This can be long, but to shorten it up I'm NOT going to tell you how to take off the head or put it on. If you are considering doing this you need to know how to do that and have all the tools.
That being said all and all this can be a big job and it can be a small job. It just depends what you want to do with it. If you are just wanting a budget rebuild and nothing crazy or super expensive than read on. If your are wanting 5 angle valve jobs, port and polish...etc etc than you could read this but some of that work is best left to people who have the 10,000 dollar plus tools that do it to the micron and are reasonably priced.
I will get some pictures up soon. I have a b16a1 head here that is stripped down and cleaned up. I wish I could have shown you that, but this is how I got the head.
OK so lets get started. You'll need a few basic tools to start with
1 small tube of valve lapping compound. I prefer medium grit but you may need something more aggressive if you have heavy pitting, but if it's that bad you might want to get 16 new valves and have them ground down at your local machine shop, but chances are your head is fine.
1 valve spring compressor tool.
1 Small strong magnet that is telescoping
1 Storage bin that is big enough to house your valves and hardware. I found one at I think lowes. It's to help separate your valves and hardware keep them organized. You need one that has a MINIMUM of 4 columns and 4 rows. You'll want it about 1" wide, 4" long" and 1" tall, but bigger is helpful. I would have liked one 2 inches wide, 5" long, and 2"tall.. but mine still works. Mine actually has 5 colums on with 4 rows on top. and than 4 big storage places on the enges and 3 small ones .. but anwho

my storage bin
1 10mm deepwell socket
1 valve stem seal removal tool (makes job quick and easy but is optional)
3" of 1" hard copper. (vtec only - again it's optional, but makes your life easy)
small can of wd-40 (or big if you like it super good)
Now on your storage bin mark your containers so you wont forget were each part goes exactly.
This is dirty work so you maybe wants some gloves. I fashioned an extension for my valve spring compressor tool. about 1/4" down from top and bottom I cut the pipe with my sawzall about half way through. When I was cutting up I accidently cut off the top, but that made it easier to cut down to the buttom marks no problem. I should have used a dremel with a cut off wheel, but the tool still works good...


Copper piece
Now starts the actual work. Take off your rocker arm assembly as per the manuel and clean the bolts (or put them in a cleaning solution) and store them away for safe keeping (in my case I use the 4 big bins on my container, seperate by length)
Clean the rocker arm assembly really good and store that away also.
Now get your valve spring compressor and the forks go on top of the springs (if you have vtec it goes on top of the copper extender) and the bottom pin goes in middle of the valve you are removing. adjust the valve holding pin so it's about 1/2" loose when the compressor is at it's loosest setting. the spring is currently compressed just a little so you'll need that extra space.

what i'm talking about
now just firm it up (usually just one click maybe 2) and spray some wd-40 on the center of valve stem. your lubbing up the retainer clips that tend to stick to the valve and make the retainer stick sometimes too.
few more clicks on your compressor and the valve stem should poke through your retainer.
clips should be taken away from the valve stem with a magnet. I've used a big magnet, but sometimes it's just useful to have a magnetic tip screwdriver. take those clips and clean them and store them in your appropriately marked storage bin.
what should happen, make sure you have both retainers
SLOWLY release the valve spring compressor to remove the spring and the retainer hat. clean those and put those in the same container.
take out the valve wipe off the grease and put it in that same container also. move on the the next 7 on the same side, adjust the pin for the other side and remove the other 8.

it's put away keep going
Now get your seal removal tool and take off those valve stem seals and discard. NEVER EVER RE USE THEM. and don't Put on new ones until your putting your valves in for the last time... as will be discussed later. they are easy to damage, so be careful with them. in fact don't even buy them till your done
since this is getting long I'll start working on the pictures, maybe a youtube video.
cheers and good luck
That being said all and all this can be a big job and it can be a small job. It just depends what you want to do with it. If you are just wanting a budget rebuild and nothing crazy or super expensive than read on. If your are wanting 5 angle valve jobs, port and polish...etc etc than you could read this but some of that work is best left to people who have the 10,000 dollar plus tools that do it to the micron and are reasonably priced.
I will get some pictures up soon. I have a b16a1 head here that is stripped down and cleaned up. I wish I could have shown you that, but this is how I got the head.
OK so lets get started. You'll need a few basic tools to start with
1 small tube of valve lapping compound. I prefer medium grit but you may need something more aggressive if you have heavy pitting, but if it's that bad you might want to get 16 new valves and have them ground down at your local machine shop, but chances are your head is fine.
1 valve spring compressor tool.
1 Small strong magnet that is telescoping
1 Storage bin that is big enough to house your valves and hardware. I found one at I think lowes. It's to help separate your valves and hardware keep them organized. You need one that has a MINIMUM of 4 columns and 4 rows. You'll want it about 1" wide, 4" long" and 1" tall, but bigger is helpful. I would have liked one 2 inches wide, 5" long, and 2"tall.. but mine still works. Mine actually has 5 colums on with 4 rows on top. and than 4 big storage places on the enges and 3 small ones .. but anwho

my storage bin
1 10mm deepwell socket
1 valve stem seal removal tool (makes job quick and easy but is optional)
3" of 1" hard copper. (vtec only - again it's optional, but makes your life easy)
small can of wd-40 (or big if you like it super good)
Now on your storage bin mark your containers so you wont forget were each part goes exactly.
This is dirty work so you maybe wants some gloves. I fashioned an extension for my valve spring compressor tool. about 1/4" down from top and bottom I cut the pipe with my sawzall about half way through. When I was cutting up I accidently cut off the top, but that made it easier to cut down to the buttom marks no problem. I should have used a dremel with a cut off wheel, but the tool still works good...


Copper piece
Now starts the actual work. Take off your rocker arm assembly as per the manuel and clean the bolts (or put them in a cleaning solution) and store them away for safe keeping (in my case I use the 4 big bins on my container, seperate by length)
Clean the rocker arm assembly really good and store that away also.
Now get your valve spring compressor and the forks go on top of the springs (if you have vtec it goes on top of the copper extender) and the bottom pin goes in middle of the valve you are removing. adjust the valve holding pin so it's about 1/2" loose when the compressor is at it's loosest setting. the spring is currently compressed just a little so you'll need that extra space.

what i'm talking about
now just firm it up (usually just one click maybe 2) and spray some wd-40 on the center of valve stem. your lubbing up the retainer clips that tend to stick to the valve and make the retainer stick sometimes too.
few more clicks on your compressor and the valve stem should poke through your retainer.
clips should be taken away from the valve stem with a magnet. I've used a big magnet, but sometimes it's just useful to have a magnetic tip screwdriver. take those clips and clean them and store them in your appropriately marked storage bin.
what should happen, make sure you have both retainersSLOWLY release the valve spring compressor to remove the spring and the retainer hat. clean those and put those in the same container.
take out the valve wipe off the grease and put it in that same container also. move on the the next 7 on the same side, adjust the pin for the other side and remove the other 8.

it's put away keep going
Now get your seal removal tool and take off those valve stem seals and discard. NEVER EVER RE USE THEM. and don't Put on new ones until your putting your valves in for the last time... as will be discussed later. they are easy to damage, so be careful with them. in fact don't even buy them till your done

since this is getting long I'll start working on the pictures, maybe a youtube video.
cheers and good luck







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