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Head Rebuild- long and perhaps boring response.....

I am not aware of one on this site, and with the risk of boring you will offer this:

My experience is that the heads on the Volvo red blocks seldom need "rebuilt" in the strict sense of the word. "Freshening up" might better describe what I have done. I have never had to replace any valve guides in these heads and I have only replaced one valve. A quick count brings up a number of seven that I have gone through. Several of those were turbo heads of which one was cracked and needed to be replaced, but otherwise none have been terribly warped. I believe .004 is the tolerance for out of plane and most of them were out that much or a bit more so a clean up cut was called for.

If you have a valve spring compressor and a "power wire brush" you can probably do most of it yourself.

Check and record the valve clearances. Disassembly is easy enough and the bits can be placed in numbered ziploc bags to keep them ordered. Read the FAQ’s about cam removal. Be sure to remove the spring seat that is between the head and the valve spring so it does not get lost. A couple of dental picks are a great help for this, and be careful not to drop one and have it disappear into the galley; they can be extremely difficult to find and extract sometimes (BTDT). Either clean up the head yourself (carb cleaner) or have your selected machine shop do it for you. Have them check the head for plane and take a cut if needed. If you are not familiar with how much clearance you should "feel" in the guides you will want to take one along that represents the maximum wiggle between stem and guide and have them evaluate it.

Put on your safety glasses and use your power wire brush (bench grinder or die grinder attachment) to remove all the build up on the valves. Apply significant pressure to remove all surface build up.

In anticipation of the work you are doing you probably ordered a head gasket set. I always use Elring. I can’t remember if the set includes the hushers (rubber seals on the top of the stem) and stem seals but I am pretty sure that it does. This would have been a good time to order any valve shims you need to correct the clearances. You can use a micrometer on the shims of any valves out of tolerance and calculate the shim you need to put it right.

When you get the head back you can lap in the valve/seats. It only takes lapping compound and the tool which has a suction cup end. Simply apply the compound, attach the cup to the valve and rapidly roll it back and forth between your palms while applying downward pressure. As your hands end up to low on the tool to continue pick the tool and attached valve up and redistribute the compound on the surfaces. You really can’t hand lap too much so spend some time at it. Clean up the valve and seat when you are done and examine them for evidence that the abrasive has contacted and knocked down the sheen of the surfaces all the way around. Rebag the valve when done. Remember you want all the components to be assembled with the ones that they were originally with. After all the valves have been lapped double clean to make sure no lapping compound remains on the head or valves. Make sure all areas of the head are clean of foreign material.

You are ready to assemble the head at this point. Start at one end with the appropriate bag of pieces. I oil the guides and put assembly grease on the stems. These heads only have guide seals on the intake valves. When installing intake valves I oil the seals and install the valves in a rotating fashion until the valve is seated. Replace the spring seat that goes between the spring and head. I always slip it onto a long skinny screwdriver and place the screwdriver into the guide- just some insurance they don’t get dropped into the galley. Install the springs and retainers and compress the assembly. Install the keepers. A bit of lithium grease on the keeper halves will insure that they will stay in place while you slowly decompress the springs.

Once the springs are in place go back and install the rubber seals. Give each assembly a couple of tablespoons of engine oil. Put assembly lube on the cam followers and their mating surfaces on the head, install them on the correct valve with the shim that you have determined will give you the correct clearance.

Install the cam after applying assembly grease, it is easy to install it now in the TDC position. Draw down the caps a little at a time as described in the FAQ’s (opposite procedure of removing the cam). Install the camshaft oil seal.

I may have left something out and hopefully someone will bring it to our attention. Bentley has a good description of the process but actually provides more information than is necessary for all the heads I have come across. These are great engines with both the top end and bottom end nearly bulletproof unless terribly abused.

Good luck.






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