1995 355 valve guide question

Frankly I don't understand the headwork costs guys. Removing and replacing and honing a guide is not difficult given the correct tools. Refacing a valve and seat isn't difficult either. Any machine shop yoyo can be taught these simple tasks in a couple hours. Most good machine shops charge about $15 to r & r each guide then about $10 per seat cut and a few bucks per valve reface. Deck the heads, stick em in the aluminum cleaner, but it back together with new steam seals, done. Don't let anyone tell you it's a difficult job, unless serious head work involving welding and replacing seats is required.

 

I think not everybody can do these heads. Lots of angles with 5 valve heads.

 

Depends on how you do the book keeping. If you are talking about delivering a pair of heads to a shop and have guides installed ands valves/seats ground, that is one thing. But if you start considering what has to be done to R&R the heads on the engine as part of the cost that's another. Even without replacing any valves or tappets there is a lot more in labor and parts than just the head work.

 

I don' believe there are any shops in my area (Carolinas) that have experience with 355 engine work. If I am willing to ship the bottom or top end away to have the work done, what are the most experienced shops to send them to?

 

What about Karl Troy?

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I was told last year ferrari wasnt making the steel guides anymore. Is it true? I don't know, what I do know is When I was shopping for parts last year I could only find the "ferrari"exhaust valve guides. No intakes

I do remeber the steel Guides were over $40 a piece.
At ferrparts and Ricambi maybe Daniel knows of they are available.


A lot of us have just gone with modern guides and didn't use the steel guides.

 

There is nothing fancy about the cuts to the seats. Lots of heads have valves and seats as small.

 

Any machine shop with sport bike experience should be able to handle them without issue.

 

Have you tried GTM and son in Greenville? I have heard good things about them. I have no first hand experience, but I am going to take my car to them to try and reset the Airbag light. Spoke to them on the phone and got a good feeling. I asked about doing a major, with me doing the removal/install and bringing them the engine. They had never done that, but were fine with the idea and seems very knowledgeable.

Not to thread jack, but if anyone has used GTM and son please let me know.

 

given the 5 valves, 4 of them are at different angles--only the 2 exhaust valves point in the same plane. You need a special head machine that can deal with the multiplicity of angles.

A normal 4-valve head can be done with 2 angles.