I wanted to give back something I picked up while doing a recent valve adjustment, it may be a topic that has been beaten to death but this may help someone with OCD qualities like me. The guides and workshop manuals make it sound like their is a 'magic' drag or resistance felt in the feeler gauges that can give incorrect or erronous readings. I found this is not very helpful and gets mixed results and can be misinterpretted. Instead of dragging a feeler gauge, I like using the 'go- no go' method. Insert correct feeler gauge for example .009" for intake valve, tighten adjustment screw until resistance felt, back off just til no slack is felt(aka A Hair), tighten lock nut. Attempt to insert .010" feeler but do not force it. If .010" does not fit, reinsert .009" to verify feeler gauge slides in without force. If .009 slides and .010 does not, valve is complete, move to next valve. Very easy, you may only have to redo one or two valves with this method to once you get a hang of it. It is good practice to verify all adjustment screw locknuts are tight before reinstalling valve cover, just to make sure :0 Please feel free to chime in on alternative methods or perhaps tube seal tips. I found a 36mm axle socket works great to drive spark plug tube seals back into the valve cover evenly although I have not figured out a clean way to get old tube seals out without galling the valve cover to seal surface. All feedback and tips welcome!!!

 

I found you can pry the old tube seals out with a flat head without scratching anything. The key is to not have the end of the screw driver touching the valve cover, otherwise when you pry it up it will leave a mark.

To get the new seals seated I used an old seal and hammer. Just tapping it lightly.

 

After basically rebuilding this entire car, I found that valve adjustments are probably one of the most tedious, annoying things to do haha, takes hours just go get everything right. Great advice though, might speed it up next time i do them haha

 

really? the valve adjustment is one of the easiest things to do on this car aside from changing the cabin filter.

 

They make stepped feeler gauges specifically for go-no-go measurement. Each feeler has its size, then an abrupt step up to the next size.

You adjust to tbe correct gap, then with same gauge you make sure that next step won't go. This could speed things up for you even more.

Personally, I am more anal than that, and want just the right feel on each adjustment, not merely a no-go for the next step. I want each valve adjusted the same. To do this you mostly just need to make sure each valve has the same drag, not aim for some mystical magic drag. You also have to make sure you're dragging perfectly parallel to the gap. Otherwise you are adding drag and will end up too wide.

 

To add, that's also part of the reason there's an adjustment range, as long as it's within specs it should be fine. So I pick a feeler that if set correctly will put me in the middle of the range, that way I have a small buffer to cover my clumsiness.

 

I have really bad ocd, so i try and get them perfectly. And nah, swapping retainers, carpet, ripping apart the dash, all that was not fun haha

 

First time took me 4hrs including having to run to the parts store to get a pcv hose(torn when removing) and also replacing tube seals which I am confident I could have reused. I am sure my next one on this car would be less than 2hrs start to finish(w/o tube seals).

 

This is making me nuuuts. I tighten the screw till I can't move the feeler, back off a little till the feeler slides, tighten it down... but no matter what I do I can still get the next size up feeler gauge in there. Can someone give me some advice on what I could be doing wrong?

 

use your 1/4" torque wrench to precisely set torque to 14 lbft. After setting the clearance, I gently snug the nut so it doesn't move (maybe 3-4 lbft). I keep the feeler gauge in place, then torque to spec. Finally, I pull the feeler gauge out and feel that the drag has remained the same.

I've done many VA on the s2000's and can get it done in just about 90 mins now. Practice, practice, practice.
darcy