valve adjustment question

[lb7lbz]

when i adjusted the valves i apparently got one wrong on the drivers side. is there a way i can tell what stroke the engine is on without watching the #1 valve open and close. i dont want to pull off the pass. side valve cover just to watch a valve open and close. 01 lb7

[DmaxMaverick]

You should only have to "watch" the cylinder you are working on. Rotate the crank by hand (correct, normal rotation, not backwards), and continue 1/2 crank rotation once the intake valve closes. That should place that piston about TDC on the compression stroke, with valve play well out of action and the valve at full lash. TDC for any other cylinder is irrelevant to the cylinder you are adjusting.

[lb7lbz]

interesting. the alldata proceedure i followed said to pull both valve covers and rotate the engine in normal direction and watch the #1 open and close then line up the marks as u said. however it then gave all the valves that could be adjusted at that time. then it said to continue rotation watch the other #1 valve open and close and continue turning till the marks lined up and you could then adjust the remaining valves. it must work cause i adjusted them a little tighterthen spec and it quieted things down with the exception of 1 i obviously messed up. thanks for the info maverick

[DmaxMaverick]

I haven't read the Alldata procedure, so I can't comment on that. Valve adjustment is simple, unless you complicate it. You could use the procedure in the manual, which relies on cam lobe indexing to do several cylinders at a time, but I've found this to be unreliable. Not something unique to the Duramax. It only takes a couple crank degrees to foul the results, and if you are off a little, you'll have to do it again. I always default to the basic, and do one cylinder at a time on every engine I've done. You may save some time doing multiples, but not enough IMO, to justify the uncertainty.

Your case is different, only having one bank to do. If it were me, I'd check them all again, just because.