adjusting them was pretty easy and having the Hazet wrenches helped a lot. Oh, and I turned the engine by using a wrench on the power steering pump. Very easy.

I didn't do anything special to prep the area where the valve cover gasket sits. I should have cleaned it off but I was in a huge hurry. I hope it doesn't start seeping oil, but I guess if it does, it'll give me an excuse to triple check the valves. Getting the valve cover back on was a pain in the rear. Negotiating the gasket, and minding the fuel return lines and dealing with the long linkage rod that goes to the firewall was all a big headache. Finally though, it all came together and I was done.

When I was tightening down the nuts that hold the valve cover to the head, I dropped one of the nuts! It disappeared and I panicked like I usually do. So, I used the nut on the negative terminal of the battery and found a completely different bolt/nut pairing to use for the battery and everything turned out ok.

I took the car for a run tonight and it seemed to be much more responsive and have more power. Also, although I only drove it down a fifth of the tank, it seemed like it was getting better fuel economy. Who knows, both of those things could have been in my head. On the first run out after the adjustment, the transmission was acting up and giving me hard shifts, which was a large change from the soft shifts it was giving me before the adjustment. Boy this sucks, I thought, and figured I'd just deal with it if no one had any clues as to why this was, and yes, I did double check that I re-assembled everything properly when I was done. The trans. would shift hard and worst of all, clunk into a downshift as I was slowing down to a stop. So I came back, poked around to triple check everything, and broke a vacuum nipple on the main vacuum line going to the vacuum pump. That really sucked. I had to rig everything up to the other remaining nipple and I guess it'll have to stay that way until I can order a whole new vacuum line.

I took the car out for another drive (a long one this time) and the trans. seemed to get better! Who knows why. I didn't really do a thing and it sort of fixed itself. The shifts are still firm, which I actually like better than the softer shifts, and it no longer clunks when braking to a stop. Superb.

All in all, it took me about 3 hours. I know I posted 4 hours before, but I then realized that I did it from 2 - 5 PM today. I hoping that next time I do it, I can cut it down to an hour and a half or so. A lot of my three hours was spent being extra careful about the disassembly, and now I know what to do.

Thanks everyone for their help with my current posts, and in previous general posts about valve adjustments. I did an extensive search through the archieves and found a lot of great stuff.

Alex

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1983 300D (parked for four years)
2012 VW Sportwagen TDI Manual
2001 Miata SE
1962 Chevrolet Corvair Rampside

Where do you get vacuum lines from? I was replacing a couple of glow plugs today and leaned on one of the lines and it was so brittle, it broke. It's coming from the main distribution unit on top of then engine. I haven't driven it yet to see what problems it will cause, but I definately need it replaced.

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1994 C280 204k miles