Author Topic: Valve guide lengths  (Read 404 times)

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Offline Peter327

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Valve guide lengths
« on: February 01, 2022, 05:22:51 PM »
I know I've done the wrong thing by removing my CB500 four K0 valve guides and not taking note of which were inlet and which were outlet.
One set is longer than the other, but I haven't been able to find anything on the internet as to which is which.  Although Partzilla show an inlet guide against a ruler which looks like it's 1 and 7/8th inches.  They don't do the same with the exhaust guide.
Just want to be sure before reassembling.  Any help greatly appreciated.

Offline HondaMan

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Re: Valve guide lengths
« Reply #1 on: February 01, 2022, 06:29:27 PM »
Umm...maybe look at them this way: which ones have the burnt-on carbon? The intake side is usually quite clean.

Another question: are you installing new guides? Because if not, you're likely headed for some trouble, here. You can't pull the guides out and just reinstall them: the valves will no longer align with the valve seats and you must recut the seats to match the new angle of the guides. If not, they will not seal.

When the guides and seats were first installed, the faces of the seats were cut with a valve seat machine to ensure the valves seated and sealed. This is necessary because there is always a slight misalignment between the axis of the valve guide and the axis of the valve seat, due to the way they get installed. The final step in making the valve setups is to cut the seats with a tool that is piloted in the valve guide, after that guide has been honed to the final ID dimension. There is always a slight angle to the finished result, so whenever guides are replaced this process must be repeated. "Bad" shops would sometimes try to just increase the bore of the valve guide (i.e., make it looser) so a valve would seal at the seat after installing a new guide, but this just makes that valve leak (and burn) oil.
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Offline MRieck

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Re: Valve guide lengths
« Reply #2 on: February 02, 2022, 06:08:27 AM »
I know I've done the wrong thing by removing my CB500 four K0 valve guides and not taking note of which were inlet and which were outlet.
One set is longer than the other, but I haven't been able to find anything on the internet as to which is which.  Although Partzilla show an inlet guide against a ruler which looks like it's 1 and 7/8th inches.  They don't do the same with the exhaust guide.
Just want to be sure before reassembling.  Any help greatly appreciated.
The exhaust are the longer guides BUT.....are you going to reinstall the old guides???? I really don't recommend that at all. You can purchase new OEM intake guides which will work on the exhaust side as well. And yes.....you are going to need a valve job AND have to have the guides honed to fit the valves.
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Offline Peter327

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Re: Valve guide lengths
« Reply #3 on: February 02, 2022, 02:10:49 PM »
Thanks guys.