VALVES MAKING  NOISE?

Can you hear the ticking of your valves ? Good, this is not necessarily a bad thing, if you cannot hear the valves, your engine is probably running very rough. The noise is not a sign of problems, the trick is to know when there is too much noise.

As most people cannot distinguish between enough and too much noise, BMW requires an interval of 15,000 miles between valve adjusts, following this procedure should keep your valves nicely adjusted and not allow any damage to the valve train.

The specifications for valve clearance vary between engines. Check the appropriate specs against your engine type.

M10 4 cylinder, 6-8 thou
M20 6 cylinder, 10 - 12 thou
M30 6 cylinder, 12 - 14 thou

The lower spec is for a cold engine, the upper one for a warm engine, however, I recommend using an in-between size when cold. Especially with the M30 engine which is very susceptible to a rough idle, in the case of this engine , I almost always use the upper setting when the engine is completely cold.

Remove the valve cover and open the cap on the diagnostic connector. I use a wire with a reverse light switch inline to activate the starter remotely, you can make something similar , or just use a wire to jump the appropriate pins.

The pins you need to jump are numbers 11 and 14. These pins are the same numbers regardless of which type of diagnostic connector you have.

Use the jumper wire to actuate the starter, make sure the car is not in gear if it is a manual, and make sure the ignition is off or the engine will try to start. There is a procedure to bring the valves to the point of adjustment on several cylinders at once. But it is easy to get lost and miss a valve if you are not experienced in this method. As a result, I suggest starting with the front valve and working backwards, one at a time. Rotate the cam until the lobe is 180 degrees in relation to the rocker, this is not vertical, be careful of this, you need the lowest section of the cam directly below the rocker to make the correct adjustment. Use a feeler gauge of the correct thickness, insert it between the round section of the rocker, and the top of the valve. If the valve is correctly adjusted, you will be able to move the feeler gauge around with some resistance, but no force. If it moves very freely, loosen the 10 mm nut on the end of the rocker and insert a piece of wire or thin rod into the hole in the round eccentric. Rotate the eccentric away from the cam to lessen the gap above the valve, thus tightening it. Tighten the nut and recheck the clearance. If this is your first time, you will find yourself doing each one twice until you get used to the way it works.

When you have finished, check them again. If you have made even one valve too tight, your engine will run poorly and you run the risk of damage to the cam if it is not corrected quickly.