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Valve Adjustments?

39K views 39 replies 17 participants last post by  speedlever 
#1 ·
Anyone ever heard of doing a Valve job on the Ridgelines? If so, anyone have the specs/details? Thanks...
 
#36 ·
Looking again at Keoni's pictures I noticed that the valve covers and cam holders are a very different casting from my 2009. The 09 motor has a taller camshaft hold down block which sits up higher than the 06. That's why the 09 cover is harder to remove on the rear and why sealer is required at the bend in the gasket. If you look at a parts diagram you will see the differences between the 06 and the 09.
 
#37 ·
who's to say if they are *really* tight or not? I bet the person at the factory swore they did it right the first time too ... a few thousandths is basically moot in human terms
 
#38 · (Edited)
Just adjusted the valves on my 2008 Ridgeline with 102,000 miles. The Intakes were loose about 1/8 turn of the adjuster, while the Exhausts were tight about 1/8 turns. Engine is noticeably quieter after the valve clearance adjustment, which surprised me with such a small change (1/8 turn is about -.0008" - .0010"). I set my intakes to the low end of the spec .008" so they can open up as they wear. I set the Exhausts to the middle of the spec at .012", but knowing that they tighten up as they wear, setting to .013" upper end might be better, if you don't want to do this job too often. I like quiet valves, so I hedged with the mid range. I'm the 3rd owner of my RL, so no telling how the previous owners drove it, but I drive it fairly average, so I'd say Honda's 100,000 mile recommendation on this service is accurate, unless you drive your truck really hard at high RPM for a long time or frequently haul heavy loads, in which case, doing it sooner is probably a good idea. I think the owners manual says to do it only if the valves are noisy, but in my case, the engine was pretty quiet before the adjustment; I noticed it being quieter after the adjustment but I would have never characterized the before sound as "noisy", unless I worked on Honda V6 motors every day and trained my ears to good or bad ones; regardless, the valves definitely needed the adjustment.

I'm posting real world findings to the forum, because the valve adjustment service is VERY expensive, but then the cost of fixing a burnt valve that got too tight from lack of adjustment is even more expensive, so it's a balance, deciding when to do it, for sure. Reading posts from others, saying their exhaust valves were tight after only 50,000 miles, got me nervous that I had waited too long, but that just was not the case for me. I think the Honda engineers knew what they were talking about with their 100,000 mile service recommendation.
 
#39 ·
Great write-up. I noticed similar results after I also had my valve clearances checked and adjusted two years ago. I had a dealership do it because, whereas I likely would have had no issue doing it myself, I simply didn't have the time to devote to it. What the dealership did in 3 hours, it would have taken me all weekend. From the report of the tech, two of the intake valves were fine while four of them were slightly out of spec. I had three exhaust valves that were fine, two that were tight and one that was actually loose. It cost me $350 to have done, which constituted two valve cover gaskets and labor. I did notice a "quieter" engine with a little more smoothness in acceleration, but that was about it. No change in fuel mileage or power delivery. I'm more than likely going to do it myself next time because quite honestly it was not worth the price.
 
#40 ·
My issue with Honda is that they only recommend adjusting the valves if they're noisy. I don't think tight valves are noisy, and I think there's more potential for damage from tight valves than noisy (loose) valves.
 
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