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Bleeding And Cleaning Hydraulic Lifters
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11100100
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 07, 2009 11:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here's a picture of the body of a FEBI lifter I got from VC (I'm assuming it's a FEBI because that's what they have listed).

One difference from loogy's pic is the retainer clip. It's flat rather than cylindrical. It also has holes as you can see,
but let me tell you, I had a much easier time removing them carefully with a pick than with my ring pliers. It's just
difficult getting the tips of the pliers into the holes deep enough to hold.

Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.

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rosamond
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 30, 2014 2:38 pm    Post subject: Creatively lazy lifter hack method Reply with quote

Thanks to all for all the information on this topic. I always read Schimke and tencent's posts and learn alot. And Schimke's T3 lugs for my 16" mercedes wheels are definitely stylin. End of platitudes and on to the meat of the matter: I'm nearing the end of a rebuild of my 2.1l, which threw a rod in central Baja California awhile ago. I'm now finally rebuilding it at a friend's house where we had it towed after a huge 3rd world adventure getting it and our sea kayaks out of Mexico. I don't have the benefit of my shop full of tricks and tools here where I'm doing this. I got new lifters from VC, and was fiddling around with how to bleed them properly without fancy stuff, fiddling with the drift pin method and so on, I had an epiphany that requires no "lining up the holes" and no sliding small metal scribes or drifts into the aligned holes. Being basically creative (which is my technical term for "Lazy") I took the foot off a 5" C-clamp that had a ball at the end of the screw which was just a bit bigger than a vanagon rod. I ground down the sides of this ball a bit so I could get needlenose pliers in to put the final top clip on the lifter, filled the oil into the tappet, put all the other stuff on in its proper order, then slowly (maybe about 1 turn per 30 seconds), I pressed the little lifter piston into place with the modified C clamp, and put the clip on while the C clamp was holding it all at just the right depth. I think it's a viable method in place of using the scribe method or a hydraulic press. It worked great. After about the sixth valve, I seem to be able to do a lifter bleed in about 3 minutes per lifter. Anybody see any reason this would screw up a lifter or the profit margin of someone who charges to do waterboxer lifter bleeds?
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djkeev
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 05, 2015 3:46 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I just disassembled my lifters to clean and preload with oil.

108,000 original miles.

Mine (brand unknown but I can only assume OEM originals) were built differently from the ones posted earlier in this thread.

The top that the pushrod sets into was a permanently assembled side feeding cap.
The interior piston and a spring loaded ball bearing as the bottom check valve.

Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


Assembly was not unlike others, I used a small 7/32 drill bit to hold the piston compressed while assembling the top and retainer clip.

Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


Image may have been reduced in size. Click image to view fullscreen.


I found that by using two small screw drivers I was able to compress the piston easily, one small enough to depress the ball bearing check valve, the other to use pushing down at the same time. You Can't just push the ball to compress the piston..... You knock off the ball retainer and spring!

I found that mine were sticky with a heavy build up of oil deposits.
I Used common carb cleaner which quickly cleaned off the deposits in short order.

I filled the lifters with oil from my trigger oil squirt can about 1/2 way.
Dropped in the bottom spring.
Slipped in the assembled piston /check valve.
Depressed ball and pushed down piston.
Slipped drill bit into hole on top of piston.
Slipped on the top and pushed down excess oil oozes out lifter side hole when the drill bit is inserted.
Install clip.
Done!

Do One at a time, don't risk mixing up parts.
Does it matter? I don't know ....... but why risk it?

Dave
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BavarianWrench
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 01, 2015 12:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm off to clean some lifters. Thanks everybody for your processes and photos. You have once again put forth a lot of effort sharing the knowledge. I hope these tickers I have are repairable? It is a fair amount of labor. New lifters are silly expensive. I'll put forth some labor. Is there a vender or a brand that is recommended and reasonable? What is the average cost per lifter that you folks have come across?
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guillaume.bastian
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PostPosted: Thu Nov 10, 2016 7:30 am    Post subject: Re: Bleeding And Cleaning Hydraulic Lifters Reply with quote

hi, I believe I'm having similar problems, dirty lifters or failure altogether, engine hadn't been run in long time.
I removed the cylinder head with poor compression (#4), fixed valve guide, put it back together, new oil, plugs, and had the engine running smooth for two weeks drove down street a couple times. then started experiencing what I believe to be a "lifter knock". thought It could be related to one of them not pumping up maybe due to dirty oil clogging up oil channels somewhere. ran marvel mystery through the engine with very thin oil, revved it for twenty minutes, lifter seemed to pump up gradually. engine runs smooth again! for two weeks until I have the same problem again. I'm going to check the oil, more cleaner...etc.

Maybe a visual inspection of lifters are necessary after I try cleaning It out again , do the lifters just slide out with a magnet of some sort when I remove the rocker arms, rods...etc?? or is splitting the case necessary?

also if my lifter has failed should I worry about damage to the camshaft, or any other parts?

any advice on diagnosing pretty loud lifter noise/possible failure?
thanks everyone
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DanHoug
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PostPosted: Sun Jul 16, 2017 1:46 pm    Post subject: Re: Bleeding And Cleaning Hydraulic Lifters Reply with quote

this is an old thread but with great info and photos.. two things to add as i'm doing this.

i tried cleaning them in acetone, mineral spirits, lacquer thinner, and couldn't get the black spooge off of the check ball. 10 minutes in an ultrasonic cleaner with hot Pine Sol did the trick. cleaned everything up very nicely.

then hooked up a bleeding system that seems to work extremely well... vacuum pump to a jar of oil. while sucking the air out, it also seems to be boiling off the WD40 i used to assemble these. don't know if that is an advantage for when the engine gets hot or if the WD would just boil and get pushed out. whatever, the vacuum bleeding seems to work very well.


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tencentlife
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 06, 2020 12:19 pm    Post subject: Re: Bleeding And Cleaning Hydraulic Lifters Reply with quote

Following up on the "pump-up" phenomenon discussed all those years ago. As I've said, the internal fluid pressures are simply nowhere near enough to actually overcome even very light valve-spring pressure. But there is a situation where this might seem to be what's going on. In cases of valve float (valves not closing completely at high rpms because the springs aren't strong enough to control valvetrain inertia) or sticking dirty valvestems at lower rpm, there can be slack in the valvetrain at times when it should be fully loaded. At those times a lifter may expand into the available lash, making the lifter effectively too long so it holds the valve off the seat at rest.

My own experience is that wbx's are quite prone to intake valve sticking, and it's mainly from use of fuels that don't have a good detergent additive package. Lots of other engines are probably similarly prone, we just don't see the problems that used to be common because major fuel vendors have all had good additive packs for a long time now.

But you can still find cheap gas out there, and it's prevalent in some other countries and markets. I had several engine customers that had valve sticking problems while traveling thru Latin America, where fuel quality is spotty. I advised them to add some ATF to their fuel and in every case that cleared it up.

Valve float probably isn't much of a factor for wbx drivers and most other engines that have rev-limiters in their ECU's, and in my experience I haven't seen valve springs losing strength with age.

In either case, the over-filled lifter should self-correct in a few engine cycles, but a chronically sticking valve would present the same problem again and again.
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gregburb
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2022 8:43 am    Post subject: Re: Bleeding And Cleaning Hydraulic Lifters Reply with quote

Dave, it looks like I have the same lifters that you were able to clean up and prefill. How did you take apart the plunger?
Greg
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Wildthings
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2022 9:16 am    Post subject: Re: Bleeding And Cleaning Hydraulic Lifters Reply with quote

tencentlife wrote:
Following up on the "pump-up" phenomenon discussed all those years ago. As I've said, the internal fluid pressures are simply nowhere near enough to actually overcome even very light valve-spring pressure. But there is a situation where this might seem to be what's going on. In cases of valve float (valves not closing completely at high rpms because the springs aren't strong enough to control valvetrain inertia) or sticking dirty valvestems at lower rpm, there can be slack in the valvetrain at times when it should be fully loaded. At those times a lifter may expand into the available lash, making the lifter effectively too long so it holds the valve off the seat at rest.


I purchased a '78 Bay with hydraulic lifters and AMC heads. The keepers, retainers, and valve stems had all worn to where there was not longer sufficient spring pressure on several valves and as a result the lifters would over pump when the engine was run for 10 minutes or more. This was a dozen+ years ago, but from memory the lifters would over pump either at speed or at idle. I am sure I added some kind of lubricant to the fuel (likely a synthetic motor oil) to lube the valve stems without seeing any improvement in lifter function.
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