any recent 2802 experiences?
 

in middle of putting this engine together:
69 428, eagle rods, trw +40 pistons, moly rings, studded mains (just because),
most likely will use 1968 216 heads will cc but they are currently on the motor in the car, that this will be replacing, guessing 78-80cc
pistons are -.012 deck
compression should be in the 9.5-9.8 range depending on gaskets and final head cc.

i might put an HR in it but considering the summit 2802 and their lifters. maybe some 1.65 sharpes.
car is 68 firebird, long branches and 2.5 exhaust, muncie m20 and 3.42 rear gears. street car that will be flogged occasionally but not a race car. appreciate your input

Not sure about the current cam quality but wouldn’t use the Summit lifters of unknown source - Johnson Hylift FTs instead.

Or Crower cam saver lifters or Rhoads or Eatons from Spotts, anything other than standard white box lifters at this point

Rhode Island is a lot cooler than Florida so a cooler running car will be more knock and ping resistant; however I'm done with high compression or even medium compression on iron heads. Either go Edelbrock/Speedmaster or get some 6X heads to bring the compression down to where you can run a responsive aggressive spark advance curve.

I run the 2802 in a '69 400 with 62 heads and RPM intake. Decent lope, makes 13" of vacuum at 850 RPM hot. It will ping if you put more than 30* of timing at 3K. Loose converter keeps me from lugging it too bad, but VERY responsive with double pumper. TH400/3.25 gears. Pulls hard to 5700 RPM, where rev limiter is. I'm happy with it, replaced a Crane 284 HIT that was going flat.

Above 9.5 in a bigger engine with manual and street gears, you'd want one step larger cam unless you were really on the tuneup. My concern would be lugging it near peak torque would aggravate pinging.

I found a set of NOS hylift-johnson lifters on ebay for hunnit bucks. That, the 2802 and a set of crower 68404 springs and crower retainers and let it eat.

I had really good luck with the cam savers

Melling JB951 are Eaton lifters and are made in Mexico. As Paul says they are a quality lifter.

You know your way around engines, so I will keep it short. I can think of 3 Summit cams in Pontiac’s that didn’t make it thru the break in so far just this year. All 3 had different brands of lifters.

I did a 2802 in a 389 for a friend with Crower’s (Eaton), still waiting for him to break it in.

From the engine specs I would install a 2802 cam -2* (111*)in a 428, you would probably be happier with it.

For new cheaper lifters right now I would probably try cheap Comp DLC high energies or Howard’s. The Comp DLC coated lifters should break in better though, how long the DLC coating will last (or if that matters) is still pretty unknown. There are a lot of suppliers using Eaton lifters, it wouldn’t surprise me if Summit used Eaton lifters. My last Howard’s set took 2 sets, one lifter had a big chip off the corner of the face. Just seems to be the world we live in now.

Hi Jay, how are things?
Just out of curiosity, do you know if any of the three failures were broken in on single springs or reduced rocker arms?

Hi Murf. I am doing well, hope things are well with you. We took the TA on a cruise that the machine shop in Falls City hosted, unfortunately it got scheduled the same weekend as the Pontiac Uprising. Hopefully you made it down there.

I think 2 of the 3 could have had better outcome’s if they would have made some effort to drop the break in spring pressures.

ok thanks guys sounds like HR it is lol

Yeah, we were hoping to see you there. I think the crowd was a little small due to the rain in the area.
Sue got 2 trophies with the 65. Best GTO & farthest driven. She was happy!

I ask about the break in procedure cause people just don’t seem to do it anymore. Whenever I mention it, they look at me like I’m a senile old man. 😁

She came home with trophies, that’s awesome!

I know what you mean, when I tell people they need to pull the inner springs out for the break in their eyes glaze over and give me a blank look. LOL

Most do ok with break in time, but special break in oil and going into the engine and pulling and installing inner springs is more than many are willing to do.

In a way i broke my last HFT. cam in 3 times. Edelbrock heads first springs stock D'port springs 1.6 IH. in a 1.7 Gap. Second time with stock Edelbrock springs which got weak pretty fast then a set of PAC springs with more pressure yet... Full disclosure i thought the Edelbrock springs were going to be good enough..

So if you have a set of old D'port springs laying around its real easy to pitch them but they still could have a use..

I did it with this 2802. Verified geometry, pulled the inner springs and used Lucas break in oil. Then I drove it for the first 10 miles or so with the inner springs removed. Seems to have survived. I did have some valvetrain noise due to a small amount of debris in the NOS lifters. Once I pulled and cleaned them, the clattering on start up largely went away.

I wasn’t aware that Comp finally introduced a Pontiac DLC coated lifter, out of stock currently though

https://www.compcams.com/xtreme-ener...310103016.html

Those are for Pontiac?

I have a set of cam savers that I’m going to use for my HFT build this winter but tempted to try these instead. I’ve been waiting for Comp to introduce them for Pontiacs.

Thanks for the link - the first link went to GM lifters. Hopefully these have the oil band in the correct location.