1964 Corvair Monza | Valve Adjustment 

Back in the day when I was playing with Corvairs, I was picking up some parts at the Chevy dealer when one of their mechanics, who was also getting parts for the Corvair he was working on, got to talking with me. I mentioned that I was going to adjust the valves, as I had a noisy one. He was the one who told me how to adjust them running using the cut-down valve cover, saying he did that all the time at the dealership. Taking his tip, I fashioned two cut-down covers from a single one. Got to where it took longer to jack the car up, take off the stock covers and install the cut-down covers than it did to adjust the valves, doing both sides in one sitting. His suggestion, which always worked for me, was when adjusting after the clatter, 1/2 turn for 80, 95, and 110 engines, 1/4 turn for 140s and turbos. Bonus result? If you fired it up and the engine clattered and didn't quiet down within 30 seconds or so, chances were good 90% of the time you were a quart low on oil - bringing it back up to full solved the clatter. Enjoy the toy!!

very clear explanation. i have a 63 Monza coupe and struggled with those valve adjjustments. i will recheck after seeing your video. Thanks!

Good vidieo ed

You can adjust them non running. Get it on the base lobe of the cam and 1/2 to 3/4 turn after zero lash is good

Nice job on the valve adjustments ! & I like how clean your engine compartment is as well as underneath , I would have liked to have heard her running with everything hooked back up ! She looks like a sweat ride , I have always done mine cold ! Based on the book how keep your Corvair alive. It has worked every time for me , But it is more time consuming. Thanks for the video.

I have never seen valve lash adjusted like that, on anything. I'm no expert but I get the valve off the cam lobe, so the valve is closed, then adjust the lash to the spec there. Cool car though.

Sorry for being late on these comments, but I only recently discovered your channel. A lot of fun. I bought my very first car - a 63 Corvair 700 coupe - in 1970, and wound up having a business repairing Corvairs for several years. I have some thoughts on your valve adjustment. First, I don’t think that your previous valve adjustment caused the valve on #4 to hang open. Adjusting hydraulic lifters is not a precision adjustment like adjusting solid lifters. The only purpose for adjusting hydraulic lifters is to move the inner piston in the lifters down to approximately the middle of their stroke. Remember, hydraulic pressure is what takes up the slack in the valve train, and by adjusting the inner piston down a bit, you give it room to take up the slack as things wear. I suspect that there is dirt or varnish inside one or more lifters, preventing the inner piston from being able to move its whole stroke. So, instead of the little piston just moving farther down into the lifter as you tightened the adjustment, it actually opened the valve a bit. Because you were able to get good compression once again after slacking off on the adjustment, I’m guessing that the bad lifter is the intake lifter. Running with the exhaust valve not fully seating would have likely burned the valve and you would have noticed very low compression, even after loosening the adjustment. If you decide to fix this, it’s not too bad a job. You have to remove the rocker arm, pushrod and pushrod tube on that cylinder, and then the lifter can be removed with a magnet. I would not replace the lifter with a new one, however, as lifters wear into the cam and putting a brand new lifter there could cause unnecessary wear on that cam lobe. I would simply disassemble the original lifter and thoroughly clean it, using something’s like carb cleaner or lacquer thinner as a soak. This problem really isn’t that unusual. Once, I repaired a Chevy 230 inline six that had every single lifter totally frozen. Generally, it’s from lack of maintenance - way too long between oil changes. Anyway, thanks for the great channel. I’ll keep watching it.

Where would I find the one third valve cover? Or can I do it without it?

Do you need to drain any oil out before doing this ? I bought a 62, adjusted cold and it’s knocking so I want to try while it’s running. I don’t have a half cover.