Valve lash adjustment

[mystere900]

How important is the initial valve adjustment that's recommended at 11000 miles or first oil change by the Cat owners manual. The Cat specialist at my maintenance shop says not a big deal. He says 75,000 to 100,000 miles is sufficient. I'm probably opening up a can of worms, but what the hey.

[mystere900]

How important is the initial valve adjustment that's recommended at 11000 miles or first oil change by the Cat owners manual. The Cat specialist at my maintenance shop says not a big deal. He says 75,000 to 100,000 miles is sufficient. I'm probably opening up a can of worms, but what the hey.

[JoeT]

Adjustment by the first oil change is for heavy duty trucks. For motorhomes, Cat recommends valve adjustment between the third and fourth oil changes.

[JRP]

Roger,

My Cat manual says for RV use, its "between" 11,000 and 44,000. Most every Cat rep I've listened or spoken to at RV rallys said its best to wait till closer to 30,000 - 40,000 for that first valve adj, unless you've got an engine issue.

Jim

[TXiceman]

The problem with not keeping the valve lash set properly is that you can burn the valves. Burnt valves equal an expensive repair, so it is better to error on the side of caution.
Ken

[mystere900]

Thanks everyone, couldn't find any reference stating a difference between the truck and RV engine. Haven't had any engine issues so I'll go with the 30 to 40 thousand mark. Sounds reasonable anyhow.

[JoeT]

Roger - Check out www.catrvclub.org Technical Tidbits page.

[mystere900]

Thanks Joe, that has cleared up a lot of confusion on the subject. Excellent web site, have placed it in bookmarks for future reference.

[tomsm]

Roger - Can't remember if catrvclub has a link to this or not. Check out all the links in the left column. This is the best page on the Cat site for RVers.

On Edit: Never mind Checked the catrvclub site and they do have a link to the same area - of course...