Hot Rod Forum banner

Hyd. Roller lifters problems

29K views 115 replies 18 participants last post by  BogiesAnnex1 
#1 ·
Hey guys, sorry for the long read, seems like my questions always are.

I'm having more issues with my valvetrain on the camaro (SBC 406, hyd. roller). Back when I built this motor I had trouble adjusting the preload on the lifters. I didn't really understand why, but my buddy helped me adjust them with the engine running and all seemed well for the moment.

Fast forward to now, and I have been hearing a funny valvetrain "noise" at 6500 RPM and up. Thought it was valve float, so changed to the proper dual springs (that's another story).

Upon putting valvetrain back together, I again have the issue with adjusting the preload on the lifters. If I set at 0 lash plus 1/4 turn, four of the 16 lifters will not pump any oil, and will be making noise, the fix being to tighten them up several turns to get the plunger in the right dimension.

Here's where it gets weird. If I set 1 of the lifters in question next to one that is "good", you can see the difference in the angle between the two rockers (like the pushrod is .200" longer or something). It's a large difference. I don't know what could cause that to be wrong. I've made sure the pushrods are seated, same length, etc. It's just 4 lifters out of the 16 that do this (and it seems to be the same ones all the time). To set these lifters I have to just "guess" how far to tighten them, cause the 0 lash + 1/4 turn doesn't work. :mad: :confused:

Cyl. # 7 (which has one of the problem lifters, exhaust side) was making a lot of noise from one lifter (and not pumping any oil through the pushrod either), so I put my windowed valve cover on and adjusted it with it running, and the oil starts to flow as the clacking goes away. Now I notice the motor is running like crap, and when I crank it to start, it sounds like there's a bad cyl. in the motor.

So I get curious and do a compression check, and sure enough #7 has no compression. So I loosen the rocker just a little and the compression comes back, a little looser and it starts clacking again. It acts like a solid lifter. I don't get it.

What is with these lifters? I don't know if I need to replace or what? Lifters are Comp Magnum roller retros.

The motor has 3K miles on it with no problems to speak of (other than devil lifters).

ANyone have any insight on this? I could really use some help, all my car buddies tell me to throw the hyd. roller out and get a solid roller.
 
See less See more
#2 ·
I would 1st pull the oil filter and cut it open to look for any signs of "too much metal". 2nd... I would pull the intake to inspect the lifters.

The last part of your post almost sounds like you lost a roller on a lifter.
I would NOT run it any more until you do some looking under the intake.
 
#3 ·
bigbadbowtie said:
I would 1st pull the oil filter and cut it open to look for any signs of "too much metal". 2nd... I would pull the intake to inspect the lifters.

The last part of your post almost sounds like you lost a roller on a lifter.
I would NOT run it any more until you do some looking under the intake.
Fair enough. I will jerk the intake and oil filter off tonight. :drunk:

I have seen more metal than I would think is cool on my magnetic drain plug. Just a little ball of metal on the tip, not a lot, but more than I thought would be.
 
#4 ·
Jmark said:
You also mention, if I'm reading it correctly, the rocker arm angle is different. I'll assume that both lifters are on the bottom of the ramp but the rockers look like they are sitting different? Almost leads me to think the lifters are different lengths or as stated, a roller is going down. (somewhat un-likely, but possible.) .
Yes, both lifters on the base.

But the lifters in question are higher than the others (at the pushrod end). If the roller is having a problem, wouldn't that make it go lower (like a shorter pushrod)?
 
#7 · (Edited)
hotrodf1 said:
Fast forward to now, and I have been hearing a funny valvetrain "noise" at 6500 RPM and up. Thought it was valve float, so changed to the proper dual springs (that's another story).

That right there also makes the think that it could be a roller issue. If you had incorrect springs on the heads and tried to spin it up tight, that lifter is using the lobe of the cam as a ramp if you will. It then slams back down on the base circle of the cam. It can beat the needles out of the rollers in a hurry. I know from experience with a solid roller. :)

I could be way off on the needle bearings getting eat up but... it nevers hurts to check things out. It only cost the price of an oil change, intake gaskets and your time.


edit and you are correct... its makes no sense that the ones in question seem longer????
 
#8 ·
daoldbuick said:
You said "6500 RPM and up". Just wondering how high "up" was?? :confused: and how high you think your motor should be able to go??
well, the cam should pull to at least 7000 rpm. I have actually shifted at 7400 before (had a helmet on at the track, didn't hear the noise i guess), and the car seemed to pull very well, i didn't notice a severe drop in power like i would think you'd get with valve float?!?!

Crane states that valve float should not occur until 7500 RPM, but thats with their lifters, which I don't have. Wouldn't think it would be that different, but hey.

I have big heads on this motor (bigger than I should), so turning it up is "good for it!" :thumbup:
 
#9 ·
bigbadbowtie said:
That right there also makes the think that it could be a roller issue. If you had incorrect springs on the heads and tried to spin it up tight, that lifter is using the lobe of the cam as a ramp if you will. It then slams back down on the base circle of the cam. It can beat the needles out of the rollers in a hurry. I know from experience with a solid roller. :)

I could be way off on the needle bearings getting eat up but... it nevers hurts to check things out. It only cost the price of an oil change, intake gaskets and your time.


edit and you are correct... its makes no sense that the ones in question seem longer????
Indeed. I am shrugging my shoulders at this one. I am not real experienced, but this is not making any sense. Maybe when I pull the intake it will make sense.
 
#14 ·
Oh Boy

I got everything taken apart yesterday.

Wanted to post some pics to see what you guys think.

THe first thing that happened was when I pulled the distributor out and noticed that some of the teeth were chewed up pretty bad. Only about half the teeth were this way See pic. below.

Any thoughts on what caused this? It seems to have happened recently. I did have the screws that hold the rotor on come loose at about 6500 RPM and the car quit running (actually this happened twice, even with lock tight). Could this have bent the dist. shaft slightly?

I have also included some pics of the cam teeth as well. Is this cam beyond using? The cam had a pressed on gear, maybe Crane would press a new gear for a small fee??

Any thoughts on this would be much appreciated.

I have pics of the lifters, too. Will post them in the next post.
 

Attachments

#15 ·
Lifters!

Okay,

So for the original problem, my roller lifters.

I pulled them out, remembering which ones I had had trouble adjusting, and looked. Basically, Comp Cams did not assembly them properly from what I can tell. I attached a pic of the issue below.

It looks like the retainer thing was not pressed in all the way. I had trouble adjusting these lifters from the beginning and didn't do the right thing and investigate. Shame on me. I don't suppose Comp would do anything about these after almost 3 years and 3000 miles.

Once the lifters are adjusted right, they do okay, but you have to adjust them with the motor running, since there's no way to know where you are at with the lifter preload.

What do you guys think about these lifters? I have 4 of the 16 that are this way!

(The lifter on the right is the one with the problem, look at height of the retainer)
 

Attachments

#16 ·
Comp Cams has had significant problems with at least a couple of their part numbers for SBC hyd. rollers. And these may just be the ones I'm aware of. They also started having some valve spring problems awhile back which was traced to "outsourcing" to Mexico. Whether that's a factor in their lifter problems though, I don't know. I do know that these lifter problems have been wide spread and well documented on Corvette and F-body forums that I visit. I myself installed a brand new set and had one come apart (plunger) almost immediately. Luckily it only bent a couple of push rods. I went back to factory GM roller lifters and have had no problems in the 10K miles since.
It's a crying shame when a company with the (former) good reputation of CC starts down the path of selling junk that may as well say "Proform" on the package.
With a properly combined overall valvetrain combination, you really should have no problem spinning it to 7000 occasionally with hydraulic rollers. Heck, my factory lifters see 6500 with some regularity. You may want to see what one of the real serious companies such as Jesel or the like have available.
 
#18 ·
Something I read said you shouldn't adjust roller lifters with the engine running, something about damaging the rollers or the roller bearings.

Seems to me you could calculate how much to turn the adjuster to get a certain amount of preload using the thread pitch of the adjuster and the rocker arm ratio, then adjust them with the engine off.
 
#19 ·
Jmark said:
I know that the dist gear, when used on a roller cam, will wear faster than on a flat tappet cam. Seems everyone has a dist. gear that will "last a long time" but still haven't seen it yet. Just seems to be "one of those things" I guess. Good thing you found it before it went away completely! :D

Mark

But this was the Crane Powermax cam that supposedly has the cast iron cam gear pressed onto the end of the billet cam, which allows the use of a regular steel dist. gear.

And why are only half the teeth worn away and not all of them? I put the dist. in a vice and put a dial indicator on the gear and the runout was no more than .004", which I didn't think was too bad. Doesn't look like the culprit anyway.

I'm concerned to know what did this so that when I put new parts back in, it doesnt' chew them up too.

Anyone else have any ideas?

I guess this thread is sort of off topic at this point.
 
#20 ·
.004 runout is excessive in my eyes, but that maybe because the company I work for doesn`t allow more than .002.
.004 is still alot, I would check the runout of the distributor shaft and inspect the bushings closely. I`m hoping you used a steel HD oil pump drive rod, but even with the stocker it likely wouldn`t cause this unless the oil pump is binded.
 
#21 ·
I looked at the pictures and have to wonder if there are two versions of the lifters that got crossed up or whether a couple had a failure of the plunger's retainer accounting for the difference in height between them. My concern is that whether different heights resulted in the piston hitting a valve or two and driving things backwards. This could have aced the roller bearings on the follower wheel which would have then circulated with the oil. If the lifter was slammed back onto the cam, it's possible the lobe is gone. This might not be apparent, but with sufficient mangnification you might see micro cracks in the surface at the impact point. These will eventually lead to a lobe failure. The bearing failure in the roller end of the lifter could have taken out the distributor gear, but there will be more damage inside the bottom end if this stuff circulated with the oil, at least the pump will be damaged even if the filter stopped anything else. Given the RPMs you've turned this to, you need to consider that you caused the damage by over-running the valve spring's capabilities.

Frankly, I like the factory Melonized distributor gear better than anything else when running a roller cam. This however means you need to run a factory distributor because of the slightly smaller OEM shaft size. Or bore it out to 1/2 inch for these aftermarket distributors.

Bogie
 
#22 ·
jimfulco said:
Something I read said you shouldn't adjust roller lifters with the engine running, something about damaging the rollers or the roller bearings.

Seems to me you could calculate how much to turn the adjuster to get a certain amount of preload using the thread pitch of the adjuster and the rocker arm ratio, then adjust them with the engine off.
Sure, on a 3/8" fine thread stud, a full turn is just over .041". On one of the CC roller lifters that was infamous for failures, recommended preload was only .002-.004 thousanths! And in all fairness to CC, I'm sure at least some problems were caused by folks not paying attention to that. Anyhow, this spec would be just about as little as past zero as you could get! I never run more than a 1/4 turn (about .010") in a performance hydraulic application. Not only is minimal preload good for a few HP on the dyno, but if you ever have pump-up issues, this minimizes the chances of piston to valve contact if you're running near the safe limits. Even on stock engines which generally spec a full turn, I only go one half.
There should be no reason that I know of that you can't adjust a roller engine running. But that being said, I haven't adjusted the valves in anything while running for many years. It's just not necessary once you fully understand what you're doing. And besides being needlessly messy, I assure you that I can dead-on the adjustment as accurately in any static engine as anyone can while running it.
 
#23 ·
DoubleVision said:
.004 runout is excessive in my eyes, but that maybe because the company I work for doesn`t allow more than .002.
.004 is still alot, I would check the runout of the distributor shaft and inspect the bushings closely. I`m hoping you used a steel HD oil pump drive rod, but even with the stocker it likely wouldn`t cause this unless the oil pump is binded.
yes,

I used an ARP drive shaft.

I guess I will take the gear off the dist. and check the runout right on the shaft.
 
#24 ·
oldbogie said:
I looked at the pictures and have to wonder if there are two versions of the lifters that got crossed up or whether a couple had a failure of the plunger's retainer accounting for the difference in height between them. My concern is that whether different heights resulted in the piston hitting a valve or two and driving things backwards. This could have aced the roller bearings on the follower wheel which would have then circulated with the oil. If the lifter was slammed back onto the cam, it's possible the lobe is gone. This might not be apparent, but with sufficient mangnification you might see micro cracks in the surface at the impact point. These will eventually lead to a lobe failure. The bearing failure in the roller end of the lifter could have taken out the distributor gear, but there will be more damage inside the bottom end if this stuff circulated with the oil, at least the pump will be damaged even if the filter stopped anything else. Given the RPMs you've turned this to, you need to consider that you caused the damage by over-running the valve spring's capabilities.

Frankly, I like the factory Melonized distributor gear better than anything else when running a roller cam. This however means you need to run a factory distributor because of the slightly smaller OEM shaft size. Or bore it out to 1/2 inch for these aftermarket distributors.

Bogie
The pics show the height difference of the retainer in the lifter, and they were not installed properly somehow, or pushed out. If I look down at them, you can easily see that the retainer is deformed, since it's not down in its proper position.

I checked the rollers by eye on the ones that were having problems, and I didin't see anything, but I guess that doesn't mean that it's okay.

I plan on replacing the cam, lifters, and all, probably go solid roller this time and do it right.

What is this Melonized dist. gear you speak of? I thought I was running a factory dist. gear on this thing. Wasn't running a bronze because the Crane shaft isn't supposed to need one (pressed on cam gear)
 
#25 ·
Notorious said:
Sure, on a 3/8" fine thread stud, a full turn is just over .041". On one of the CC roller lifters that was infamous for failures, recommended preload was only .002-.004 thousanths! And in all fairness to CC, I'm sure at least some problems were caused by folks not paying attention to that. Anyhow, this spec would be just about as little as past zero as you could get! I never run more than a 1/4 turn (about .010") in a performance hydraulic application. Not only is minimal preload good for a few HP on the dyno, but if you ever have pump-up issues, this minimizes the chances of piston to valve contact if you're running near the safe limits. Even on stock engines which generally spec a full turn, I only go one half.
There should be no reason that I know of that you can't adjust a roller engine running. But that being said, I haven't adjusted the valves in anything while running for many years. It's just not necessary once you fully understand what you're doing. And besides being needlessly messy, I assure you that I can dead-on the adjustment as accurately in any static engine as anyone can while running it.
I agree that adjusting while not running is the way to go.

HOWEVER, look at the pics of the lifters that I posted. There is NO WAY to adjust those lifters without the motor running, since you don't know where 0 lash even is! The retainer in the top of the lifter is not holding the plunger down where it is supposed to be. If you were to adjust them yourself, you would find the same thing I did. That the motor makes all kinds of noise and doesn't even pump any oil to the rocker cause it's so far out of adjustment.

That's why I just had to run the motor and tighten until the clacking stopped. I just didn't have any way to know where zero lash was cause of the stupid defective roller lifters.

Really, I feel pretty stupid for letting this go on as long as it has. When I originally put the motor together (my 1st, lot to learn!) I thought something was wrong there, but my buddy (who I thought knew way more than me) adjusted them with it running and all seemed well for the moment. I should have done more investigating!!! :spank: :drunk:
 
#26 ·
I usually adjust these hydraulic things by having a helper run the oil primer tool while I adjust each cylinder. It makes a lot less mess. I just bar the motor over to TDC on the compression stroke and adjust both valves to '0' or 1/4 turn as you noted. The primer gives 40 psi or so oil pressure simulating the motor running and presurising the lifters. Sometimes you have to go around a couple times to check it. I also make sure all the lifter are getting oil up to the rocker before I start the motor. This way nothing gets started dry. I use loads of assembly lube too.

Check the threads on the oil problems now too.

One last thing regarding the dist. gear. You should have some clearance between the housing when it is clamped down and 'bottomed out' so to speak. I haven't used one of these new fangled pressed on cast iron gears so I really can't give much on them. I just never had many problems with roller cams. I broke a needle roller one time in our Alky funny car but it didn't make any noise I could hear. haha Eat up the inside of the motor however.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top