matching valve train with cam, necessary?

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vpSPOONsol

Senior Member
hi, is matching the brands for valve train and cam necessary? for ex. i asked the guy @ skunk2, and he said you hafta use skunk2 valvetrain with a skunk2 cam, i raise the bs flag. i was thinkin bout crower valve train just cuz its cheaper. also, when puttin in a stage 2 cam, are aftermarket valves necessary, or are springs & retainers sufficient?thanks!!
 
sorry. I'm tired. Anyhow, yes you can mix setups (cams with different springs etc etc) as far as upgrade. I recomend to anyone that is serious and doesn't want to limit themeselves in the long run, to upgrade valve springs and retainers at least. SS valves are nice but not nessasry. as far as having to upgrade, usually anything more than a stage 1 cam it is required to upgrade spring/retainers
 
Valves, generally no.

Retainers, not really.

Springs- definitely yes. You don't have to match the brands, but you really should make sure you're running the right kinds of valve spring rates for your cams. If you go too soft, you'll float a valve. If you're too stiff, you could damage the cam. Check to see what the camshaft manufacturer recommends, then match the springs to your cam application.
 
Adding retainers only lightens the load being accelerated by the cam motion on the valvtrain. It just makes for less parasitic power loss to the valve train. Not really anything to do with upgrading the cams. It's more of a "I am already pulling this bastard head apart anyway, why not spend the extra 125 and upgrade these too?" It's more of a time saver than anything, since you have to pull the head to get the valvetrain apart. You just end up spending more $$$ on new gaskets and more work if you split it up into two jobs.
 
You can still replace the retainers easily without pulling the head. :)
 
I dunno about that. My retainer keys were stuck in there REALLY tight when I pulled mine. I had tap on the valve heads with a rubber mallet pretty hard before the keys popped out. What tool did you use to get them off? I was just using a snap-valve spring compressor (the ONLY snap on tool I could afford) to compress the springs. Even that tool was hard to use with the depth of the vtec head. The valves are buried in those heads.
 
I didn't do it- I watched my buddy Dave who used to be a tech at a Honda dealer in Dallas do it on his B16 while it was still in his car. I don't remember what tools he used- this was about two years ago- but he just took a hammer and gave the retainer bits (whatever they're called in the center) a good whack (had some tool in between) and everything came apart nice and easy.

Wow, long sentence...
 
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