valve grinding

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conan383
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Re: valve grinding

Post by conan383 »

Thanks for info but when I got these great parts ( eagle forged crank, 6.0 h rods, dished pistons and a small flat tappet cam , and lousy blue printing, I tookit off his hands for a SUPER low price and put it together with flat tops, a roller cam , and the difficult thing was finding a suitable intake manifold that would work, ended up with a wieand team G single plain and port matched with a 1266 gasket. all the manifolds i tried didnt have enough meat to port match the .2 that the runners were raised. They line up, as do the push rods w/ guide plateds and the front acc. holes as well. NOW back to the issue _ it wasnt a seat issue at all, the guides were worn beyond acceptable range and with new rings and pistons sucking good pulled in oil thru guides. Yes I shouldnt have ran with such clearance but stock motors running out of steam at sub 5000 rpm wouldnt have much issue, but getting into high compression, and rpm and 500+ hp then Yah I had an oil issue.( wont do again). ran it for less than 4000 miles and tore it down to address issue's. Needed new guides. He just had to touch up the seats which most of them looked like barely touched. One wasnt lapped so I lapped everything. Discovered the #3 in take buried into head , Now IF the guides pounded the seats bad enough to need to burry them, it would be ALL not one, and before it went down there they were not different heights. I havent been able to get ahold of him yet, but Yes I want to talk to him only, not his boss, and hear from him why he didnt ask me about replacing the one burried seat weather or not it was an accident or needed to be done. AS far as anybody in other threads bashing toplines, I will say that despite having to fix issues that most every head will have in some form or another, these heads are the real deal, and make awesome power.
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Re: valve grinding

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When you said don't touch the seats.....
Maybe shop assumed you did not know what you are talking about so proceeded to do a normal valve job.
If you had asked for something more realistic, or special care, then maybe it would have been different or maybe not. There are some heads that replacing the guides results in ruining the seat alignment, but I would not have known this to be one, unless it was a factory goof or somebody made it so. Guide liners can be installed in guides sometimes to dodge alignment problems. Could be many reasons to end up this way, sorry. Maybe it was a goof, but not for sure. Check the old guides and see if the wall thickness is even or not.
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Re: valve grinding

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conan383 wrote: Sat Dec 18, 2021 3:33 pm Thanks for info but when I got these great parts ( eagle forged crank, 6.0 h rods, dished pistons and a small flat tappet cam , and lousy blue printing, I tookit off his hands for a SUPER low price and put it together with flat tops, a roller cam , and the difficult thing was finding a suitable intake manifold that would work, ended up with a wieand team G single plain and port matched with a 1266 gasket. all the manifolds i tried didnt have enough meat to port match the .2 that the runners were raised. They line up, as do the push rods w/ guide plateds and the front acc. holes as well. NOW back to the issue _ it wasnt a seat issue at all, the guides were worn beyond acceptable range and with new rings and pistons sucking good pulled in oil thru guides. Yes I shouldnt have ran with such clearance but stock motors running out of steam at sub 5000 rpm wouldnt have much issue, but getting into high compression, and rpm and 500+ hp then Yah I had an oil issue.( wont do again). ran it for less than 4000 miles and tore it down to address issue's. Needed new guides. He just had to touch up the seats which most of them looked like barely touched. One wasnt lapped so I lapped everything. Discovered the #3 in take buried into head , Now IF the guides pounded the seats bad enough to need to burry them, it would be ALL not one, and before it went down there they were not different heights. I havent been able to get ahold of him yet, but Yes I want to talk to him only, not his boss, and hear from him why he didnt ask me about replacing the one burried seat weather or not it was an accident or needed to be done. AS far as anybody in other threads bashing toplines, I will say that despite having to fix issues that most every head will have in some form or another, these heads are the real deal, and make awesome power.
Like most iron heads when these were marketed back in the early days they were not marketed as a raised runner head.
They were intended to be used in class racing where an iron head was allowed but no porting was allowed.
Thus others like World made a 200 runner head but did not compare to the out of the box numbers of the PTL heads.

They were killer heads for sure and did not require much if any port work but they were ahead of their time and most guys that got them soon learned they were not for the average builder. Most guys learned the hard way they needed off set intake rockers of a shaft setup to use the heads and the intake choices were limited with the taller then average intake ports.
Bare head valve seats were not concentric to the guide center line and always needed to be touched up as they were do on a serdi machine and because the bronze guides were always an issue with damage on the top from driving them into the heads pilot choice to deal with the dents on the seal end of the guides ment they used a smaller then optimum pilot size causing the cutter to wiggle a bit making the need for touch ups necessary.
Any of the heads we used got a larger valve installed like the heads with a 2.02 intake got a 2.055 and the larger runner heads got a 2.08. While these sizes were also offered by PTL as well depending on the runner size it was easier to treat the heads like a core and replace the guides fit new valves and re-machine the seats. I should mention we never got any of these heads complete but some customers did buy them that way and the result was they still needed some work to make them perfect.

Its too bad the PTL iron head design made available from RHS have been discontinued in favor of aluminum stuff as there is still a market for them but Dart started to fill that void but has limited options when compared to the PTL heads.
EQ was another great head that is long gone as well made in the same foundry and same basic molds as the PTL heads but again aluminum has taken over but Dart is so far behind now in the foundry so heads will not be available till mid 2022 I am told since they were bought out and ad covid to the mix we will be lucky if they ever can get back up to speed any time soon [-o<
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conan383
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Re: valve grinding

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well I went down to the machine shop with a great attitude and asked him to look at it. Any how he installed a new seat . He said he could do all 8 intakes and raise them all back level, after seeing him do the one I declined and had it just match the others. Took the heads home , sat on bench for a week or so, then decided work on it. started by smoothing the underside of the edge of seat then a lap job. cleaned it off put valve back in and and noticed 2 things: 1 he installed cast iron guides( I have stainless steel valve) not mangunese bronze. and 2 they clearance when I rocked it back and forth with a dial gauge was .009. I'm getting the feeling that this is definitely not a performance oriented shop. I've had issues before with different owners, but I wanted to give these new guys a go, Im wrong, they suck, just seems like lately everywhere you look shoddy work is all around, its in the air. Im done with these guys, I doubt I'll get my money back or my used guides. it would have been cheaper to buy oversized valve and reem the old guides. Pissed off in wyoming!!!!!
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Re: valve grinding

Post by PRH »

In the area of the country where I’m at(New England), quality engine machine work done by people who are proficient at their job, using well maintained equipment can be expensive.

It’s nothing to spend upwards of $500 for a regular servicing on a pair of performance oriented V8 heads.
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Re: valve grinding

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Sounds to me care deeply about it and you want to do it yourself and that's great.
But you don't have enough of a clue yet to do it. IMO you need to be more respectful of those that do.
Why do iron heads need bronze guides? Why do stainless valves need bronze guides?
Most valve stems are hard chromed or nitrided, and most exhaust valves are stainless anyway. Use a magnet to find out.

Can you can make your own tools to do the job? no, then you don't need to be bragging about how you have access to any tool at your work if you don't know how to use them. Sorry to be rude but this isn't Instagram or facebook or whatever.
I cannot tell what is miscommunication and what is misunderstanding. Maybe both.
I can tell you that some customers want to be FULLY involved in every detail, and you might be one of those.
And that's ok but you know what the majority of customers don't seem to like that. You give them too much information or too many choices and they get frustrated. So maybe not the right shop for you but if the work was good enough or not I'm not going to speculate.
Last edited by modok on Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: valve grinding

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PRH wrote: Sun Jan 16, 2022 11:35 am In the area of the country where I’m at(New England), quality engine machine work done by people who are proficient at their job, using well maintained equipment can be expensive.

It’s nothing to spend upwards of $500 for a regular servicing on a pair of performance oriented V8 heads.
Or considerably more than that.
These are CDN dollars in 2015.

Cost.jpg

Don't mind paying for quality work but sometimes the fine print kills a guy. $40 for freight, $90 for shop supplies , another $40 for shipping and handling...
I will say they did a fine job though. (And the 3 angle VJ posted on the invoice is in reality a 5 angles as seen on the seats.)
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Last edited by skinny z on Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: valve grinding

Post by modok »

So it has bronze guide liners?
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Re: valve grinding

Post by skinny z »

modok wrote: Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:17 pm So it has bronze guide liners?
Mine does. I was illustrating the costs as per PHR's previous post.
Not sure about the OP.

Edited for accuracy.
Last edited by skinny z on Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: valve grinding

Post by PRH »

The invoice posted by SkinnyZ is quite a bit more involved than the “regular servicing” I was referring to...... which would be more of an end of season freshen up on heads that were properly done the last to around.

However, it does appear their rates are higher than mine.
Not sure how that would shake out after taking the exchange rate into account.
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Re: valve grinding

Post by PRH »

skinny z wrote: Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:24 pm
modok wrote: Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:17 pm So it has bronze guide liners?
Mine does. I was illustrating the costs as per your previous post.
Not sure about the OP.
Based on your invoice, they used CHE brand “1/2” guides.
I don’t think most people consider those as “liners”.

“Liners” to me are like what K-line sells.
Last edited by PRH on Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: valve grinding

Post by skinny z »

PRH wrote: Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:27 pm The invoice posted by SkinnyZ is quite a bit more involved than the “regular servicing” I was referring to...... which would be more of an end of season freshen up on heads that were properly done the last to around.

However, it does appear their rates are higher than mine.
Not sure how that would shake out after taking the exchange rate into account.
Yeah. Far more than a simple service.
As for pricing, I can reconcile the cost of goods but the labour rates between the two countries, or regions within a country for that matter, are more to difficult to level up.
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Re: valve grinding

Post by skinny z »

PRH wrote: Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:30 pm
skinny z wrote: Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:24 pm
modok wrote: Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:17 pm So it has bronze guide liners?
Mine does. I was illustrating the costs as per your previous post.
Not sure about the OP.
Based on your invoice, they used CHE brand “1/2” guides.
I don’t think most people consider those as “liners”.

“Liners” to me are like what K-line sells.
They most definitely pushed out the old guides and pressed in the new. I've got the old ones in a box here somewhere.
Their invoicing descriptions aren't particularly accurate. Case in point is the listed VJ as I highlighted earlier.
But they sure know how to add.
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Re: valve grinding

Post by modok »

Oh, I see sorry. Didn't see who was who.
Putting bronze liners IN iron guides would have been a good way to improve the seat alignment problem.
Tho it's a lot more work
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Re: valve grinding

Post by PRH »

Assuming the OP’s heads came with press in bronze guides....... the normal servicing, plus guide replacement, plus a skim cut........ would have pushed the bill into the $850-900 range, depending on exactly what guides were used.

If the heads just had holes drilled in the iron as the original guide(I’m assuming they’re iron heads, but they could be aluminum), then I would have installed bronze “liners”.
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