[Chrysler300] 300H valve adjustment

I have been working gradually towards getting my 300H running as well as I can.

This forum has been a terrific help in many ways.

A big step was the professional restoration/rebuild of both carbs, which followed the earlier massive and total restoration of the braking system, including installation of the correct double diaphragm booster. (Booster Dewey of Portland discovered that problem.)

Recently, I had the distributor rebuilt which resolved my runaway idle adjust problem and is generally a great improvement.

The next thing I am suspicious of is my valve settings.

Unfortunately, the camshaft in the car is not the stock 300H camshaft, but instead is one which a well respected

racing engine shop in Illinois installed in 1982 because of a fear that the engine would not be able to run on unleaded gasoline . (They were right in a way because a few years later I had to have hardened seats installed on the road.) It ostensibly lowers the compression ratio.

The camshaft is a Barnes Racing Cams Design no 275 (I have the spec sheets for it) I do have a stock 300H camshaft which I eventually use to replace it, but not this summer.

I had a well meaning friend stop by last year who was going to help me get it running right,. He managed to destroy all the old car linkages by bending them etc. and wanted to modify all sorts of things-in the process though, we got into a valve adjustment exercise one might and he was convinced the settings specified were wrong!

So my next step is to set all the valve per the manufacturers specified valve lash.

Chrysler 300H settings specified are .015 intake, .024 exh, set with engine running.

Barnes F295 settings are .026 instake, .026 exh, set "hot"

I have no idea what settings I have which is why I want to verify it. I suspect they may be stock 300H settings but the idle makes me think I have some hot valves.

Question:

I do not think I have ever set these valves hot with the engine running as specified in the shop manual.

I suspect that makes an awful mess.

Is it that important?

If you have set the valves hot and running, I would like to hear how it went.

Thanks, Mike Moore