Reprofiled Camshaft Nightmare

[Guest chief]

Some of you may remember I was asking questions about setting up the cam timing on a reprofiled cam a while ago.

 

Well, I thought Id update you on my progress but mostly I just want to have a good moan to my fellow pug owners.

 

Okay, so about three weeks ago I took the old cam out, measured the existing shims and put the new cam in. No problems there, but I had difficulty deciding on the valve clearances basically through inexperience and having no frame of reference as to how tight the feeler gauge should be. Anyway after measuring the clearances as best I could, I put the old cam back in and took the car home from my mates garage.

 

After sleeping on it I decided Id measured the clearances too big so I went back to the garage and did the whole thing over again. Confident Id measured them more accurately I calculated what new shims I needed and ordered them from Pug.

 

Next weekend I did the whole thing again, old cam out, new shims in, new cam in, clearances measured. The gaps didnt seem to have closed up at all despite putting approx 0.3mm thicker shims in across the board. Bugger I thought, I must be way off measuring these clearances so I got my mate down to measure them for me. Confident Id (wed) got it right this time I put the old shims and old cam back in so I could get to work the next day.

 

I ordered more shims from Peugeot, again approx 0.3mm bigger than the last ones and took a half day off work yesterday when they arrived and did the whole thing again.

 

This is where I start to lose my patience a bit. Depending on how I measure the clearances they have either not closed up at all or have closed up only 0.10.2mm. I checked and rechecked everything until about 11.30 last night when Id had enough and threw the car back together and fired it up anyway with the new cam installed. I know I shouldnt have especially listening to the clattery engine but at that stage it was either that or I was dropping the f***er off the nearest cliff.

 

So Ive just ordered more shims from Peugeot, the thickest they have which if Im lucky will be too tight and then at least I can get them ground down. Im also pissed off because the amount Ive now spent on shims has all but cancelled out the economy of buying a reprofiled cam. So now Ive got a cam which I probably ruined by running in with excessively large clearances and a mounting collection of shims which are basically useless to me. f***ed off is an understatement.

 

Anyway, that little rant has helped a bit. Thanks for listening

[Guest macatac14]

a large clearance will make the engine sound like a bag of spanners,but it won't really damage the cam,too tight a clearence will bugger it though.

Better off buying a new std cam.

[Pugnut 9 1 Cars]

are you forcing in the feeler gauges ? it should be a light interference fit

 

the worst thing about having too small clearances isn't really the cam , its when your valves dont shut properly and they get burnt

[atomic-jon 1]

why didnt peugeot use rocker arms instead of shims in XU engines, it would make adjusting the clearences so much less of a pain in the *ss, this is one of the reasons Ive steered clear of fitting an uprated cam, just because I know it will anger me so much, commiserations on your hassle, hope these new set of shims sorts it out

[fiji bob 0]

buy a ported head and cam at the same time and get someone else to do it

[Guest chief]

Finally got it sorted with the 4mm shims. Exhaust clearances are still a little loose according to pipers recommendations and I had to grind the inlet shims a little to get them perfect but the engine sounds very healthy again.

 

I wasn't forcing the gauges but when the gaps were over 0.7mm you could basically put a range of feeler gauges in there and not tell the difference. Once I got the clearances smaller it was much easier to judge accurately.

 

Very frustrating (and expensive in terms of shims) but I can now have a camshaft out in about half an hour I've done it so many times! If anyone needs XU valve shims I have a v. good selection available