Which thickness of Adjustment valve shim ??? 190E
 

My hydraulic lifters are noisy after removing the rocket arms and camshaft several times for various reasons when I was rebuilding my '88 2.3 8vlv engine. I already tried Rotella oil and that did not silence the noise.


The Haynes manual says that after replacement of these parts, the valve train becomes noisy because the clearance in the lifter has become more than what the lifter can tolerate. It is then neccesary to replace the "valve adjustment shim" that goes on top of the lifter.

Fast lane has at least three diffrerent thicknesses: 1.5, 1.8, 2.2

If someone knows which thickness is best for me please let me know; I want to repair the noise. Now, dumb question but I ask anyways, can I use the same hydraulic lifter after I remove it????

If it was my car I would take the thickest shim, the design of a hydraulic lifter will compensate for a thicker that needed shim but will not compensate for a thinner lifter, and of course you can reuse the lifters, just inspect them for normal wear and do not replace any suspect ones they are cheap enough to replace, try REDLINE oil, that did the trick, you can search for an earlier post I made regarding this issue

That's great to know!!! If you say that you would better go for the thickest (2.2) ones I believe you, but I was wondering why the store shows the least thick (1.5) as the one for "repair" and is also the one that is most expensive (*like three to four times as expensive)...




About the hydraulic lifters that can be replaced, I remember a few months back when I was rebuilding my engine I removed four of them, and a little ring that goes almost on top of the lifter broke after removed. That made me think the hydraulic lifters couldn't be reused. Maybe I was removing them with gorilla force or not the right way :confused: Or should I be very careful? I really don't need to remove them, but just in case I insert the wrong shims and still have noise and I would like to try other thickness.

Thank you very much for replying :cool:

I'm having a similar problem with noisy valves on my 1985 190e, and read that thicker shims might help. The choices were 1.4, 1.8, and 2.2 mm.

My car already has the 2.2 mm. I got the impression that one can buy thicker ones, for example 3.0 mm. Do you think this would be a good idea?

Thanks

Steve Winans
scw2@cornell.edu

Would guess the true problem is a bad hydraulic compensator, not a shim.

All of mine are new. I carefully bled the air out of them, filling them with engine oil, by depressing the ball with a jewelers screwdriver after filling with oil. I don't think it's the lifters. I used a stethoscope, placing the probe directly on each rocker. The intake of #2 cylinder makes a loud click.

thank you very much for your help!

Well, I just purchased two shims, 2.9 mm and 3.4 mm. They should arrive in about a week....stay tuned.

Let up know, Steve.
You can take some sort of bar, even a large screwdriver or the handle end of a hammer, and press down hard on the top of the rocker (the side with the compensator), then let go, and see if there is now a lot of play on the rocker. That would mean the oil is seeping out and the compensator is bad. You could also check for play even before you do anything to see if you have play.
It is easy to check what shim is in place by the dots on the top of the shim, you know this right?
You didn't lose the small cup shaped washer on top of the valve? These are available in diffent thicknesses as well, I assume you are talking about the actual compensator shim.

I read about pressing down on the rocker arm to look for play and didn't find any. That's the troubling part: if I need a thicker shim, then I should be able to detect some play, and I can't. The only symptom is that when I crank the engine with the starter, and put my stethoscope on this one rocker (intake for #2 cylinder), I hear a loud tick, once per cam revolution.

I didn't know that you could tell the thickness of a shim by those dots on the top. Can you explain how?

As for the cups washers above the valve, they are all in place. I even replaced one or two, and only later learned that they come in different widths.

I"m grateful for the time you've spent writing.

Steve

Well I've been out of the business awhile. Here is a link to a thread I wrote 9 or so years ago, I'll let the "younger Gilly" do the talking. I belive the process is the same between the M103 and M102.
http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/tech-help/55160-valvetrain-help-needed-m103.html