LUVTruck.com

the best way of doing it is to wire or zip tie the chain to the camshaft gear. this allows you to remove it without having the hassle of retiming it when it comes back together.

also important when doing this is do make sure you disable the starter so as to not wreck the chain. this will also throw off timing. besides that, just DONT LOSE ANYTHING! some parts are hard to find, so keep an eye on things.

also important to note is that you MUST install each valve back into it's corresponding guide. this is because they are worn to that specific guide and another guide may have too much play. i put all my valves and associated hardware into ziploc bags and labeled them "intake no 1" "exhaust no 4" etc.

if you need any more help, just pm me and ill help you out! hope this helps!

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To the Oquirr hills for awesome thrills! Go-go 4wd, Activate!

I do believe that you get the engine to TDC number 4 cylinder and point the arrow on the cam gear up. Something like that, I'm not sure though. The 1980 engine is in an Isuzu book rather than a chevy LUV one... I think it has a picture of a Rodeo on the front of it.

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1980 4X4 LUV daily driver, as stock as can be.

thanks. an isuzu book huh. will have to look. my biggest thought was will i have to remove the cam hold down bolts. the manual i have says to but it shows a totally diffrent set up than what is under my hood. i dont see why i would have to other than just pressure pulling on the head from the valve springs pressured by the cam. goooood call on the zip tie would never have thought of that. sorry if i am hijacking, just wanted to keep all info in one place. thanks again

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do everything in you life so you can put your name on it

alright, time to get organized. and make sure to take notes as this is going to be along post


Basic instructions with pictures on how to perform a cylinder head rebuild on the 1.8 engine

Start by taking off the hood. This will make the work ALOT easier. ( I'm sure I don't have to tell you)



Drain all the coolant from the radiator and make sure you keep it away from any animals. They like to lick that stuff. While you do this, unplug your spark cables, but leave the plugs in. Remove the accelerator cable from the carb.

Remove the vacuum and smog lines to the air cleaner assembly and mark them or make a good mental note as to where they go. If you don't, your engine will idle erratically once the head is done and put back together.

Remove the smog pump (if you still have it) and disconnect the hoses to the carb and to the air injection rail

Take a wrench (a 22 or 24mm if i remember correctly) and remove the air transfer tube from the exhaust manifold.

Carefully remove the nuts that hold the exhaust manifold (if possible/necessary, clean up the studs with a dremel and wire wheel to remove as much oxidation as possible then hit them with a few shots of wd-40 or liquid wrench)
Note the leak in the background and its location ( in my case the no 3 cylinder)




I let my header just sit off to one side with enough clearance to remove the head, but you may want to support it somehow.

Take off the valve cover and take some zip ties or re-bar tie wire and tie the camshaft gear to the timing chain. If I'm not mistaken, the camshaft only has one peg that sticks out and connects to the timing gear wheel. Make a mark or scrawl what side of the nut the peg is on.



Stick a socket extension through the hole in the cam gear and stick a piece of rag or towel underneath it so as not to damage the surface of the head. Remove the bolt and again, don't forget what side of the wheel that peg is on! Let the gear drop a little bit and off to the side.

Take off the upper radiator hose, and the heater core line that runs behind the intake on the passenger side. It's best to remove it at the junction on the firewall. The top return line for the heater is on top of the intake just behind the carb. its a bit of a pain in the butt to get to, but it must come off.

Once that's done, remove and mark or tag the vacuum lines that lead from the carb to the smog stuff and the vacuum advance on the distributor. This would be a great time to send the wife to the parts store and pick you up some food, beer and vacuum line. ( just make sure to send a sample along too! )

ok, break time over, GET BACK TO WORK!! *cracks whip

Use a 10mm hex head socket to remove the head bolts, and don't forget the 2 smaller bolts that are in the front of the head. They are kind of hidden. ( I spent a few minutes wondering why the head wouldn't budge until I realized those two smaller bolts were holding the head to the block )

PS, in case you are wondering where the pictures of these past few procedures are.... I don't know. I guess i must have been busy doing the work that I forgot to take them. My apologies. That and my hands were covered in grease and antifreeze and didn't want to get my 30D Canon dirty.

Get an extra pair of hands to do this next part, since you don't want to wreck your back at this stage of the game.

Carefully pull the entire intake/head/smog tube up and over the front end and onto a work table. Be prepared for some oil and gas from the carb to drop onto it too.

this is what you will have


I recommend taking a rag or plastic bag and covering the block for now, Just so you don't get any other crap into it while it's exposed


To remove the intake from the head, set it on it's side and use a 10(?)mm socket or wrench and remove the nuts. If you lose any, you can take one or two from the exhaust side when it comes time to re assemble. Just don't forget to get new ones!

Once you have the head separated, you will have something like this:



See the white valve? Burning coolant will do this...



If you plan to have a shop rebuild the head, this is all you have to take care of for now, but rebuilding the head is pretty easy.

i have some more pictures, but i cant seem to find them from here. ill describe as best as possible. sorry! bear with me!


Take off the valve train carrier (that's what I call it ok?) and dont lose any clips. Carefully place it on a clean rag so as not to scratch the face of the lobes. The camshaft should be free at this point. It may stick due to some trapped oil, but lift it up from both ends and it should come right out. carefully use some carb cleaner spray and give it a quick cleaning. wrap it in a rag for safekeeping and whatever you do, DO NOT DROP THE DAMN THING!!!!


To remove the valves, use a valve spring compressor. They can be rented from most auto parts stores.
Compress the springs, and use a magnet to remove the valve keepers from the valve stem.

:::::::IMPORTANT::::::::

Wrap each valve in a piece of shop towel and place it along with all the other hardware into a ziploc and label it No.X Intake or exhaust. I used the front of the head as the reference point for numbering them. YOU may want to use the back. Doesn't matter how, just make sure that when it comes time to put them back into their guides, you know what valve goes into what guide and cylinder!!!


Do this for all the valves on each side.

NOW, it"s time for a beer. Take the head to the machine shop and have it machined.

To be continued....

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To the Oquirr hills for awesome thrills! Go-go 4wd, Activate!

Small things that I like to do rather than go grab a drink... (lol, not old enough yet)

Take a brass wheel to the remnants of the head gasket. Scrapers are good, but the aluminum head doesn't take too kindly to hardened tool steel. A cordless drill works wonderfully for this. SAFETY GLASSES! Spinning wire anything has a tendancy to shoot pieces of wire with enough force to stick into you . I'd post pics of my latest use of a magnet, pocket knife and superglue, but nobody wants to see that. A benchtop wire wheel works best to clean the carbon off of the valves, and the brass wheel on the drill works for the cumbustion chamber crud.

Also, if you've got any sort of moisture in the air, it's a good idea to soak the rags you've wrapped everything up in with clean engine oil of the same spec that you use in the engine.

It's a good idea to take the head bolts out in the reverse order you put them in. That prevents any risk of warping your head.

Also, little masking tape flags are your friend. Label everything! And, with these trucks, never cut a hose off. I've never looked for a heater hose, but evidently they're discontinued.

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1980 4X4 LUV daily driver, as stock as can be.

ret is right, but since you get to send the head to a shop to get surfaced, they take care of that.

I forgot to mention in the last post also, The gasket set i used is a master set i got from checker auto (kragen / O'Reilleys) Its a Fel-Pro Set PN# HS 8621 PT-1. Runs about 65 bucks (62.95 here in salt lake) The actual head gasket is the new perma-torque and doesnt need to be sprayed with the copper spray-a-gasket that some of us are used to doing.

Here is a partial list as to what it contains:
Head gasket, Water outlet, Intake and exhaust, valve stem seals, valve cover gasket, exhaust ring, throttle body, EGR gasket, Cap nut gaskets for the valve cover, Distributor O ring, Intake man. Chamber gasket. Good Quality stuff!

BTW : If you right click on any of my pictures, and select "View image" it will show fully. photobucket cuts the pictures down for some reason in threads.



What you want to worry about while the head is at the machine shop is the leftover gasket material on the block itself.



Take a narrow scraper and run it down the length of a file to really sharpen it. Just don't cut yourself!

This is probably the most, or ONE of the more time consuming tasks when rebuilding the head. SCRAPING IMO is much better and much safer than using a wire wheel on either the block or the head. Take your time and get ALL the old gasket material off the block. Dont worry TOO much if you get some in the cylinders. You can use a vacuum later to pull all that stuff out.

Spray a rag with some brake parts cleaner and wipe the head while you scrape. Doing this will help break down the old material and tell you where you still need work.


This is a good time to dunk your valves in a pan of parts cleaner and let them soak overnight. you can also take a dremel and cupped wire brush to clean the valves, but don't scratch the stems too much. Doing so will cause the stem to in return scratch the guide once it's re inserted. I recommend doing one bank of valves at a time since that way, you wont mix them up.

After picking up your cylinder head, and marveling at how pretty it is, it's time to get back to work.

Some people like to perform a valve face grinding at this point, but I didn't this time since my engine doesn't have that many miles on it. You decide what you want to do, but keep in mind that you will need the valve lapping compund, the suction cup tool, and/or a drill to lap them. (or you can just let the machine shop do this)

Hopefully you've bagged all the valves or know what sleeve they belong in. Start replacing the valves by lightly coating the valve stems in some clean motor oil. This will ensure that they both go in smoothly and they have some lube when starting.

:::::Note:::::

Make sure you are inserting the Valves into the side they belong!! Intake valves are on the passenger side while the exhaust valves are on the driver side

Place the spring seat down over the stem guide, the inner and outer springs and the keeper lock and compress them. If you dipped the valve stem into some oil, this will help you keep the keepers in place once you go to decompress the springs.

Do all 8 valves in this way.

Once you are done, Find your camshaft and coat the seats in which it rides with some motor oil or assembly lube and put it in place.

Remember what position that peg was in? Try to position it in that same area so it becomes easier to attach the timing gear.
Take the valvetrain rail and re install it while keeping an eye on where the peg moves. It's ok if it moves the cam a little bit, but dont let it move ALOT. Make sure all the clips are holding the rails in place!



Torque the rails down ( I forgot the specs, but i think i did mine to about 40 Ft Lbs)
If you didn't know, ANYTHING you torque must be done in increments! This is important! If you don't you can ruin new gaskets and all the work is for nothing!

Once the rail is in, take a moment to scrape / check any remaining gaskets on the intake and exhaust side. If you are lucky, they peeled right off, otherwise, you will have to take some time to clean off the surfaces.

Once that is done, You can spray the intake gaskets with the copper spray if you wish, but make sure to let them "dry". They should still be a little bit tacky when done.

put those on and re-attach the intake manifold. I dont remember what the torque specs are, but i just tightened them by hand, then once all were tight, i went over them again just to make sure nothing was loose.

Place the head gasket on the clean block and over the two head alignment stubs that were hopefully left behind when you pulled the head.

Take the entire head/intake/carb assembly and with help carefully place it onto the block. have the head bolts handy since the head is side heavy and you dont want to ruin the new gasket. finger tighten enough to keep the head on the block.

Sequentially torque the head to 70 LBS. Start with 30, then 40 then 50 and 60. The torque sequence is in an earlier post in this thread!

Carefully pull the wired timing gear up and attach it to the camshaft. REMEMBER WHAT SIDE THAT PEG GOES ON!!!
Tighten it in the same method you pull it off. place that rag under the extension and tighten. i dont remember what that torque spec was either, sorry! i think i did about 45 lbs on that. i could be wrong.

This is the time to pull the "half moon" gaskets out of the kit and place them at either end of the head. if you dont do it now, you will forget. trust me!

Dont worry you're almost done!!!


reconnect all your vacuum lines to their respective places with the exception of the line that connects to the valve cover. plug that off for the moment.

Do an oil change at this point. Its the easiest time and you need to do it anyway! just get'er'done!

connect the fuel lines back to the carb and the accelerator cable. just eyeball it. you can adjust it later.

Connect the coolant lines to the head and the intake manifold. dont forget the heater line on the firewall!!!

If you didnt already, plug the radiator drain plug and fill the radiator with some fresh coolant mix. you can buy the 50 50 stuff, but i like mixing my own. i dont know why. i guess i feel like a chemist or something!

change the plugs if you havent already! and connect the spark plug cables. plug off the air injection rail if you dont intend to re install the smog pump.

Re attach the exhaust manifold and the air transfer tube.

THINK. Is there anything that i might have missed? Or you might have missed? make sure there are no stray tools lying around that can fall into a running engine!!!

Start the engine. If you did everything right, it SHOULD fire almost immediately! Don't run it too long without the valve cover on. you will get oil everywhere!!

Replace the valve cover and put everything back together (IE Valve cover, air cleaner assembly, vacuum lines, hood etc. If you need a reference to the vacuum line diagrams, there may still be a sticker under the hood that shows you the routing. otherwise consult with one of us)


Enjoy the ride. Hopefully everything went well enough that you are now ready to cruise down the street or around the block!

HOPE THIS GUIDE PROVED HELPFUL! THIS IS THE FIRST GUIDE I'VE WRITTEN!

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To the Oquirr hills for awesome thrills! Go-go 4wd, Activate!

Just a helpful suggestion, I would retorgue the head bolts every so often to ensure they stay tight. i was having a lot of problems blowing head gaskets on mine. I took to checking the torques and would find a few loosened up everytime. Now that I check them, it has been running great with no issues

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Tact is for people not funny enough to be sarcastic.

BUMP - just so I can find it again

Great write-up figuaras, SUPER helpful. Should be installing new head gasket this or next week,

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My Rides:

2002 Mazda B4000 4x4
1978 Chevy LUV - Sold
1990 Kawasaki EX500
2008 Yamaha TTR230

don't thank me. it was everyone here on the site that helped me out too. thank them!

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To the Oquirr hills for awesome thrills! Go-go 4wd, Activate!