I get to fix my family's cars with my wallet and when I have time with my craftsman tools. My mom's car caved about two weeks ago. 1982 6, yes a 6 cylinder engine (flat)(260 series). Had (done) all kinds of work on it already. So one day it will not turn over. Mind you this is after I got the dealership to deal with the ECU cold start problem where the fuel pump was not properly negatively grounded and it was tough to get them involved in this as I just didn't have time to figure the legend, trace and solder the board by wire to the chassis.

My mom told me that the battery tested ok and the starter would not engage. So I get it to the dealership and am told that the starter was bad. $400.00+ there. Try to get the car moving and it sputters but hard starts and movement is like dragging a cart of rocks uphill. Now, I already know that the dealership does not want to deal with this car and hasn't wanted to in the past either. The guy tells me that it 'sounds' like the valves might be bent and the cam has flat lobes. This is all without removing the valve covers. I am familiar with driving cars that have a flat lobe or two that are driving still and really good. So, I told them to adjust the valves and yes, I know this means moving a few pumps. They are telling me that this might do more damage than good and that they would have to order seals etc. (stall, stall, stall) and that to get a new cam & valves might be about $2400 which became $2800 and then became $3200 as the discussions progressed. I bought this car for my mom originally and I missed adjusting the valves initially which my Haynes says should happen every 30,000 miles.

I just need to know, does everyone agree with this man's assessment that adjusting the valves will harm it? I spoke to two other people at two different shops that just didn't understand how that would harm it and having done this to my old '71 Beetle, I can't either. Am I just putting too much wishful thinking into this or should I just find someone, and I have, that will do the valve adjustments? And is this even valve related?

I already had these guys drain the oil and put in a lye-intensive but not seal-eating lubricant to reduce mechanical resistance to keep the engine from locking up and it still churns. I have had so much good luck with old cars as my '92 Hyundai had 400000+ miles on it (wrecked/gone now *sniff*) and my '77 Mercedes has 300000+ miles on it. Two saturdays ago I woke up that morning and put a badass new flip-CD stereo system in it too.

Thank you,
Charlane

PS I am curious about any situation with the catalytic converter and AMM also. Please tell. My email is greentek@aol.com if this is easier.