VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - GENERAL Mechanical - Engine, Trans, etc Valve Adjustment

HI; I just put a rebuilt motor in my 1952 chevy The block is a 54 and the head is a 1956,848 number head.Any suggestions on setting the valves,and what gap.Ed

Ed,

This was discussed just recently. I think that Chevgene (Gene) covered both the mechanical (solid lifters) and the hydraulic lifters. Try the search engine at the top of the page.

I hope you find it, but if you don't, come on back and we'll provide the answers you seek.

It will help to know which lifters you have when, and if, you can't find the information on the search engine.

I would go ahead and provide the info but I don't know it for your set-up.

Best wishes,
Charlie

Ed, Charlie is right about Gene covering this valve adjust topic recently but you certainly have a special case if the '54 shortblock you used was a stick shift version w/solid lifters. All my reference books call for intake .010, exh. .020 hot. Solid lifters for the years before and after were .006/.013 hot. Why 1954 was different---- Gene probably knows. Then , of course, the '56 head you used should be off a hydraulic lifter motor unless it was a truck appllication. My reference bk shows the 848 head number as a car thus hydr lifter application. This interests me because I have spare 235 motors from these years ,both w/solids and hydraulics.
Let's see what other folks have to say. DFC

The 1954 shop manual lists .006" and .016" for the passenger cars. No reason why the exhausts could not be set to .015" if they are too noisey at.016"....The heavy duty trucks were .010" and ,020" for better valve life under heavy hauling conditions.

The 848 head was used on all 235 engines from 1956-1962. Solid or hyd. lifters make no difference. That being said the compression ratio was raised three times in the span but the casting was not changed.

In 1956 all cars had Hyd lifters and all trucks solid. The Hyd lifter block is drilled for lifter oil supply so Hyd lifters can not be used in a solid lifter block.

Thanks for your replays, My problem is I bought this engine from a fellow who rebuilt it 20 years ago,all he knew was that both top and bottom were out of cars,I do not know how I can tell if they are hyd or solid,any suggestions would help Thanks Ed. PS the engine runs great but is noisy.