I was assuming the shop was pulling the motor, there is some labor involved, the motor needs to be torn down to pretty much a shortblock and the heads have to be stripped down.

Ok now that makes sense. I didnt think of that. I thought $300 was insane specially since you can buy a brand new set of stock heads from 350 to 380.

Damn type 1 stuff is dirt cheap compared to type 4. New stock AMC heads are about $900 and then you got to replace the valves/guides/seats/springs/retainers/keepers if you want them to be reliable, or you spend $3500ish on a set of Raby's heads. Makes the thought of swapping in a Honda motor seem logical. Luckily I have 3 spare sets of good used heads in different levels of awesomeness .

300 for a valve job with them removing the motor is rather fair..

Eric did say Job but he meant Adjustment.. he rocks a pimp double cab but has not learned all the things needed to keep his ride tuned up just yet...

so 300 for a valve adjustment is steep..

I have seen a couple bill to mention.. one was for 180 dollars to repair a pop out window latch.. this includes just welding the tab back on the the pillar..no paint or prep needed.

and
A guy was charged 275 dollars to have a pressed in sand seal pulley installed.. yes press in..
so remove stock pulley .. add sillycone around press in seal install and then place new pulley on .. add belt... call customer.. EMPI pulley charge 80 dollars.

they tried to charge me once 15 dollars each for short head studs -I needed four to convert to dual port.. they said... that will be 60 dollars,..I said um no it won't .. I didn't buy from them..
plus I pulled the parts... from a bin of oh...700 head studs..

crazy....!!


I will say I've scored a few 019's for under 20 bucks.so they can have good pricing.. Just gotta know when to say NO! and walk away if it is too outrageous.

Ahh... So it was an adjustment job afterall...lol

Shucks, I thought it was a valve job. I have no idea what the prices are for labor, 20 yrs of doing all my own work.

Yeah, sorry guys... I meant adjustment

I tried to be a real man and do the adjustment myself, went great until just before I went to put the valve covers back on I noticed that the 0.006 feeler gauge was stuck to its neighbor (new oily gauge) .... so I got to do it twice, practice I guess. I think it was probably spot on initially. When I was adjusting them the first time, I thought to myself wow these are way too tight, this thing will run really great when I am done.

I changed the plugs and wires, and I changed the oil, used Mobile 1 5w30, hope that is ok- left overs from the wifes car. I also replaced the 009 with the Pertronix vacuum advance to help with the dead spots as the 1600 has an EMPI 34 pict 3. I static timed it to 7.0/7.5 BTDC and it seems to run fine, no dead spots. (also tried 5 and 10 BTDC to see the difference when reved) It seems to have much better power in the hills now, but it does seem to have lost some power in 4th gear. I think I need to recheck the adjustment and buy a timing light and degree pully.

Any words of wisdom? I am trying to get this thing to run real smooth, so I can beat the ChumBucket in the upcoming June Bug Rally.

The easiest way to beat chumbucket is to never try.