Does anyone know anything about valve stems in the engine? I was told something about

valve stems and to replace them you'd have to take the engine out, unless you had a special tool.

Is it a difficult job? How much are we talking to replace these?

i take it you are talking about the valve stem seals?

you could do it with the head still on the car but the cam and all the other valve operating gear would need to come off.

what makes you ask? is your car smoking?

j

you would have to take the head off because to get to them you need to take the valves out and to do that the head needs to come off.

Yes! The valve stem seals, thats what i meant.

The car is smoking out of the exhaust and burning oil big time, there is lots of sooty build up in

the exhaust pipe too.

if your car disappears in a cloud of smoke when its started up in a morning and then clears up, its likely to be the valve stem seals, but if its smoking all the time its more likey to be piston rings.

It smokes whilst driving too, what are the piston rings like to replace?

What kind of money are we talking to replace those/fix it?

if the piston rings have had it, it a complete engine rebuild or getting another engine, but getting a mechanic to see it would be a good idea first.

Usually if your car chucks out blue smoke when you've backed off after accelerating it is your Valve stem oil seals that are fooked!!!!

Mine was smoking on overrun,it was the valve stem seals,i did them in situ using compressed air introduced into the cylinder with a threaded airline connection into the sparkplug hole to keep the valves from dropping when i dismantled them.

They were the first set i'd ever done and took the best part of the morning.

Anyone ever done it the Pikey way using nylon rope pushed into the cyl to keep the valves up??? aperently it works well!!

it is possible to replace the valve stem seals with the head still on, but you need specialist tools, like already mention above you need to remove the camshaft. you then take out the spark plug and put in a air line fitting and fill the cylinder with compressed air which holds the valves closed. then using another special tool you remove the valve retainer and springs. then again you need another special tool to remove the old seal (very longer narrow pliers)..

in my opinion it's easier to remove the head and do it properly