[phaques]

Here are a couple of tips, learned from a couple of folks with a whole lot more experience than me, that will save you some time - I've had to do this three times over the last few thousand miles in order to get it right.

First, don't bother draining the oil from your car (unless you were planning to do it anyway) - rather, do all the intake valves first, with the car flat on the ground. Piece of cake. then, tilt the car up on one side, pretty high, then do the exhaust valves on that side - all the oil will drain to the other side, and relatively little (note - not "none") will spill out when you take off the valve cover. Repeat on the other side (Be sure to re-install exhaust valve cover before lowering the car!!!).

Also, don't remove the spark plugs - it is not necessary, and may risk screwing up your adjustment if some carbon drops into the valve seat.

Finally, how tight? This seems to be a case of learning the feel. Basically, I was instructed to make the clearance as tight as you can with your guage, but still allow yourself to be able to re-insert the guage after it snaps out of the gap. And it will snap or pop out if the clearance is pretty tight. If you can't get it back in then, its too tight. The guage should be quite stiff when you move it around in the gap. You are likely to break a feeler guage or two in this process.

good luck.
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