Reseating and Truing Valves
Much has been said relative to valve grinding, and despite the mass of information given in the trade prints it is rather amusing to watch the average repairman or the engine user who prides himself on maintaining his own motor performing this essential operation. The common mistakes are attempting to seat a badly grooved or pitted valve head on an equally bad seat, which is an almost hopeless job, and of using coarse emery and bearing down with all one’s weight on the grinding tool with the hope of quickly wearing away the rough surfaces. The use of improper abrasive material is a fertile cause of failure to obtain a satisfactory seating. Valve grinding is not a difficult operation if certain precautions are taken before undertaking the work. The most important of these is to ascertain if the valve head or seat is badly scored or pitted. If such is found to be the case no ordinary amount of grinding will serve to restore the surfaces. In this event the best thing to do is to remove the valve from its seating and to smooth down both the valve head and the seat in the cylinder before attempt is made to fit them together by grinding. Another important precaution is to make sure that the valve stem is straight, and that the head is not warped out of shape.
A number of simple tools is available at the present time for reseating valves, these being outlined at Fig. 183. That shown at A is a simple fixture for facing off the valve head. The stem is supported by suitable bearings carried by the body or shank of the tool, and the head is turned against an angularly disposed cutter which is set for the proper valve seat angle. The valve head is turned by a screw-driver, the amount of stock removed from the head depending upon the location of the adjusting screw. Care must be taken not to remove too much metal, only enough being taken off to remove the most of the roughness. Valves are made in two standard tapers, the angle being either 45 or 60 degrees. It is imperative that the cutter blade be set correctly in order that the bevel is not changed. A set of valve truing and valve-seat reaming cutters is shown at Fig. 183, B. This is adaptable to various size valve heads, as the cutter blade D may be moved to correspond to the size of the valve head being trued up. These cutter blades are made of tool steel and have a bevel at each end, one at 45 degrees, the other at 60 degrees. The valve seat reamer shown at G will take any one of the heads shown at F. It will also take any one of the guide bars shown at H. The function of the guide bars is to fit the valve stem bearing in order to locate the reamer accurately and to insure that the valve seat is machined concentrically with its normal center. Another form of valve seat reamer and a special wrench used to turn it is shown at C. The valve head truer shown at Fig. 183, D, is intended to be placed in a vise and is adaptable to a variety of valve head sizes. The smaller valves merely fit deeper in the conical depression. The cutter blade is adjustable and the valve stem is supported by a simple self-centering bearing. In operation it is intended that the valve stem, which protrudes through the lower portion of the guide bearing, shall be turned by a drill press or bit stock while the valve head is set against the cutter by pressure of a pad carried at the end of a feed screw which is supported by a hinged bridge member. This can be swung out of place as indicated to permit placing the valve head against the cutter or removing it.
As the sizes of valve heads and stems vary considerably a “Universal” valve head truing tool must have some simple means of centering the valve stem in order to insure concentric machining of the valve head. A valve head truer which employs an ingenious method of guiding the valve stem is shown at Fig. 183, E. The device consists of a body portion, B, provided with an external thread at the top on which the cutter head, A, is screwed. A number of steel balls, C, are carried in the grooves which may be altered in size by the adjustment nut, F, which screws in the bottom of the body portion, B. As the nut F is screwed in against the spacer member E, the V-grooves are reduced in size and the steel balls, C, are pressed out in contact with the valve stem. As the circle or annulus is filled with balls in both upper and lower portions the stem may be readily turned because it is virtually supported by ball bearing guides. When a larger valve stem is to be supported, the adjusting nut F, is screwed out which increases the size of the grooves and permits the balls, C, to spread out and allow the larger stem to be inserted.