[Vwdiesel] Valve adjustment WAS: low compression

[Chris Geiser]

Update on my '82 vanagon:  it was the one with low compression in cylinder 3
(200) with subsequent finding of tight valves, particularly exhaust valve.
The discs that were in there were 2.90mm; couldn't find any on the market
thinner than that (found 2.85mm a few places, but needed 2.6ish).

Finally got to working on it today - held the discs in a vice grip and used
the flat side of the wheel of a bench grinder to thin them down.  Don't have
any precision measuring tool, so used my bracket with dial gauge that is
normally used to measure piston protrusion over the block to determine head
gasket thickness (measures to .1mm).  Put it on a flat surface and used that
to measure disc thickness as I ground.  Cut one to 2.60mm and another to
2.65'ish.  Valve adjustment was pretty close with those in, and more
importantly, the van ran much better.  Most of the 48hp appeared to be back
in action.  I put the discs in "ground side" down; didn't appear to be any
adverse effects so far of not being perfectly (machined) flat...  Redid
compression test before I ran it and compression came up in the 300 range,
so not great yet, but markedly better.  Might be more now that it's run a
bit too.  I'll check that again in a few days.  And the valve adjustment
isn't perfect yet.

Will start looking for a machine shop to cut a few of these down to exact
sizes I need, but in the mean time, the van moves on...

Thanks to everyone who sent advice and ideas.  I did call "Parts Place"
where I got this remanufactured head from a few years ago and expressed my
disappointment with the lack of downward adjustability in the valve discs,
and that I thought their head rebuilder took shortcuts and didn't grind down
the valve stems to allow adjustablity in the future.  They were less helpful
than I would have liked in the situation, admitted nothing, and offered no
real solutions, retribution, or assistance...  I will exhaust other options
in the future before buying something again from them.

Chris