What valve spring compressor should I be using to remove the stock valve springs? Anyone have any links? I have one from Craftsman, but I don't think it will work with this setup, and I don't understand how this tool will work.....

http://buy1.snapon.com/catalog/item....re&dir=catalog

Any input would be appreciated!

Thanks!

Chris

 

Any standard valve sprint compressor should work. It just grabs the sides of the springs and compresses them, so you can remove the valve retainers.

 

No offense (really!), but have you taken these heads apart before?

I have not found a 'standard' valve spring compressor that will do it. I ended up having to make my own tonight, which works well.... Thanks for the response!

Chris

 

chris... since we do not do the valvejobs in house, the most we ever do is take the valves/springs out. my head port work guy puts that stuff back in after porting the heads.

it is pretty ghetto but to be quite honest if i need to take that stuff out of a head that i dont have a valvespring compressor to fit... there is a little trick.

simple find a socket that is close outside diameter to your retainer, put a shorty extention on the socket, and grab a mallet. put it on the retainer and give it a sharp strike and keep a sharp eye for where the keepers go flying. If you do it carefully, it wil not damage anything and of course it definatly will NOT work for putting it back together.

if you ever DO do that, always make sure and locate every keeper, last thing you want is a keeper in the head somewhere getting in your valvetrain later down the road after assembly

i know it doesnt sound too professional... but it is a means of getting the entire valvetrain out in under 5 min and once again if you do it carefully you will not damage anything.

 

What I did was get a craftsman spring compressor, pictured here:

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr/produ...cemgdffmdggg.0

Tig welded a 15/16 deep socket on to it (in hind sight, a 3/4" would have been better), then used my plasma cutter to cut a hole on the side of it so I could access the keepers. It works amazingly well actually.

I need to lap the valves in now, and the normal use-a-drill-to-grab-the-back-of-the valve-stem-to-spin-it trick won't work as the stem doesn't stick out far enough... So I am off to look for other tools now to finish the head work....

Thanks for the responses so far!

Chris


After all of my searching, I have not found a valve spring compressor that will work with these heads... I guess you need to use one that works like a level with the cam installed??

Chris