Cosmic's Winter Pulsar Project

Yeah I can return the shims buts it's £30 postage plus admin, but it's the time it takes.

Measure & measure again & send um back for reorder . only option really  especially if they sent right sizes .
I would of probably gone with shimming for you build as if put effort in like mr burrows it not much of a bodge & works well & long term .
if got a long wait spend bit of time ding a few checks or tweaks so rest of work & first start goes smooth. fingers crossed .
Is a bummer things like that but best approach is suck it up & accept timespan to sort it .
I would also blame boy wonder for this, wish I had one as I only got the wife & if blame her she probably attack me with kitchen knife :-S

Finally solved the riddle of my awful cam clearances. You can read into this what you like.

I removed the new shims and today and spent an hour at work measuring them with Mitoyo point calipers (0-25mm) borrowed from our gauge labs.
i could only get half of them to tie up to within .01mm with what they should be. One shim that should've been 2.98mm was 2.92 so not good.
Every time i measured the same shim i got different thicknesses.

OK, so maybe it's me, right?
So i also re-measured the original Nissan shims.
I got exactly the same results as i got 2 weeks ago, and then a colleague also got the same results as me. No matter how many times we measured the same shim, we got the same thickness.

So, there's no doubt whatsoever that this is why my cam clearances were still out.

I'm definitely going to refit the original Nissan shims and then simply use punched out inserts to make up the gap.

Maybe they read the measurements upside down as they are Australian?

Bad luck there dude but glad you have the equipment and knowledge to measure them all properly what a waste of time and money.

Couldnt someone lend you a correctly adapted punch tool sureley once they have used it on their engine they wont need it for a while...

So the shims are wrong full stop or there made bad hence you getting different readings everytime

Sorry to hear dude, hopefully another option is available for you.

Yes us Australians tend to read us upside down or sideways, it's all the beer

shroom wrote:Maybe they read the measurements upside down as they are Australian?

Bad luck there dude but glad you have the equipment and knowledge to measure them all properly what a waste of time and money.

Couldnt someone lend you a correctly adapted punch tool sureley once they have used it on their engine they wont need it for a while...

I'm going to refit the original shims and then put a help post to see if anyone will make the inserts i need?
Ill certainly make it worth their while

johnny gtir wrote:So the shims are wrong full stop or there made bad hence you getting different readings everytime

I can't say if they're wrong or made bad, but they're not as accurate or repeatable as the nissan shims.
I targeted a clearance of 0.1mm but ended up with 0.05 to 0.25mm

0.25 will be ok as a cold measurement but 0.05 would be a tad tight! I've aimed for anything from 0.16 to 0.21 ended up only using 0.10mm & 0.15mm blades 13 X.10 and 3 X .15

I can send you my tool or cut the blades here and send the cut outs to you if that's any help?

Gaz

Hi Gaz,
If you could cut the inserts that be a huge help, thanks.
Like you say its not excess clearance im concerned with but tight clearance.
Once i know the thicknesses ill PM you mate,
Cheers

Yeah no problem mate, happy to help

I tend aim around 0.13 to 0.18 but mr burrows measures are perfectly fine range.
I use a point mic to measure shim caps (see pic) but you could also use decent vernier caliper & a spacer rod to fit in cap well then deduct this spacer rod length to get shim size.
readings can vary slightly but sometimes a large variation could be fact you measure off a manufacturing pit in cap well .
Just remeasure well & take up the welsh tool solution wizard mr burrows offer to sort you set from his blade stock & modded punch tool
not too much bother if wrong again as he lot more local than oz ...

That calliper is identical to the one i used with the pointy ends.
Id be happy with achieving 0.1 to 0.2 right now tbh.
I was aware of the small manufacturing pit and was very careful to avoid it,

I used the spacer method with vernier calipers. Cut part of the stem of an old valve and used that for the spacer. You know it's going to seat properly and give the right measurement.

Aren't the valves sodium filled?

Also how did you achieve the thickness you needed without grinding?
Sounds an interesting solution?

Not the one I used....
This was just for measuring the shims, not for making them.
As Mr B said, the length of the spacer doesn't matter, just subtract its length from each measurement to get the actual shim thickness.

Ah, now i get it.
That's a much better method.

Gaz's shims arrived and are working a treat!! Cheers Gaz    

I'm also using Johns method to inspect and swap around the shims. Cheers John    

Last night i nailed down all the intake clearances 0.1 to 0.15 which is f&*#ng brilliant,

I'll do the exhaust clearances tonight  

watch this space....

Awesome news, everything's working out in the end

Finally finished the cam clearances.
Got them all between 0.13 to 0.2mm
What a dog of a job, glad they're finally done.

I'll give you a shout next month you can do mine