ALFAGTV6.COM

[GarthW]

Hi all, well my baby is sitting in the garage due to me bending afew valves. It happened after she was sitting outside in the cold for 3 days whilst i was replacing a turbocharger on a friends car which took the spot of my Alfa in the garage...The cold start programme was never fully sorted out so i thought that may have contributed to the bent valves...maybe not, but before i pulled her out of the garage everything was fine before then..yes the heads were old, i never had them rebuuilt when i did the forced induction.

But anyway my question is this, i have all this spare time to myself and i just want to know whats involved in rebuilding the heads...is it straight forward, or a special tools involved..? I've been quoted $3k to have them rebuilt with stainless steel valves, and i just dont have that cash atm from being out of work whilst i'm recovering from the mega surgery i've had. After all the work i've done myself i'd love to have a go at doing this myself, but it seems well beyond me to do it, well i'm not sure exactly whats involved, but the labour getting this done is just very expensive. I paid too much to have all the engine management done, and would love to save abit by doing this myself....if i can.

Any advice would be, as always greatly appreciated!! Times like this i wish there was a mechanic in the family!!

Thanks for any help..

Regards,
Garth.

[Giuliettaevo2]

Taking the heads off is not to big of a job, you could do that yourself. Taking the heads apart is also do-able for the DIY mechanic.

It al depends on what is wrong with the heads and what you want done to them i guess.

If there are just a few valves bent and you replace them with other ones which you grind nicely to the seats you can fix it quite cheap. You would need a gasketset for the heads and a few valves and that's roughly it. You would need to set the gap on the valves however and the cambelt has to come off anyway so you may want to change that also.

Skimming the heads( not necessary since the engine didn't run hot or anything), replacing the valveguides, seats and valves all bring extra costs, especially in the labourcosts. You could replace the guides yourself but without any support/experience i wouldn't recommend it. But if you dismantle the heads completely yourself it isn't that much work for the shop to replace them, maybe you can get a quote for that alone?

My advice: take off the heads yourself, take them apart ( bag the parts for the cilinder they are for, so the cyl 1 exhaust valve and intake valve and all the springs and stuff go in a bag marked 1) and go to your machine shop to have them check the guides and seats and have them give you a quote.

Good luck with it!

[GarthW]

Wow thankyou very much! Thats great advice thanks evo2, hmmm i'm gonna get my tools out and give it a go for sure...!!

Thanks again..



First time car has seen sunshine in awhile, cry, sob, sob..

[fortom]

Hey Garth, just had my heads done for my 3.0 conversion.
Did not need to replace valves but did replace the guides and stem seals, re seat the valves and skim. Valve guides NZ$100 stem seals part off complete engine set, but are cheap enough from IAP. Machine shop charged me $600 for both heads. Now if it would warm up in NZ.........
Tom

Any ideas on how to remove the old belt tensioner oil feed tube/ stud, putting in an IAP tensioner.

[MD]

Garth

When removing and replacing the heads you need to follow a torque up/down sequence to avoid warping them. Look up the sequence in the manual diagrams. You can find this @ Craigs Place
I would suggest replacing all the valve stem seals at this time as the cost is negligible and you will have uniformity. The synthetics are the best.

My guess is that some guides will be scored.

http://www.users.on.net/~craigf/

[GarthW]

Yeah for sure MD, will do the lot i think, heads were well overdue for a re-condition..
Will check that link for sure!!

Fortom, sorry i've got no ideas on how to do that...soz.

[bteoh]

Just a curious question. When removing the heads from a RHD GTV6 2.5 , is it mandatory to remove the brake booster? I was told that it could be a clearance issue with the left hand head. Anyone who has done this care to share some info?
Thanks in advance

[GarthW]

I'm sure the brake booster has nothing to do with it...but i could be wrong, but none of the boys have mentioned it, so shouldnt be a problem...

[fortom]

Yes the brake booster has to be removed before the head will come off, pretty easy unbolts from inside the car.
Tom

[Giuliettaevo2]

didn't mention it, that's right.... but we drive on the right side of the road. And i had the engine out of the car so no brakebooster trouble.

what about taking off the nut of the engine mount and using a jack to tilt the engine to clear the brake booster?

[Zamani]

Undoing the mounts and tilting the engine should work too.

[GarthW]

Aha, no problem thanks Zamani!!

[GarthW]

Just a quick question on removing the brake booster for removal of the LHS head...

I've removed 2 nuts off from the inside of car against the firewall, but i cannot see any other bolts/nuts to remove..? All i see are weird looking nuts which no spanner can remove...so today after removing/lifting off the RHS cylinder head, i cannot remove the other cylinder head because of this damn brake booster..can anyone help me with this so i can remove the cylinder head..? Surely its only 4 nuts to remove so brake booster comes off..?


I've ordered all the parts i need to reco the heads and need to send heads away ASAP.

[Giuliettaevo2]

the brake boosters i know of are fitted with four nuts on the inside of the car. they are located in a square around the rod that attaches to your pedal ( the rod also has to be disconnected by the way ). so you should be able to find them.

I remember at least one of the nuts being quite hard to reach, believe it is over the steering column in a rather tight space...

Good luck! it's not a funny job to do, hanging upsidedown in your car ( for any spectators it could be funny though.. )...

[GarthW]

Hey Evo, no the brake booster is on the passenger side(LHS), but all good i removed it...phew.

Funny about the spectating part, i'm nearly 6',3" so must have looked very funny, legs hanging out and all, haha.