Checking valve springs
 

I've got 250 hours on my heads and I figure it's about time to check the valve springs. I've noticed that you can buy a Valve seat pressure tester from Moroso and check them with the heads/springs still on the engine. Is this a sufficient way of testing them, or is there something else I should also consider?

Thanks in advance..

It's not the most accurate way of doing it. Depending on the way you hold it, your readings may be off +/- 10 lbs. Also your exaust manifolds may get in the way. Mine did. It's better than nothing. A friend that drag races uses one between rounds to do a quick check. Of course his cam has about 1.000 lift so he needs to.:D

As far as I know, Moroso only makes a valve spring pressure tool that works on roller rockers. I don't think you can use it on stamped steel stock rockers.

True. I use rollers...

I was at about 250 hours with my HP500EFI's and decided to replace the springs. I went with Isky springs ($$) and am satisfied that I wont be nedding to redo them anytime soon.

I'm using Isky's now. I just thought I'd pull the valve covers and check them over the winter months.

The valve spring tester works good, but typically its used in a comparison mode. IE when you check the srping pressure ever set period you get a trend and when it changes then you know their is a problem. When we raced a sprint car we saved many valve train issues with the spring checker. We checked them every race. I check my springs every 10 to 15 hrs in the boat.