FWIW I broke in a flat tappet and it survived
 

With all the doom and gloom towards flat tappet cams lately, you rarely hear any good news so I thought I'd share something positive.

Recently did a cam swap on my AMC 360 (I know it's not a Pontiac but it still applies) and everything went fine.

Here's what I used:
-NOS Erson cam (tq20 grind)
-New Hylift Johnson lifters that I sent to delta cams to get their oil notch mod (it's a buck a lifter) and it's similar to crower cam saver lifters but the notch doesn't go all the way down to help with oil pressure
-Isky Revlube on cam and lifters
-Lucas 30w Break in oil filled with extra 1.5 qts
-stock springs for break in (they clear with cam specs)
-varying rpm between 2200-2500 every few minutes and a few blips of throttle in between

I was almost positive that with all the horror stories I'd have to pull it and deal with a flat cam but I was pleasantly surprised.

Just thought I would share some good news on the cam front.

I think a good percentage of the failures stem from too much cranking before the engine stays running and not having the extra oil to really keep things well lubed.

Congratulations.... Good job!

Not all flat tappets that fail do it on break in. Sometimes it takes a little while ,,, I’ve seen it.

I've done a few flat tappets recently, and all have been fine. As with everything, people will only post negative results.

While true that camshaft and lifter quality has fallen, they're not all spontaneously imploding.

Yeah I've learned that actually from reading your posts. I also primed the oil system for a while before installing the distributor. I tried very hard to keep the rotations to a minimum before starting it.

Very true, running vr1 20w50 in it now. I'll keep an eye on things.

That's why I figured I'd post a out it because you only hear the bad.

Mine was easy too