Yesterday I was re-fitting my rocker shaft onto one of the heads on my black bug's engine, and there appears to be an excessive amount of play between the tappet and valve stem on my #2 exhaust valve. All the others are fine.

I have had a look and it appears that the pushrod is not sticking out as far as the others do when the cylinders are at TDC. When I insert the pushrod into the case it also feels slightly different to all the others, which all feel the same as each other.
The pushrods are all the same length.

Type 1 engines have valve lifters that go between the pushrods and the cam, yes? Could this be the source of my problem?


Any other suggestions?

Thanks, Steve

[Edited on 1/2/05 by *did*]

Yes vw engines have a lifter between cam and push rod.

Check the valve stem height first with a steel rule. put it across the tip of the valves and make sure there all approximatly the same length. you make have dropped the valve or it might be stuck. check this before you go much futher.

How much difference are we talking about. Also check that the pushrods are the same length to begin with. I had excessive clearence on my engine and the valve seat had fallen out.

Ok I've checked it out. All the valve stems are level (not stuck valves).
The pushrods themselves are all the same length and are straight.
I swapped the pushrods around and it does seem to make a difference, it appears that the ends on the pushrods are slightly different.
Anyway, with the pushrods swapped around I think i can adjust the tappets properly, just need to put the right sized shims between the rocker shaft and the head.
Currently the shims mean that the gap is too big to adjust on all the valves, and without the shims the end of the valve would probably be pushing against the rocker itself