Story of my life, plan for a project and some minor problem always pours its way into the mix to make things "interesting."

I disassembled a set of new Motown street heads in order to do some port/gasket matching and to do the basic porting tricks I could easily accomplish. That went great. Got the manifold matched and hogged out a little bit too, that went great.

Cleaned the heads up and went to assemble them, the first try, the #1 exhaust I think, the one valve stem lock got seated properly, but the other physically cannot seat, I managed to pull it out from its halfway position, and there is no way that it will go in all the way, there's not enough room between the retainer and the valve stem.

I'm afraid to rock the valve stem side-to side to get it to fit, even though I do confess I shimmied the spring to a point before it moved the valve stem. I also tried to compress the spring pretty darn good and no luck either. I "gently" but with some amount of force, pressed up on the valve face while compressing the spring, nothing.

Was it OK to reuse the retainers and locks? It was a newly assembled block, turned over just long enough to QC it, no use at all on it. Is there any way to get it out short of cutting the valve and spring (man, that doesn't sound fun or safe). Did I screw up when putting the locks in? TIA :chevy

 

You might want to pull the one lock out and try to set them both together. Sometimes when one is fully seated there is not enough room to get the other one in. Starting them both together will take care of that.

 

Yeah, that's the whole problem. I started them both at the same time, but one fell down into place, and the other, only 1/2way in. Now, obviously, it won't fit back in, and I'm not sure how to get the other one out. I tried a machinists scribe, a magnet, nothing seems to budge it. How much force should I use when pushing the valve towards the spring to "unlock" it? I guess this is the only way short of cutting the spring/valve (won't that be fun, maybe there's some sodium in there that can put on a fireworks display for me to keep things interesting :rolleyes: )

 

I would not use any force against the valve, you should not have to. It should unlock once the spring is compressed enough to take the pressure off it and the retainer. I would try a little pressure against the lock itself (perpendicular to the valve) once the spring is compressed.

This head was already together when you got it? Are you sure the parts are going on the same way. I mean you do not have two different sets of locks/retainers because the valve stem diameters are different do you?

If all this is ok, you should be able to get that sucker out without cutting :eek: the spring.

 

Thanks for the help, I finally got that bad-boy out. Thanks, Snap on, Thanks Matco. Good tools for the job.

I compressed/rotated the double spring 20 or so times until I could just see the bottom of the lock in between the springs. I used the blunt end of a machinist's scribe and pushed up on the lock. Voila, lock popped out.

Of course, it jumped onto the floor and I got to spend 10 minutes hunting for it. Finally I got a magnet and did a sweep of the floor, PLINK! there it was, found a nice little corner where it hid.