Moderately dumb valve adjustment question

youtube is my go to guy for advice

It can be done .... a quickjack works wonders to get the car in the air, and while you wait for the valves to be stone COLD you can polish the car on a rolling seat

You can even turn it with your hands on the pulley, but it's easier with a properly-sized socket wrench.  I have both 30mm and 36mm sockets, and I can't remember which I used since I no longer have the car.

I use a 1/2” drive 30mm on a ratchet. On my Spyder, there’s just enough room between the bolt and the torsion bar tube to slip it in there and it will stay out for the whole job. If you don’t have a 30MM, a 1 3/16” one works as well.  

A decent adjustable wrench on the crank pulley bolt will suffice to.

Thank you all!

I use a plain 30mm box/open end wrench on the crankshaft pulley bolt.  Something that big gives you more than enough leverage to easily turn it over.  You can try to get a 1/2” drive socket down in there, but you may not have enough room to fit.

Please do not try to turn the engine over by turning the alternator nut.  Yes, it will probably do the job, but it puts undue strain on the fan belt (and often just slips, anyway).

You’ll also need a 12mm or 13mm box wrench and a flat screw driver to adjust the valves, along with a mechanic’s feeler gauge to set the gap.  

https://www.harborfreight.com/search?q=feeler%20gauge

Touch a magnet to your pushrods to find out if they are steel or aluminum - the process of setting them properly is different for steel or aluminum push rods.   Stock aluminum rods get .004” and .006” clearance at the adjuster as mentioned in the Youtube vids.

Steel pushrods get “loose zero” which means that you can spin the pushrod with your (dry) fingers but feel no gap at the adjuster (or maybe just a faint click when you pull the adjuster in and out with your fingers).  If getting that right scares you as it does for some others on here, you can set them to .001”-.002”   They will make a bit more noise, but you won’t get burnt valves, either.

If all this sounds intimidating, ask around your area for a good aircooled VW mechanic and ask him to show you how to do it the first time.  It should be easy after that.

I concur. Make sure the tires are blocked and the transaxle in neutral. John Muir's book " How to keep your Volkswagen alive" has been the most valuable tool that I use while working on VW air cooled engines. It gives easy step by step instructions to most repairs including full engine rebuilds. I recommend getting this book asap if you don't already own one. Good luck and don't forget the most important thing to have fun while doing it.

@Jimmy V.thank you…..this is all new to me. I’ll get that book today…….what if I’m only a partial idiot? 🤔

Then you are way ahead of what I was 30 years ago. I have built many VW engines and other VW related repairs using this book and still reference it regularly today.

I’m probably giving myself too much credit……thank you again for the suggestion

To save a little turning time with the wrench. After setting up the engine on TDC of #1 cylinder (dist. rotor pointed to #1 contact on the cap) , adjust #1 valves, turn the engine backwards 1/2 turn and adjust #2 valves, turn backwards 1/2 turn and adjust #3 valves and so on thru #4.............Bruce

I have used a ratcheting box wrench.  Now, my crank pulley bolt has a 3/8" square hole I can stick a ratchet wrench into.

@aircooled You and I must be the only two on here that set them that way.  Usually, when I tell someone I set them in order 1-2-3-4 by turning the engine backwards I get a weird look  😳  and a bunch of reasons back why that isn't right.

Phooey.  I've been setting them that way since a local Porsche race engine builder taught me back in the late 1960's and it always works.

@aircooled, @Gordon Nichols, I also set them that way.

I set them that way too. Turning the engine backwards starting with 1 through 4 is the easy way.

Pro tip: Lift one rear wheel off the ground after chocking both sides of one front wheel.  Put the trans in 4th and turn the wheel backwards to rotate the crank. That's what us mid-engine guys do. You know, since it's a PITA to get to the crank pulley.

On my Spyder, I pop both valve covers. Then I adjust the valve opposite the fully open one. I keep track of my progress on a dry erase board, until all 8 are finished. Then I turn it over again and check all 8 to make sure they're correct.

Gordon, Michael, Danny,.......Yup that's the easy way.  You have to jump over to the other side each time but both rocker covers will be removed anyway.

Setting the timing at,  say,  10 BTDC, using the oil pressure switch wire connected to the distributor side of the coil works in a pinch too.  (Ign switch must be on)  The oil pressure light goes off when the points open.  Just remember to reconnect the wire back on the oil pressure switch when finished...............Bruce

Danny...Very smart on the "opposite the fully open one"......You know crankshaft configuration

Jimmy V .......When that Manual first came out I thought it was Hilarious !!  I had a Bus and recall that it said "If your Bus overheats, pull over to the side of the road and shut off the engine so it will cool down. It's going take a while for it to cool down to check things so you might as well Ball the old lady while you're waiting."  I bet a lot of younger people now don't know what "Ball" meant at that time !..........Bruce

@IaM-Ray posted:

It can be done .... a quickjack works wonders to get the car in the air, and while you wait for the valves to be stone COLD you can polish the car on a rolling seat

NEVER, EVER adjust the valves unless the engine is STONE COLD. As in do it in the morning after the car has sat all night.

Waiting for the engine to cool is like watching the grass grow. It takes FOREVER if you're watching and waiting.

Ya know........What WOULD happen if the valves were adjusted hot ? I've never done it or even thought about it. Probably you wouldn't or couldn't do it with the engine really hot anyway. Since a lot of us set them at nearly "0" anyway, I wonder if they were set at say.....001 " if it would be OK ?  Anyone out there ever done it ?  Maybe it is just a safety or comfort decision or a convenience thing for the most part since the oil has dripped off everything to settle in the sump.  Thus making it less messy and the oil probably will get changed at the same time anyway.............Bruce

At least you don't have to measure the gap (x8 valves), remove the cam, pull up the bucket (x8), take out the shim (x8), mic the shim if you can't read the imprint, then do the math to pick the right size shim to go back in (x8).  Reinstall cam, rotate engine..remeasure all 8 valves and fix the ones you didn't quite get right.  THEN repeat for the other 8 valves under the other cam..    but when your spinning 15K rpms, I guess you don't exactly want pushrods & rockers either.

@aircooled posted:

Ya know........What WOULD happen if the valves were adjusted hot ? I've never done it or even thought about it. Probably you wouldn't or couldn't do it with the engine really hot anyway. Since a lot of us set them at nearly "0" anyway, I wonder if they were set at say.....001 " if it would be OK ?  Anyone out there ever done it ?  Maybe it is just a safety or comfort decision or a convenience thing for the most part since the oil has dripped off everything to settle in the sump.  Thus making it less messy and the oil probably will get changed at the same time anyway.............Bruce

I used to adjust the valves on my Austin America not only hot, but with the engine running. After doing a couple of times then confirming it with the engine cold to find the proper feeler gauge, I’d just pull the VC and could tell by feel when the gap was correct by sliding it as I adjusted each rocker.

dlearl476...........I used to adjust my Mother's valves on her Buick straight eight that way. With the engine idling and the 4' long rocker cover off. One of the rockers was so worn it had a dimple in it and would hammer my feeler gauge out so it sort of looked like a spoon when finished. So......I would adjust all the others first and do that one last and throw the feeler gauge away when finished. They sold  Starrett feeler gauge by the inch at the hardware store so I just had to buy the thickness and length I needed/wanted.  They had a whole rack of rolls of different thickness feeler gauge in the back.

I finally got tired of this and removed that rocker arm, ground out the dimple as best I could on a bench grinder and reinstalled it. No more tappet noise !  As far as I know, it was still working OK when she traded the car in on a newer one.........Bruce

Apples/oranges - hydraulic lifter valvetrains are adjusted with the engine running. Back out the adjustment until the valve clatters, turn in until it doesn't, then another 1/4 turn.