Is this an example of high build quality?

[d00df00d]

A friend of mine was doing a valve adjustment on his car, which is a certain German vehicle with a certain high-revving inline-6 engine. The adjustment process consists of checking clearances and replacing shims as needed.

The car has 65,000 miles on it after about three years, which includes bi-monthly track weekends and a lot of hard street driving.

It turns out most of the valves ended up needing exactly the same size shim, and the rest all needed the same directly adjacent size.

Is that as awesome as I think it is, or is it to be expected of any engine that isn't cheaply built?

 

[meep]

that's awesome IMO.

Had the same experience w/ 2.2L subaru at 76000 miles. Note, not only were they consistent, they were all still at the far end of in-spec.

M

 

[Kestas]

I give thumbs up to German machinery, but they can vastly improve their electricals that run it.

 

[Steve S]

shims suck big time.

 

[mechtech2]

Valve clearances don't change much, especially with a shim or bucket type system.
But it would be comforting to know they were so even, on my personal car.

 

[andyd]

Heh heh, For 10 yrs I resisted the temptation to lift the valve cover on my 88 529e. At 330k miles, I gave in. The widest lash was .002" over spec. Very little sludge too. 3K OCIs using Walmart dino 20w50 and STP filters. A certain amount of an I6's durability is the fact that it has very good balance.

 

[NYEngineer]

I had a friend with an 89 Dodge / Cummins pickup ask me to adjust his rockers and replace the injectors. About halfway through the rocker adjustment, I noticed they were all well within spec. I asked how many miles on the truck. He replied 140,000. I was impressed.

 

[BarkerMan]

The Toyota 4.7 V8 has mechanical lifters and a long time Toyota tech said he has checked clearances on these engines for years but has never found one that needed adjusting no matter how miles the engine had on it. He checked a 4Runner in here with 51k miles and the clearances were right in the middle of the tolerance on every valve. I think the build quality of this engine is pretty good.

 

[glennc]

Originally Posted By: andyd
Heh heh, For 10 yrs I resisted the temptation to lift the valve cover on my 88 529e. At 330k miles, I gave in. The widest lash was .002" over spec. Very little sludge too. 3K OCIs using Walmart dino 20w50 and STP filters. A certain amount of an I6's durability is the fact that it has very good balance.


Similar engine in my E30 325i. The valves are pretty stable, but I do usually find one or two off a couple thousandths or so.

But I'm curious... 330k? Do you still have the car? How many miles on it now... or if you don't have it how many when you sold it?

Great car BTW. Love the E28s.

 

[moving2]

'97 Landcruiser @ at 11 years and 100k mi. all clearances within spec. So no, doesn't sound special to me, esp. compared to the guy with 330k mi.

 

[d00df00d]

Thanks for the responses, guys.

I'm not so much interested in how typical it is for this kind of valvetrain to remain in spec for a long time. What I'm interested is in the consistency across all the valves. For those of you who noticed that everything was in spec, were all the clearances the same distance and direction from the center of the range, or were some clearances on opposite ends of the range?

 

[andyd]

I still have it Glenn, but I retired it in Dec. 07 with 348 K miles on it. It is now parts for a virtually identical 528e, with only 117 k on it. A guy at the last 2 5er Fests showed up with a good looking 84 that has 500K on it.

 

[glennc]

Originally Posted By: d00df00d
I'm not so much interested in how typical it is for this kind of valvetrain to remain in spec for a long time. What I'm interested is in the consistency across all the valves. For those of you who noticed that everything was in spec, were all the clearances the same distance and direction from the center of the range, or were some clearances on opposite ends of the range?


No, you're right, the consistency is impressive. It makes me think perhaps the variation is due to some common factor that affected all the valves equally. Some small change in dimension within the engine that affected every clearance by a few thousandths in the same direction.

Just a thought....

 

[glennc]

Originally Posted By: andyd
I still have it Glenn, but I retired it in Dec. 07 with 348 K miles on it. It is now parts for a virtually identical 528e, with only 117 k on it. A guy at the last 2 5er Fests showed up with a good looking 84 that has 500K on it.


Now that I read that I think we have had a similar conversation before.

Good old cars.

What kind of mileage do you get with it? I could see having an eta E28 some day.

 

[sprintman]

I'm looking at two BMW's a 2001 325 CI Coupe 74,000kms $35,990 and a 2002 530I M Sport 78,000kms $39,000 ono. Can anybody tell me anything about these cars as I havn't a clue?

 

[andyd]

best ever MPG was 34.5 on a run to Greenville SC. It was a 86 528e, my son's car. The 88s best was a hard fought 30mpg. The main difference is the diff. 86 has a 2.93 and the 88 has a 3.46. Both are doggy 0-60mph.

 

[Big O Dave]

Originally Posted By: Steve S
shims suck big time.

So true...

 

[tom slick]

Were they tight or loose?

 

[d00df00d]

I think loose.

 

[Aldaris]

Originally Posted By: d00df00d
A friend of mine was doing a valve adjustment on his car, which is a certain German vehicle with a certain high-revving inline-6 engine. The adjustment process consists of checking clearances and replacing shims as needed.

The car has 65,000 miles on it after about three years, which includes bi-monthly track weekends and a lot of hard street driving.

It turns out most of the valves ended up needing exactly the same size shim, and the rest all needed the same directly adjacent size.

Is that as awesome as I think it is, or is it to be expected of any engine that isn't cheaply built?

A well built engine won't need valve adjustment for 250,000 miles. (see Toyota 1UZ-FE)
so I'll say that the engine was cheaply built.